standard deviations

Colleges and Universities A-Z Cornell University
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<p>So I'm wondering around how many standard deviations above the mean (in large intro science classes) does one need to score to have a 90+. From what I've read its around 1 std devn?</p>

2

<p>anyone ???</p>

3

<p>It depends entirely on the curve and the individual professor?</p>

<p>Some classes are curved to B means, others B+ or B-, others A-, Some C/C+</p>

4

<p>90+ doesn’t signify anything. if everyone got a 90+ then you could have a 93% and still be below the mean.</p>

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<p>alright i guess i’ll be more specific. curved to a B-. and yes not 90+ raw but 90 as a final grade after curving. lets say the mean is probably around a high 60 to low 70 and im getting around a low to mid 80.</p>

6

<p>curving doesn’t change your grade, it just affects whether low-to-mid 80 will show up in a letter grade as an A or B or whatever else. you don’t get final grades reported in numbers, except to translate the A or B or whatever else to the 4.0 grading scale.
if the mean is, say 70, and the standard deviation is 10, and you got a low-to-mid 80 I bet you’d have about an A- or an A.</p>

7

<p>if mean is 50. sd is 20, an A would be about a 80.</p>

<p>i scored in the 90s for bio 101 which is no longer here, but the mean was about a 67-70. forgot the SD but i got a A</p>

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<p>so a little over 1 std devn above the mean probably puts you at A- or above?</p>

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<p>1 sd is about A- for most science curved classes. some professors may even give you A for that. but for the b- mean ones, 1.5 SD is about A</p>

10

<p>alright. thanks. just a little nervous heading into my first bio prelim tm night</p>

11

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<p>That’s why you’re worried about the standard deviation and not the material you should be studying…</p>

<p>Some Cornell students, I’m telling ya…</p>