Hmm, I’m in Sulikowski’s section this semester and apparently her averages are higher, as her grading scale is the standard one (ie 90+ is A-/A)
Personally I’ve always liked less concepts, more problem solving (like what you would see in a physics or calc class) because I’ve always found practice problems to be more engaging than memorization.
I’m curious about the one “bad” exam as well, as in are these used to set the curve (intentional) or could it just be that the class is caught off guard after the initial exams seemed easier (assuming the earlier topics are the easiest)
@Pancaked : I’ll PM you our exams and show you a gradient from what I consider easy to hard. They’ll all be organic chemistry 2 exams since that may be the freshest and is typically associated with memorization. Our sections are so all over the place in terms of style and difficulty such that you can tell clear differences in which ones are mostly memorization/basic synthesis and which are more “problem solving/analysis” based (usually the latter instructors will have a small to 1/2 of the problems be the lower levels and then 1/2 or more the latter). Some students view synthesis as memorization and do them much like general chemistry problems…algorithmic. It usually depends on the difficulty of the synthesis and how many steps it takes to get to the product.
@Suffer : No, sometimes the instructor will actually change the distribution of the question types and it will change the mean dramatically. Often they don’t have to curve if their averages are already high.