Information Pertaining to Homework
Information about the HW Component of Course Grade
Rather than have 6 HW assignments, and count your best 5 of the 6, like
I do for some of the other classes that I teach, I will make the
problems assigned throughout the semester worth various amounts of
points, and just keep track of your cumulative points earned.
In order to make some allowance for illness, work-related travel,
canine urination, etc.,
that may make it hard for you to turn in a good solution to each
problem, at the end of the semester I'll compute the HW component of
your course grade as described below:
letting m be the sum of all of the point values for the problems
assigned throughout the semester,
and y be the sum of all of the points that you earn (your
cumulative total),
the number of HW points you receive (out
of a maximum of 50, since HW is worth 50%) will be
50*min{y, 0.9*m}/(0.9*m) = min{500*y/(9*m), 50}
(and so you can miss up to 10% of the points, and still get a perfect 50
... and extra credit points will count toward the numerator sum
(y), but not the denominator sum (m)).
At this point in time, I don't know how many HW problems, or HW points,
there will be this semester. But I'll guess that there will be more
homework points in the second half of the semester than the first
half.
Late HW Policy
Most problems will be due about 2 weeks after they are assigned so that you
will have ample opportunity to ask questions about the material and do
the problems. (Some weeks I may not get the new assignment posted on Thursday, but will instead post it on Friday or
Saturday. If I don't post the new problems until Saturday, then that will be 12 days (instead of 2 full weeks) prior to
the nominal due date. But it will still be more than 2 weeks prior to the end of the grace period.)
If you don't have the problems ready to turn in on the
Thursday that they are due, I will accept them up until 7:30 PM on the
following Monday, and will grade them after that only if I haven't
graded the papers of the other students (but I expect that most weeks I
will be at GMU on Monday nights and will start grading the papers before
going home).
When dropping off late HW papers, or anything
else, the best thing to do is to put them under my office door
(Room 25 of the
Central Module). But sometimes at night or on the weekend, the
doors to the Central Module may be locked, and you can't get to my
office door. In such cases, you can try to put them in my department
mail box in Room 158 of
Science and Technology Building 2. (Note: My office is quite
a distance from the main office of my department.) But at night and on
the weekend, you may not be able to get to my department mailbox because
of locked doors, and in such a case you can put the papers under the
main glass door to Room 158 of Sci-Tech 2.
(Do not put papers under the glass
door in the little hallway that goes by the entrance to one of the
computing labs.) Whether you fax your paper, leave it for me under
my office door, or leave it for me in Sci-Tech 2,
send me an e-mail indicating that you turned in your
paper late (with late meaning that you did not turn it in at the
classroom on the nominal due date).
If you fax your paper, or drop it off, and for whatever reason I don't
get it, then I won't give you any credit. So the best plan will be to
always turn in your paper to me in the classroom on the Thursday that
it is due (but it is usually safe for you to put your paper under my
office door --- I don't know of any instances when students have done so
and I didn't get the paper).
Other Comments about HW
- Never e-mail me your solutions ---
I want a paper copy that I can carry around and grade.
- Please turn in neat and orderly papers, always
stapling papers
together with the problems in order (e.g., Problem 2 before Problem 3,
part (a) of Problem 3 before part (b) of Problem 3).
- Don't give me a lot of SPSS output, especially if it is attached as an appendix of sorts to the rest of your solution.
(A good way to give SPSS output is to cut-and-paste the pertinent part of the output very near the final answer that it contributed to.
For example, if you use SPSS to obtain a confidence interval, either cut out the appropriate part of the output and tape it on your
solution pages, and then write the properly rounded interval estimate right after this, drawing a box around or highlighting this final
answer. Or, insert a whole page of SPSS output into your homework solutions, at the proper place, and write the final answer, properly identified, on that
same sheet.)
If you use SPSS to get an answer, and you make sure that you identify the right number from the SPSS output and use it to write
down the final answer on your HW submission, then I don't need to see the SPSS output. But if you worry about getting partial credit
in case your final answer is wrong, it's okay to include the pertinent part of the SPSS output (as long as it is inserted into your HW
solutions in the proper place).
For answers obtained not using SPSS, generally some supporting work should be shown
(unless no real work was needed to obtain the
answer). Correct answers may earn less than full credit if adequate supporting work is not given!
- Clearly indicate what your final answers are
by highlighing them and/or drawing a box around them.
- Round exact p-values to 2 or 3 significant digits, but never give
more than two significant digits for an approximate p-value.
(The following numbers show 2 significant digits:
0.12, 0.029, 0.030, 0.0041.)
-
Round estimates and confidence bounds to avoid expressing unwarrented precision.
(A good rule of thumb is to compute the estimated standard error of the sample mean
and round to the place indicated by the 2nd significant digit. (It helps to know what a significant digit is.)
If the individual data values were recorded with less accuracy than this, I may round one place further.)
- Report confidence intervals (aka interval estimates) as intervals!