Is It Fair for Some Students to Get Extra Time on Exams?

[Sorry!]

This is simply bizarre. I honestly can't understand why anybody would care if the teacher wants to give people a few extra minutes. (I agree, however, that cutting into a student's next class is unfair.) I also can't understand what's so hard about looking at the teacher, listening to him/her, and judging whether it's OK to continue writing. There has never been a problem in my high school; the teachers always made it obvious whether extra time was allowed.

This isn't high school it's university. When you spend upwards of 10k a year for a program which getting into second year is competitive then come back here.

 

[physics girl phd]

So far, all the teachers I have taken that don't use standard tests have told me that they determine the length of test by taking the test themselves. They work out the problems using the methods they have taught you and then calculate the amount of time they think it would take the average student to take the same test based on past experience.

My rule... If I can take the test in 15 minutes, my students can probably finish in an hour and 15 (and like Moonbear says, the good ones can usually finish earlier). I'd still have students that wanted to stay over, but I announce every minute for the last 3 minutes and do take it from them if they aren't done (My large classes are also helped by the fact that another class come in right after). This is more for my sanity though... I administer my own tests and I don't want to stay late.

My latest stoke of brilliance was also letting my EM students pick 3 of 4 problems for the midterms and 5 of 6 for the final (this saves them from playing and playing with that one they just can't seem to get, which is usually the easiest if they know the tricks of the trade).

 

[DanP]

This is simply bizarre. I honestly can't understand why anybody would care if the teacher wants to give people a few extra minutes. (I agree, however, that cutting into a student's next class is unfair.) I also can't understand what's so hard about looking at the teacher, listening to him/her, and judging whether it's OK to continue writing. There has never been a problem in my high school; the teachers always made it obvious whether extra time was allowed.

1. Money. When you enroll in a university undergrad program, you buy a product. You expect it delivered, fair and square.

2. Since results of a test can be used to determine whatever you can be or not part of a certain program, it is a competition. Allowing more time to some students, in a discretionary manner, while others already had already presented their work in the allocated time, constitutes direct corruption of competition results.

 

[BobG]

This isn't high school it's university. When you spend upwards of 10k a year for a program which getting into second year is competitive then come back here.

2. Since results of a test can be used to determine whatever you can be or not part of a certain program, it is a competition. Allowing more time to some students, in a discretionary manner, while others already had already presented their work in the allocated time, constitutes direct corruption of competition results.

This suggests that individual instructors of any course that will be part of a competition to advance further into a degree shouldn't be allowed to create their own tests. The competitive advantage of a few students in a class being allowed a few extra minutes pales in comparison to entire classes taking tests of different difficulty levels.

Even with the university providing standardized tests that all instructors have to use, you'll never have a truly fair competition. Some instructors just teach better than others. I doubt the necessary information is ever available to students except via anecdotal information, but the best way to improve your odds of advancing into a program is to find out which instructor has the most students advance - and I guarantee there will be some big differences. The problem with the anecdotal info is that it isn't enough to just find out who gives out more good grades - you also have to be able to figure out how an instructor's students do in their next class that uses that instructor's class as a prerequisite.

In fact, if you're ever tempted to start forking out money to "cheat" the system, you'd be a lot better off bribing someone in the admin office to give you access to the database of student records than paying someone for a copy of a test. Having some measurable standard to help you decide which instructor you want for a given class is pretty valuable.

Unfortunately, a little luck is always going to come in play since a student just won't have that info. In the case of the borderline students close to the cut-off, a lot of luck winds up coming into play. A student's only defense is to be smart enough (luck in itself) and to put in the work necessary to put them well above the variations in instructors.

 

[Sorry!]

This suggests that individual instructors of any course that will be part of a competition to advance further into a degree shouldn't be allowed to create their own tests. The competitive advantage of a few students in a class being allowed a few extra minutes pales in comparison to entire classes taking tests of different difficulty levels.

Even with the university providing standardized tests that all instructors have to use, you'll never have a truly fair competition. Some instructors just teach better than others. I doubt the necessary information is ever available to students except via anecdotal information, but the best way to improve your odds of advancing into a program is to find out which instructor has the most students advance - and I guarantee there will be some big differences. The problem with the anecdotal info is that it isn't enough to just find out who gives out more good grades - you also have to be able to figure out how an instructor's students do in their next class that uses that instructor's class as a prerequisite.

In fact, if you're ever tempted to start forking out money to "cheat" the system, you'd be a lot better off bribing someone in the admin office to give you access to the database of student records than paying someone for a copy of a test. Having some measurable standard to help you decide which instructor you want for a given class is pretty valuable.

Unfortunately, a little luck is always going to come in play since a student just won't have that info. In the case of the borderline students close to the cut-off, a lot of luck winds up coming into play. A student's only defense is to be smart enough (luck in itself) and to put in the work necessary to put them well above the variations in instructors.

This is all stuff YOU control. It's your duty before choosing your classes to find out which prof. is the best at teaching and the most involved with helping students. It's also your duty to make friends who can help you through previous classes.

 

[BobG]

This is all stuff YOU control. It's your duty before choosing your classes to find out which prof. is the best at teaching and the most involved with helping students. It's also your duty to make friends who can help you through previous classes.

Isn't it your duty then to find out which instructors never enforce their own time requirements? What makes you so sure you'll never be in a situation where 10 extra minutes gives you time to go back and figure out that one problem that had you stumped?

Yes, it's unfair that some of the students in your class will get an advantage over you personally, but it's advantageously unfair if your instructor is the only instructor teaching that class that does so and you wind up needing that extra 10 minutes. You (and the rest of the students in your class) have at least a potential advantage over the rest of the students in your university even if only a few will capitalize on it.

And what does the poor person that's ugly and has no friends do? Life is pretty much unfair to him in general. He gets no dates, he probably gets served last, not only will very few people smile at him, but they'll actually avoid making eye contact. And, on top of all that, no one will want to help him with his classes.

 

[DanP]

Isn't it your duty then to find out which instructors never enforce their own time requirements? What makes you so sure you'll never be in a situation where 10 extra minutes gives you time to go back and figure out that one problem that had you stumped?

Yes, it's unfair that some of the students in your class will get an advantage over you personally, but it's advantageously unfair if your instructor is the only instructor teaching that class that does so and you wind up needing that extra 10 minutes. You (and the rest of the students in your class) have at least a potential advantage over the rest of the students in your university even if only a few will capitalize on it.

And what does the poor person that's ugly and has no friends do? Life is pretty much unfair to him in general. He gets no dates, he probably gets served last, not only will very few people smile at him, but they'll actually avoid making eye contact. And, on top of all that, no one will want to help him with his classes.

This is an excellent and through line of thought, but here is my "applied theory":

1. I have an outcome goal. Let's simply say it for now is "winning". Although not apparent
at the first sight, you have very little control over this outcome goal. You compete against other highly motivated individuals, which train maybe at least as well as you, which may have a better coach . They also can be more genetically gifted. You can do almost nothing (unless your name is Tonya Harding) to influence this. Keep the goal, but don't dwell on facts on which you don't have control.

2. You have process goals. Those are totally within your control. I.e you can train harder, you can learn more, you can help nature with a lot of work if you are less gifted genetically (within reason). Basically, all the factors over which *you* have control.

Now the sensible thing to do is to worry less about things you can't control, and act upon the variables you can change to maximize the chances. In the issue of this thread for example, I have very little control about university policy when multiple instructors teach different courses, or different instructors evaluate test results. But I have control about
acting or not acting when someone does something in my face. In this case, letting some of the individuals from my group compete for longer.

The bottom idea is to recognize variables on which you have control over and variables on which you don't. It's wasted time to try to change variables you can't control, time which is too valuable to be diverted from process goals. In hindsight, I believe its common sense.

 

[BobG]

Sure, but if for a educator balancing coursework and tests is "out of his realm of experience", his place is not in a university. Maybe the individual in question should seek employment at a private funded research institute , where he can focus on research and work with a insanely narrow group of overachievers.

My latest stoke of brilliance was also letting my EM students pick 3 of 4 problems for the midterms and 5 of 6 for the final (this saves them from playing and playing with that one they just can't seem to get, which is usually the easiest if they know the tricks of the trade).

Mistakes in creating tests are easy to make.

In physics girl's case, her students take 4 different tests on a midterm, yet their scores are all compared as if they took the same test. For the final, students take 6 different tests, yet have their scores compared to each other.

Worse, while her test may adequately cover the course objectives, none of the students are tested on all of the course objectives unless the course objectives can be tested by a single question, in which case it doesn't matter which questions the student chooses to answer.

In essence, optional questions mean a student needs to know 75% or 83% of the material and the student gets to choose which 75% or 83% they want to learn. Optional questions mean only the results of students making the same choices can be directly compared to each other.

By the way, it's an overstatement to say optional questions are a "mistake". Most handbooks on test creation recommend against it, but that's a general recommendation. You can take recommendations for what you think they're worth. For example, if one can make sure the questions are of equal difficulty, then comparing students taking different tests isn't going to be as big an issue on physics problems as it would essay questions for a history class, since essay questions almost always require some subjectivity. (For example, is it more advantageous or is more disadvantageous to answer the instructor's favorite question?)

(In fact, one of factors that can influence essay grades is whether it's one of the first graded or last graded. Seeing how the tests are being stacked can influence whether the student wants to be the first one done or the last one done. i.e - cheating by just 2 or 3 minutes could be a definite advantage on an essay question).

 

[lawtonfogle]

This is all stuff YOU control. It's your duty before choosing your classes to find out which prof. is the best at teaching and the most involved with helping students. It's also your duty to make friends who can help you through previous classes.

Yes a student should check, but the end result is still corrupted. Do I hire student A who made an A in easy math or student B who made a B in hard math (both of them being the same class, but with teachers of two different teaching levels). A university should not allow for the difference in teaching/testing between two of the same classes grow to the point where the expected grade letter grade for some level of knowledge is different. Otherwise the results for the GPA from this class becomes corrupted (slightly, not fully of course).

 

[BobG]

Speaking of tests, here's a fun one. You should be able to score a 100% on this. The test is in English, even if you're not familiar with some of the technical terms.

1) The primary advantage of the adzontial clev is:
a) elomulation
b) sidrathion
c) musticulation
d) ancharition

2) Noficariating a druxmential clev causes a:
a) bifulations
b) bendolation
c) efscolation
d) elomulation

3) Stolitization of the endacrinatial clev:
a) does nothing
b) elomulates
c) causes the trachnicol to cortinate into strachinilate
d) polesis

4) Characteristics of the bruchinactial clev include:
a) sidrathion
b) efscolation
c) locumulation
d) all of the above

5) Strachinilate is most often the result of:
a) stolitization
b) sidrathion
c) locumulation
d) ectagulation

6) Bruchinactial clevs:
a) providing fulmation to reminify.
b) require stilagulation to reminify.
c) yields enginati.
d) efscolation

7) Polementaric clevs:
a) always decays into delvisia alamente
b) never decay into andale crenitente
c) decay into andale crenitente
d) none of the above
d) all of the above

8)
a)
b)
c)
d)

 

[lawtonfogle]

Mistakes in creating tests are easy to make.

In physics girl's case, her students take 4 different tests on a midterm, yet their scores are all compared as if they took the same test. For the final, students take 6 different tests, yet have their scores compared to each other.

Worse, while her test may adequately cover the course objectives, none of the students are tested on all of the course objectives unless the course objectives can be tested by a single question, in which case it doesn't matter which questions the student chooses to answer.

In essence, optional questions mean a student needs to know 75% or 83% of the material and the student gets to choose which 75% or 83% they want to learn. Optional questions mean only the results of students making the same choices can be directly compared to each other.

I don't remember the last time I had a test that covered 100% of the material in class. The very thought scares me, some classes such a test would take hours and a final would take half a day or longer.

By the way, it's an overstatement to say optional questions are a "mistake". Most handbooks on test creation recommend against it, but that's a general recommendation. You can take recommendations for what you think they're worth. For example, if one can make sure the questions are of equal difficulty, then comparing students taking different tests isn't going to be as big an issue on physics problems as it would essay questions for a history class, since essay questions almost always require some subjectivity. (For example, is it more advantageous or is more disadvantageous to answer the instructor's favorite question?)

(In fact, one of factors that can influence essay grades is whether it's one of the first graded or last graded. Seeing how the tests are being stacked can influence whether the student wants to be the first one done or the last one done. i.e - cheating by just 2 or 3 minutes could be a definite advantage on an essay question).

How about a more convoluted method I had for my computation theory class. We were given 3 choices from a number of sections, each one of varying difficulty. Each choice was worth points from 10 to 30 based on the varying difficulty (and there was a major amount of difference between some, one 30 was to write the proof that a Halting machine was Turning incomputable.

He then graded based on your total points divided by the largest number of points earned. He then converted this grade to the standard A,B,C... scale, but gave a +/- on each letter except D and F. He then converted this to the following scale.


250 A+
225 A
200 A
175 B+
150 B
125 B-
100 C+
075 C
050 C-
025 D
000 F

You got four such grades (two test, final, and one composing assignments and a paper. These were totaled to a scale from 0 to 1000. Your final grade was then assigned by the following scale:

1000 A+
0900 A
0800 A-
0700 B+
0600 B
0500 B-
0400 C+
0300 C
0200 C-
0100 D
0000 F

So if you get an A on your first test, you are guaranteed a C in the class. Except your highest grade can be no higher than the percent of classes you attended or had an excused absent for.

 

[Pattonias]

He then graded based on your total points divided by the largest number of points earned. He then converted this grade to the standard A,B,C... scale, but gave a +/- on each letter except D and F. He then converted this to the following scale.


250 A+
225 A
200 A
175 B+
You got four such grades (two test, final, and one composing assignments and a paper. These were totaled to a scale from 0 to 1000. Your final grade was then assigned by the following scale:

1000 A+
0900 A
0800 A-
0700 B+
So if you get an A on your first test, you are guaranteed a C in the class. Except your highest grade can be no higher than the percent of classes you attended or had an excused absent for.

Wow, that professor was into some serious personal abuse. I wouldn't want to be his TA.

 

[BobG]

I don't remember the last time I had a test that covered 100% of the material in class. The very thought scares me, some classes such a test would take hours and a final would take half a day or longer.


How about a more convoluted method I had for my computation theory class. We were given 3 choices from a number of sections, each one of varying difficulty. Each choice was worth points from 10 to 30 based on the varying difficulty (and there was a major amount of difference between some, one 30 was to write the proof that a Halting machine was Turning incomputable.

He then graded based on your total points divided by the largest number of points earned. He then converted this grade to the standard A,B,C... scale, but gave a +/- on each letter except D and F. He then converted this to the following scale.


250 A+
225 A
200 A
175 B+
150 B
125 B-
100 C+
075 C
050 C-
025 D
000 F

You got four such grades (two test, final, and one composing assignments and a paper. These were totaled to a scale from 0 to 1000. Your final grade was then assigned by the following scale:

1000 A+
0900 A
0800 A-
0700 B+
0600 B
0500 B-
0400 C+
0300 C
0200 C-
0100 D
0000 F

So if you get an A on your first test, you are guaranteed a C in the class. Except your highest grade can be no higher than the percent of classes you attended or had an excused absent for.

Did you still get credit for attendance if you were drunk? Just saying, if you can ace the first two tests, who cares about the rest of the course. Well, aside from you guys that have some strange compulsion to excel. Us slackers are going to par..tay, bab..eee!

 

[lawtonfogle]

Did you still get credit for attendance if you were drunk? Just saying, if you can ace the first two tests, who cares about the rest of the course. Well, aside from you guys that have some strange compulsion to excel. Us slackers are going to par..tay, bab..eee!

Hmm... I thought his test were great in a puzzle solving way. I went in and tried to score the highest I could on the exam even though technically I could have failed it and gotten the A. The thing was, he was 80+ years old, and one of the best most lively professors I have ever had. He really taught the material.

As for being drunk, some times he would go on a tangent and explain things that normally he saved for his grad level version of the class, in which case being drunk might help you actually understand what he was saying. Then again, sometimes those were the best days, the times I actually understood what he was saying.

 

[dotman]

Now the sensible thing to do is to worry less about things you can't control, and act upon the variables you can ... I have very little control about university policy when multiple instructors teach different courses, or different instructors evaluate test results. But I have control about acting or not acting when someone does something in my face. In this case, letting some of the individuals from my group compete for longer.

The bottom idea is to recognize variables on which you have control over and variables on which you don't.

Yeah, but this is where you're mistaken. You don't actually have any control over the last part either. If the professor chooses to give time, you're naive in thinking you can stop them. Especially in the OPs case, going to a professor and complaining about it after the fact only serves to tick off the professor, since there's very little action they can take at that point. You can act or not act, but its not going to have an effect on the outcome.

You fight the battles that need fighting. You fight the battles you can win. This is neither.

 

[Sorry!]

Yeah, but this is where you're mistaken. You don't actually have any control over the last part either. If the professor chooses to give time, you're naive in thinking you can stop them. Especially in the OPs case, going to a professor and complaining about it after the fact only serves to tick off the professor, since there's very little action they can take at that point. You can act or not act, but its not going to have an effect on the outcome.

You fight the battles that need fighting. You fight the battles you can win. This is neither.

The OP never said the prof. said it was acceptable to take extra time that is why going to talk to the prof. is the best way... of course if they say extra time is ok then by all means use it but don't just use it because other people are.

This has been what I've been saying the entireeee time lol.

 

[DanP]

Yeah, but this is where you're mistaken. You don't actually have any control over the last part either. If the professor chooses to give time, you're naive in thinking you can stop them. Especially in the OPs case, going to a professor and complaining about it after the fact only serves to tick off the professor, since there's very little action they can take at that point. You can act or not act, but its not going to have an effect on the outcome.

During the last 20 years I seen ppl doing a lot of crazy stuff and getting away with it.

Back home in Romania, I had an acquittance which used to blog about the incompetence of his cell biology instructor and in general about the quality of instruction at the faculty he was in. You can imagine the faculty wasn't very happy when they seen his opinions floating on internet. Nevertheless, there wasn't too much they could do about it. As far as I know, he later applied and was admitted to one of the top USA universities, abandoning his studies home. I guess the faculty was very happy to see him gone. He was trouble.

I don't recommend to anyone to do this, it's something very personal and perhaps case dependent if you want to open your mouth or keep it shut.

My personal opinion is that ppl do in general take too much "abuse" , and too many developed in fat depressed ball-less wimps. ( This affirmation is general in nature, and has nothing to do with anyone involved in this thread)

 

[General_Sax]

I definately could've used 5 more minutes, as I forgot to completely answer 2 questions. I still beat the class average, but I could've doen a lot better with 5 more minutes.

 

[BobG]

Hmm... I thought his test were great in a puzzle solving way. I went in and tried to score the highest I could on the exam even though technically I could have failed it and gotten the A. The thing was, he was 80+ years old, and one of the best most lively professors I have ever had. He really taught the material.

I always loved "puzzle solving" tests. Many instructors accidentally do this. When they intentionally do this, it's even better. An ability to solve puzzles can make up for a lot of "forgetting to study". I wouldn't recommend the "forgetting to study" part, though, but one of my proudest "dubious achievements" was getting a 'C' on a essay about a short story that I had to write solely from the T/F and multiple choice questions because I "forgot" to read the story. (Okay, I didn't forget - it looked like a stupid "chic" story and what were the odds that would be the story we'd have to write the essay on?)

 

[Bourbaki1123]

Well if it's a guideline, it's a guideline. If it's a rule, it's a rule. If you find out that it's a guideline instead of a rule, then you're not breaking the rule when you defy it.

Doesn't seem like they strictly enforce driving a few MPH over the speed limit, but then you'll find out one day that they do and regret it. I have two friends who found that out. One got pulled over once for going 5 MPH over and once for going 6 MPH over, the other got pulled over for going 7 MPH over.

You may think you can bend a rule, but then you'll regret it when you get caught.

Yeah, but how much time did they save over all the years of driving slightly over the speed limit? Probably more than they spent on the side of the road because they got unlucky and there was a cop having a bad day (and make no mistake, the only reason a cop will pull you over for going 5 MPH past the limit is to go power tripping when he's having a bad day, I mean; you really think he cares about the speeding?). I guess they could have gotten a fine depending on what state/city they were in, oh well, to him time may be worth more than a little money (if not, he did a poor job with his risk/benefit analysis).

I think in general you should be able to make a rational decision and make a reasonable risk analysis. If there is some malum prohibitum rule you will gain a lot by breaking and it doesn't run against your moral standards to do so, why wouldn't you do it? I guess if you have some kind of goofy (usually contradictory when compared against other moral standards held by the person, easily refuted by a simple reductio ad absurdum argument) moral standard that 'breaking the rules is wrong', then oh well, you have an ineffective worldview that will make life harder for you. If you can break a rule and are reasonably sure you can get away with it, live with the consequences (this is a key point, for most people this weeds out malum ensae rules/laws such as 'don't murder etc.') and will gain by doing so; I think most rational people who are not confused will do so.