Is There A Prize For Who Says Please The Most?

Memo 011 just came out, barking orders for the uniform final and for end of the year activities.  Every paragraph starts with the word please but the tone is Hitlerike all the way.

Term after term we have all pointed out the folly of uniform midterm and final exams when the same exam, or two slightly different versions of it are being given all day long.  By 4th period, the kids have the exam in advance and I've seen countless students put down answers without even reading the questions.  Sure there are cell phone restrictions and calculators are supposedly cleared but since the beginning of time kids have found a way to beat the system and the system at Packemin is very easy to beat.  And, to top it off, the overworked teachers often use exams from previous years, and questions from an exam generating program, questions they have done many times in class.

Mr. AP likes things his way. Even though his way is not an academically sound way, he never changes.  And, why shoud he, he gets away with this time after time after time.

Here is memo 011.  Why should the math department of Packemin be the only ones to feel the love.

January 3, 2012 Welcome back and happy New Year!

 If you are a grade leader, please make sure you communicate with every teacher teaching the course before you make up the final exam.  It is impossible to change the final.  Please submit all copies to me on or before January 11, 2012. 

Please make sure you use proper headings.  Part II should be 40 points and Part I should be 60 points.  Please make sure there are at least two versions of each final. Please make sure there are instructions going on at all times.  No parties should be held during a math class. I suggest you give a multiple-choice exam on the last day of this term.  You can substitute one low grade with that exam grade if it is higher.  Unless you are teaching a class that terminates in the Regents exam, trying to teach the last day is going to be very difficult. 

If you are teaching ME41, ME21, ME43, MG21/R/H or MR21/r/h, you must give a grade at the end of the term.  If you are teaching an elective, you have the option of NC or CR.  Please discuss with your individual students how you intend to grade them. Too many of the students in electives have come to me with great concerns.  Please address their concerns with them instead of sending them to see me or take no actions. 

Please be advised that Regents tutoring hours have been extended for Algebra and Geometry.  Please let your students know. 

Please make sure you communicate with the parents of the students who are failing your class.  We still have one more exam and the mid-term exam to hopefully bail them out.  Let the parent know how their child can correct the situation and that we will never give up on their child (some of them might have). 

Thank you very much and have a great week.

Uniform Final Exams



Uniform final exams (bitched about here, here and here) are a big deal in my department.  My AP keeps them under lock and key and demands that every paper be accounted for.  He expects there to be a strong correlation between grades in the class and marks on these exams.  Last year, kids who had no teacher for three months were passed based on this exam.

Today the student I have been tutoring on a daily basis (not my student) came to me for help with one problem that he said might be on his final.  Of course I helped him.  I've been helping him for weeks. Well, guess what?  The question he asked me was a problem on the exam he took the following period.  His friend gave him the example.  (I'm not teaching that course so I had no idea what was on that exam.)

Uniformity is a good idea but trying to have uniform exams over a 12 period day, with only two different forms of the exam available is ludicrous.  These exams are valueless.  The kids who passed last year passed knowing nothing but how to get by on an exam.

Uniformity Impossible



No matter how hard anyone tries, it is impossible for an exam to be secure when the same or a similar exam is given different periods all day long.  It is impossible to count the number of times kids have walked into my classroom and asked me how to do questions that are on the exam they are about to take.

I understand the need for some sort of uniformity in grading and testing but giving the same exam over a 12 period span of time is ludicrous and to insist this exam count more than any other exam is even more ridiculous.

The college solves this problem by giving every teacher a broad outline and sample questions to follow and then allows them to create their own exam, an exam that must be approved by the department.  Yes, it involves more work but it is a more valid exam. 

Math, as far as I know, is the only department in the school that insists on giving the same exam all day long.  The math teachers are bright and competent.  Surely they are capable of making up their own exam for their own students.