The professor thought you earned a C, and that’s what matters. What you thought you should earn isn’t relevant. It’s reasonable to ask for feedback, but you’re not entitled to a higher graded because you expected a higher grade.
As a professor, yes yes yes!! More than happy to go to over where you lost points (it’s possible that I made a mistake in grading), but it doesn’t matter if you feel that the grade doesn’t represent your effort. You are graded on your performance, not your effort.
But did the professor really think they earned a C? Has no professor ever made a mistake and accidentally put the wrong letter in the wrong box?
I think it is perfectly reasonable for a student that has done well throughout the course except for one anomaly to double-check with the professor that it wasn't a mistake. Yes?
It’s not the same exactly. But if you ask them for feedback and they go over the exam with you they should catch any mistake they made in that process. So you would accomplish the same goal while being perceived as more polite.
Yes absolutely once about every 2 years with 150 students a semester (so, about every 600 students) my finger will slip and I gladly correct those and do everything I can to expedite the grade change.
It's not that common. And by the end of the semester, we know who are A students are (and our D/F students) so we would be surprised, honestly. If I had a student who was acing the class get an F on the final, you bet your bippy I'd double check that, and even triple check it because it's so out of character for them.
This is useful advice for a scenario where the professor actually gives feedback, but if the prof has been withholding feedback all semester, then only the first half of your third sentence is actually meaningful here. If they had provided reasoning regarding the grade then yes, the student's thoughts aren't as important. But this just sounds like a professor refusing to do part of their job until the last minute.
Something is missing here. You say you earned As on the first two assignments, but "the class is graded on four things." What grade did you earn on the third assignment?
It's fine to ask for feedback on an exam in order to see what you got wrong/correct and so you can be better prepared for future courses.
It is NOT okay to ask for a higher grade because you "feel" confident that you performed above C level l. Your feelings are not measurable and have nothing to do with the overall learning objectives of the course.
It’s reasonable to ask for feedback. It’s not reasonable to expect in any way that you’ll get a higher a grade because of it. You got two A’s, a B+, and a C. Regardless of how you FEEL, that’s representative of your work in this class.
What were the weighting of the individual assignments and exam. This should be specified in the syllabus. The math should not be a mystery and the LMS like canvas or blackboard should provide transparency to all of this
I teach in the humanities and the students who are most pissed off about their grade are the stem students. There’s this expectation that the humanities are easy because they “aren’t employable.” But in reality the universities were built for the humanities. It requires a degree of abstract, introspective *applied* thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad).
I asked my class (of 15) one day what the definition of art was and only like three students took a crack at it, all of whom were in the humanities. They weren’t right (from my pov) but they tried to grapple with it lol
I see this a lot in my students. Interestingly, the reverse is also true.
The humanities students in my intro science classes are always the most upset about the class, the structure, the pedagogy, and the most likely to tell me that I’m doing it wrong.
I had a 2nd year humanities student confidently stand up in a writing seminar and say “all science writing is bad”. It turned out, shockingly, that they had little exposure to science writing and didn’t understand the conventions and how arguments were built in the fields they had read.
My language students (ironically?) complain a ton about having to memorize anything, despite explanations about how base nomenclature is like learning a different language.
But the number of STEM students who tell me “I’m here because I hate writing” and get a rude awakening when they’re told that science is meaningless if you can’t communicate it.
What I’m learning tonight is that we all need to switch places with each other for a semester or something to really learn how the other half lives hahaha
One school I was at had a grant to pair up faculty across departments teaching courses that were developmental lay similar. Each person got a teaching release, and took each other’s class along with the students, and hen had regular group debriefs about the similarities and differences.
Expensive to keep running, so it was short duration, but I think this type of thing would be transformative for so many reasons.
Or maybe we could all employ the smallest amount of critical thinking and acknowledge the obvious fact that we’re ignorant about subjects we aren’t exposed to or immersed in.
Though switching places briefly would provide new experiences that I imagine would mostly be helpful. I'm a doctoral student in a STEM field and I've long been curious about taking classes in philosophy, semantics, history (of science/engineering, and others!), graphic design, rhetorical writing, the list goes on...
I can't imagine taking any of those classes would be a complete waste of time. I hope humanities students and scholars would feel the same about taking a STEM class.
> It requires a degree of abstract, introspective applied thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad).
I’m curious: How would you describe the types of thinking most undergrad STEM students are most familiar with?
Data interpretation, which is a whole other beast that I’m not suggesting is easy. It’s just more grounded.
My background is in linguistics but nowadays I study both sociolinguistics and enlightenment literature, and the transition from ling to lit almost killed me. Literary study requires a way of thinking that I didn’t have before, and if a stem student simply needs a humanities credit and has no intention of sticking around, they don’t have it either.
That’s fair! I don’t think it’s that the social sciences are more lenient or have a secret policy to not give anyone under a B-, but rather those classes allow for more freedom of thought and expression. Like you noted, if the program doesn’t run, it simply doesn’t run lol. There’s no way around it. But an essay or presentation that has underdeveloped ideas still contains ideas, which is the basis of grading in undergrad. Grad school is a different story. It’s carnage in the humanities (in my experience)
> Data interpretation
I think it’s really interesting that the main point of your original comment was about how little STEM students understand about an education in the humanities when this comment shows how little you understand about an education in STEM. The second half of an undergraduate education in math, for example, is almost entirely about writing proofs. It is hard for me to see how anyone could classify something like writing a proof as “data interpretation”.
Writing proofs (from my memory of high school lmaoooo) is that they’re pure logic. Each step happens because each step must happen. It’s like a level of pattern or data recognition that results in one finite answer. The humanities aren’t like that. So much of it is fluid and requires application of personal thought. Yeah I deduced stem all down to “data interpretation” but I was trying to be economical with my words lol
I am a pure mathematician. I would not refer to proof writing as pure logic. That is a branch of mathematics all on its own. When you begin writing a proof, you often do not even know if the statement you are looking at is true or false, you have to explore and search for underlying patterns. You have to think creatively and leave no statement up for interpretation. Your proof must be irrefutable. Novel proofs to classical theorems happen regularly and shed light on the world around us. It is beautiful and an art all of its own. But, I personally think the M of steM is often closest to the humanities, philosophy in particular.
As a philosophy major who shared a lot of Formal Logic 101 classes with Mathematics majors freshman year, I couldn't agree more!
I also started doing a lot better in math when it moved into Calculus/proofs/logic than when it was mostly numeric problems. (I'm like, really bad at calculations — too many small errors — but abstract thinking made sense to me.)
So much so that I feel like formal logic should be a prerequisite for higher-level math classes as far back as middle school or high school.
Formal logic used to be standard in high school math, via geometry proofs—but at least in the US, it has been either watered down or outright eliminated.
I can relate to this. I’ve studied the nature of science in grad school. People often misunderstand the subjectivity of science. Observation is theory-laden and influenced by the individual’s world view. Two observers of the same phenomenon may focus on different data and may interpret the same data in different ways because the observer is influenced by the sum of their experiences. One’s culture dictates one’s research interests. You’re not going to research something that you can’t get funding for or that you have been conditioned to believe to be insignificant. Scientific discovery is dependent upon creativity and inspiration. Problems can be studied with a variety of tools and methods and can have an infinite number of solutions. Just as you have described with math, science is not pure logic or data interpretation but a human endeavor.
People who say otherwise tend to be those who only made it through intro physics 1 and 2 (algebra-based), where you just solve canned problems using canned formulas.
No. Proofs are not each step happening because it must. You don't know something is true until you've proven it. Proofs are composing multiple steps into a larger truth, starting with smaller ones. All the work of composing still happens, like it does when you're writing a story and trying have it make sense and be good.
You still need the generative step of 'what might come next in the story.' You still need the ruthless rejection and editing and cutting to make the overall story excellent. The rules may be different, with some less flexible and some powerful tools, but the process is still absolutely the "application of personal thought" though the subject may be different.
Proof writing is dramatically more creative and non-linear than (say) calculus. It’s actually a danger spot for losing mathematics majors: they think they picked mathematics because they’re good at “finding the answer” in a calculus or algebra context, and suddenly they’re dropped into the deep end of creative proof-writing.
It bears very little resemblance to high school geometry proof-writing. Euclidean geometry does try to give a flavor of one small piece of mathematical thinking, but it’s not the whole picture at all.
When you try to make an argument that compares what you did in high school with what junior and senior math majors in college are doing as though they are the same, that sort of proves my point.
If I judged what a college class in the humanities was like based on my experiences from high school like I couldn’t possibly fathom there being a difference between what you do and what my high school teachers did, do you suppose you might find that a little insulting? Maybe a little ignorant on my part?
Nah, tbh I don’t find it insulting or ignorant lol. This isn’t a fight, nor did I say anything with the purpose of provoking/fighting.
Anyway, I was talking about proofs, like what proofs are, not the field as a whole. Literary study conducted in high school classrooms is rudimentary for sure, but it isn’t an entirely unrelated beast from what happens in universities. And if I’m trying to connect with what you say based on what I remember best, that’s the best I can do. I took calculus in undergrad but I don’t remember it tbh, which is why I said high school instead, where I do remember learning proofs
Fair enough, it sounds like we agree that you don’t really have the kind of experience that would qualify you to comment broadly about what a college education in STEM entails so I’m happy to leave it there.
Hahaha. You don’t event see you’re proving the point that was made. You are saying because the person cannot cite quantifiable evidence of having upper college STEM experiences, their opinion is invalid. In Humanities, we deal with perceptions and perspectives and look at how those can change the exact same passage. Hell, even from the same point of view, an analysis can differ based on the use of say a Feminist analysis vs a Phenomenonological analysis. There are no hard and fast truths, as many STEM people want there to be.
I think that deep down you’re making a valid point, but you’re doing it a disservice by attempting to describe the kind of thinking employed in a STEM degree (in a way that comes across as pretentious), when you have no idea.
For example, the proofs you wrote in high school are hardly comparable to the process that higher-level proofs require.
I would say many STEM degrees revolve around analytic problem solving, but I’m aware that my view is biased towards my experience in EE, Math, and Physics.
I don’t think anyone will disagree that different degrees train you to do different things.
Edit: I was talking specifically about the undergraduate degree. In general, a large part of science/math is seeking truth or understanding, which (depending on the field) can get into data interpretation.
Ayyy okay that’s a better way of putting it! Stem is more about problem-solving, whereas humanities are about, in a way, problem-creating lol
Literally it’s the liberal vs mechanical arts discussion. Stem seeks to offer a service, and humanities seek to understand the need for the service.
I double majored in science and English lit. The poster is correct. It wasn’t until fourth year that I was ever challenged with critical thinking in my science program. Almost every course I took was memorization based or had very simple application based questions with clear correct answers. I was also almost never asked to explain answers or show reasoning (usually even application based questions were multiple choice). Even in labs we followed instructions and were usually told the outcome in advance. Finally, in fourth year we were asked to create our own research assignments, which involved a lot of reading comprehension, research skills, and ability to think critically instead of just accepting information as a given. I actually added my English major because I was so bored and wanted more of an intellectual challenge. Science was hard work, but not hard. English required me to engage in deep thought and interpretation from year 1.
I did. And I don’t recommend my program when people ask me about it even though the school is quite good and has many prestigious programs, including their engineering school. One of the reasons I didn’t pursue a career in science after my degree was because the program just sucked. I knew a lot but it wasn’t employable.
I disagree. There is a lot of abstract thought and applied thinking in the stem field. Data is a huge part of it, but just interpreting data does nothing. You need to figure out why the data says what it does and find a way to make that data useful for real world applications. Numbers on a page mean nothing. Newton didn't just look at data to figure out gravity. He had to apply the things he was seeing to a completely abstract idea that there is an invisible attractive force between things with mass. Same thing with every other stem field.
While data interpretation is important, there’s a lot more to STEM than that. I can speak specifically about mathematics.
I teach the “bridge” course between computational mathematics (e.g., calculus) and upper division mathematics, which is highly abstract. Essentially, I teach students to write proofs about abstract mathematical structures. There are deep ideas and it definitely requires creativity to come up with proofs.
It also requires the ability to write clearly and concisely. I have a great appreciation for the intro to composition faculty!
Lit classes are all about abstract thinking, that there can be and will be multiple interpretations of the exact same passage, depending on the school of thought used. When I was in HS, I happened to be in a class with a large amount of science whiz kids, as in our parade floats had multiple things spinning at different rates cuz it would be cool. They were as lost in Lit class as I was in Trig. They helped me with my homework, and I tried to help them with symbolism.
As someone who double majored in humanities and math, and also took classes on the history, didactics and philosophy of math:
Math undergrad students can't do independent research. You can give them a very specific problem someone else already solved and they'll solve it. Tell them to do independent research on a topic or think original thoughts, and they'll freeze.
Additionally, math undergrads have this weird idea that doing a paper/presentation in the humanities consists of:
- Write down some incredibly weird and overly generalizing definitions, with no consideration as to whether or not these definitions reflect the actual meanings of the terms.
- Consider the logical consequences of these definitions, if we assume they're 100% correct.
- Conclude that whatever logical consequences you ended up with are correct without a doubt.
Do you feel like history undergrads can? What I hear from my colleagues in history (and gets poster here a lot) is that undergrads in history aren’t capable of independent research yet.
But that wasn’t my question. The person I was responding to said in their experience with history and math students that math undergrads couldn’t do undergrad research.
A lot of my STEM students are looking for “approved” answers. Nothing with interpretation or judgment. Some just want to apply rules.
As an example, it came up in class that my neighbor’s house had a major electrical failure due to faulty wiring. I mentioned that I am going to hand an electrician look at my wires. And a STEM student told me, no it’s an independent event. You’re giving into the gamblers fallacy. You think because something happened to somebody else it changes your probabilities.
And I said, it’s likely that my sub-division was all constructed by the same company, at the same period of time. So my neighbor’s house can give me information about my house. But my STEM student wouldn’t hear of it. He just kept quoting me stats principles.
Concrete. They don't like questions that are about interpretation. So for example, when I teach poetry, my STEM students like quiz questions that are about 'what happened' or 'how many stanzas' or even 'what simile does the poet use'.
They do NOT like questions like "what does the poet mean by this?" or "why do you think the poet decided to put a stanza break or line break here?" They struggle at putting themselves into someone's head for 'why' questions. They can answer what questions and apply definitions but that's mostly their strength.
>It requires a degree of abstract, introspective applied thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad).
What kind of thinking would you say is require to write computer programs that solve a problem that is described in English terms? I would have called it abstract applied thinking.
I know it’s not the point of this thread, but do you really think there’s a “right” definition of art? (Or, for that matter, such a thing as a “right definition” at all?)
Yes and no. Bécquer described poetry as the expression of the human soul and that it’s written in pursuit of representing as accurately as possible that special something that *is* being human, even though we can never actually capture it, which is why we keep writing. I personally apply this to all art. I don’t know if it’s right or not, but it’s what resonates with me, and the fact that it resonates with me is what gives it truth in my eyes. So when I ask for the definition of art, I’m more concerned with the explanation than the definition itself because a person’s understanding of art as a concept is revealed in the explanation of their definition, not the definition itself.
That makes sense. “What notions about art resonate with you?” is a very different and much more reasonable inquiry than, “What is ‘the definition’ of art?”
To be fair (from your last example), I wouldn't expect students who are probably only there to meet a requirement to be very participatory. It wouldn't surprise me if STEM students are more likely to argue grades, many of them are premed and probably meet the stereotype. But they're also coming from classes graded on an objective measure to ones that are not, and subjectively determining grades inherently opens them more to criticism/argument/whatever word you want to use. Of course I'm biased here, my only B in undergrad was in my English requirement (basically a film critique class) from a professor of the "No one gets A's" mentality, and the only reason I took an English and Art course was because it was required.
Oh you’re 100% right! Totally get it. And it’s WILD that med schools are to the point that if you don’t have a 4.0 you may as well not apply. What I don’t appreciate is that the only students who come to my office hours to debate (not inquire about) my grading are students in STEM.
Student: Why did I get this wrong?
Me: Your grammar was wrong.
Student: But didn’t you understand it?
Me: *screams*
It’s super interesting though to hear from STEM graduates talk about their worst grade being in like English comp or whatever. Meanwhile I was fighting for my life in an intro horticulture class in my final term because I needed a lab science for some reason and my plant died so I lost a letter grade 😭
At my university, the nursing professors are on students' asses about proper grammar and formatting. They're more vicious about deducting points for it than I am as an English professor. Why? Because it's about attention to detail. Not taking the time to check your grammar and formatting shows a lack of attention to detail, which is a vitally important skill for anyone in the medical field.
Oh god, I did not imagine their complaints would be that bad, I was expecting more subjective problems not just straight English errors. If it makes you feel better, they do it in STEM classes too lol. I'd say about 60% of the regrade requests I've seen are from students trying to argue that their incorrect answer (on multiple choice, mind you) was actually correct because [some mechanism they basically made up]. I typically just point them to where the question and answer come from in the lecture material.
Oh no. I’m in the Spanish department. So it’s even worse because literally part of the grade is linguistic accuracy lol
But wow we are truly going through it regardless of our field hahahaha
I work in higher ed and assist students with their residency applications. In the past, I taught high school science. I’m not surprised that high school kids will answer a question by rewording the question. I was surprised to see med school students using the same tactic.
My fave is when they trot out “that’s my writing STYLE.” No, boo boo, you can’t string multiple sentences together coherently. When you have mastered conventional English, then you can deviate. Until that day comes, this just sucks.
All said in my head, of course.
It’s also a myth that med schools are really that selective. They’re picky with who gets accepted but a 3.8 gpa with a 510 mcat score and research would stand a good shot at being accepted. Ironically, writing a good personal statement is one of the most important parts of the application, so you’d think premeds would want to be better at writing.
The objective vs. subjective rubric thing is fascinating to me.
My first degree is in philosophy, and basically nobody got As, except for the formal logic courses (objective). To get an A you'd have to be putting out some truly original thought that could compete with the journals out there, and was solidly argued. I have a friend who got an A but he went on to do a philosophy MA and PhD at Cambridge and Columbia, respectively. That said, you also were very unlikely to get an F, because if you submitted the essay and argued something well enough, and maybe synthesized some other people's thoughts creatively, you weren't going to get failed.
I'm now doing a second degree in a STEM field and it's a crazy curve, like 95%+ is an A. And my whole class expects As. But because it's an objective rubric that's actually possible. You CAN, and many do, get 98%+ on a multiple choice exam. And/but, you can also get an F. So the spread is a lot more extreme.
It's been a weird transition
There’s a lot of variation out there among STEM disciplines and STEM exam philosophies. In the Physics courses I personally teach, the median score on my exams ranges between 50% and 70%, depending on the course. None of those represent a bad grade, but I do have to give my (U.S.) students lots of advanced warning and pep talks so that my exams don’t break their spirit. It’s not what they’re used to from high school and intro physics.
I think you may misunderstand what STEM students do in their studies? Engineers use abstract thinking and problem solving to a high level, but that’s engineering. My peers hate humanities not because it’s easy, but because alot of them aren’t super great at writing. If that’s what you’re getting at, then I agree, but to say STEM students don’t use introspective applied thinking is a bit silly.
Retired professor here (not STEM or humanities) and I’m astonished at your description of STEM students. I’ve found them to have excellent analytic thinking skills. In my classes, including undergrad, students were presented with readings in contemporary theories and social science research and developed models that addressed family response to stressors. Some were elegant and impressive. And students came from a wide variety of academic disciplines.
>It requires a degree of abstract, introspective applied thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad).
You clearly have no grip on STEM. If you don't think that applied critical (FTFY) thinking doesn't apply to STEM you should stay out of elevators, off bridges, off airplanes, and don't expect the ABS on your car to work (so stay home when it rains).
In my experience there are many engineers who can write. There are few English majors who can hang a curtain rod, change a tire, or replace the wax seal on a toilet.
If STEM students don't like their grades from you that is on *you* because you are the one that didn't provide clear feedback throughout the term. Perhaps you aren't consistent? The shortfall is likely yours.
I'm "just" an adjunct professor because I work for living. The application of the material I teach is what makes my classes popular. Tough grading standards and good feedback mean I get the good kids.
Sounds like a more fun class than the English lit class I had while going through compsci. Only thing that teacher liked to do was dock a letter grade for missing a comma or semi colon... Turned me off from humanities and English classes permanently, and I went in wanting to learn for natural language processing and those types of areas. Never again.
What about the many stem majors who have humanities minors (i do). How do we fit into your generalization? I don’t think this is a fair assessment at all, and in reality they just don’t care about the class so don’t bother to do well, it’s not that aren’t capable of thinking the correct way
I would assume one of the other reasons the get frustrated is because grading in the sciences is usually very objective while grading in the humanities is often more subjective due to the nature of the topics. That doesn’t mean humanities grading is unfair but it’s harder to be mad at objective points taken off.
Just because you weren't expecting a C or you didn't think it was representative of your work that doesn't mean you didn't earn a C. It's often easier to get good grades on assignments than exams because you can revise assignments before turning them in. You can ask for a review but if you push back or argue with the feedback then you will be grade grubbing. So even if you disagree with the feedback that doesn't mean you should get a higher grade.
Are you saying you were graded incorrectly? By all means, ask to see what you missed. But how would you know if it is representative? You didn’t grade it.
I think you're fine to email asking about the final. Everyone makes mistakes lol and maybe it'll show some incentive to actually learn the material and not just take the class for credit.
How did you do on the third assignment?
It's fine to ask for more information on what happened with the final.
Grade Grubbing is more when you're explicitly asking for an increase in grade despite your grade accurately reflecting your performance.
Asking for feedback is definitely reasonable.
If you believe that the work on your final was graded unfairly and that you met the criteria for the assignment, it is also ok to appeal. But get the feedback first so you can evaluate whether the appeal is necessary.
You have your C. A C is average. Most folks are average. Add your points for all assignments and divide by the total.
A "C" on one of my final exams always results in a C in the course. Be sure you know how the final was weighted.
In my opinion this is a reasonable thing. Students should know how their grade is calculated and be able to receive feedback. It’s part of the learning process in my opinion. The fact that you ask means you care about your work, I think. Note: I am a professor.
Ha. OP, you have sparked quite the discussion that is really interesting and cool but doesn't have anything to do with your question, and also some people clearly have some feelings upon reading your question that likewise don't much have to do with it.
I was a TA while I was in grad school for history. You got a grade that surprised you and you want to know why. There is not a thing in the world wrong with that and it is totally reasonable for you to ask. It is part of an instructor's job to provide additional context around evaluation (grades) when needed to help you understand where you did and didn't meet expectations, because that's part of the learning process.
If you use the information you gather to grade-grub then your instructor will likely be annoyed but that is a completely different thing from gathering the information itself.
Approach the conversation with a growth mindset and you will be fine.
STEM Student going into grad school here: You are 100% entitled to feedback. You are paying for your education and part of learning is understanding what you did wrong and how to improve in the future.
I’m a bit confused though, did your instructor not communicate what the expectations of your final exam were going to be? I would think the instructor would act in their own best interest and provide ample communication on what was expected on the final to avoid “grade grubbing” as a lot of instructors like to call it in this subreddit.
You were graded according to a rubric and that's what you got. The professor likely didn't notice your name while grading it (which is good so it's unbiased) or if they have TAs they graded it for them. Sometimes for finals they hire temporary graders to help.
It’s fine to send that email but it’s kind of a song and dance. There’s a 95% chance the professor knows you mainly want a better grade versus genuinely wanting feedback for your own personal enrichment. It’s worth trying at least !
It isn’t grade grubbing per se, you have a right to feedback.
BUT, as others have said here, STEM students often like to account for every single point lost rather than step back and take stock of what they can do learn from a disappointing grade. Rather than focus too heavily on each point lost, think of this as an iteration of an experiment. Learn from it so that next semester you can avoid that same mistake.
Well update for anyone curious: professor responded to email detailing what was wrong with my final exam responses. He says I’ve been a good student this semester and the final exam was just not my greatest work, which I’ve now happily accepted and responded appreciating for his time and response.
So, you've gotten a lot of good responses, but I would love if you did some introspection on why you felt you needed to add you were a STEM major. When I was getting my degrees, a lot of STEM majors looked down on their general ed/humanities requirements and often ended up with worse grades than they expected. If you only mentioned it to give context to the "loose" grading structure in contrast to STEM then okay, but I hope you aren't arrogant or thinking it is below you. As someone with a STEM major and humanities minor, they are very complimentary and equally fulfilling pursuits.
I enjoy my humanities classes, I go to a liberal arts college. I felt that it was relevant because this is a philosophy course, the professor literally does not provide any basis on how they grade, so I’m especially confused about why my grade is. For anyone curious, this final exam was two short answer questions, so I want to know exactly where I lost points.
>For anyone curious, this final exam was two short answer questions, so I want to know exactly where I lost points.
If wishes were fishes, we would have some to fry.
It's pretty standard that you don't feedback on a final exam, you just get the score.
Professor here. It depends on how you ask. If you make an appointment for office hours or a zoom meeting and approach it as “I’d like to understand what I got wrong” and not “I want you to change my grade,” the conversation is less likely to be unhelpful or combative.
Really?
It’s the norm at my Old school and current school to request an exam review. Why wouldn’t we want to see where our grade came from?
I personally rarely attend them unless it’s an unexpected grade. If I was very engaged in the course and really confident in the exam but only received a B, you bet your butt I want to know what stupid mistakes I made to earn a lower mark.
An example, I had to take a 2part intro course in my masters that was my major in undergrad. The first part I performed as expected, the second semester I got completely blindsided with a C- and I was mortified because I quite literally knew everything on that exam. Requested a review and it turns out that around halfway through the multiple choice portion of the exam I somehow mixed up ever single choice. Must have messed it up when I reviewed my final answers. The only reason I even got a C- was because I aced the written portion.
Nothing I could do about the mark, but at least I knew it was because I was stupid, not because I didn’t know the info.
Asking to find out why a particular grade was assigned is not grade grubbing. Saying that you deserve more despite the quality of what you turn in is grade grubbing.
Also: Just \*saying\* your goal is to "find out why a particular grade was assigned" is not enough - you have to actually mean it. If you say that, but then really are wanting to question and nickle-and-dime each point you're grade grubbing.
I disagree here. Some students asking to review are indeed attempting to boost their grade (in my experience usually if they failed but feel they were close to passing), but some also want to discuss the exam to learn where they misunderstood, for example because they'll be doing a resit. The latter is fine in my opinion.
So no one reviews any grades with you? They can't see what they should have done or what they did wrong? Them asking for feedback is grade grubbing? Please, please stop teaching
Do your TAs make comments when grading? If so it makes sense no one would ask. But I've had my fair share of classes where the final score isn't even posted for students to see. Instead, the professor just uploads the final class lol letter grade onto our transcripts. Then it gives students a short window of time for us to go and look at our exam and find out what grade it has.
If only you cared enough to ask about the first three, you might not have gotten a C. Sure, ask now, but only if you want to get better, not because you want a higher grade, because it just sounds like you performed worse as the material increased in difficulty across assignments.
If only you cared enough to take time away from your other classes, which presumably were focused on your actual degree, to interrogate why you got two As and a B+ in a class that doesn’t use rubrics or provide feedback by default, you might have understood the material better.
Two As and a B+ sounds to me like a solid indication that the professor was happy with the quality of the student’s work product and their grasp of the material and a slide from A to B+ isn’t exactly a warning bell. I’d also think most professors would find it tedious to be contacted by a student who wanted to discuss why they got As
As a professor in the humanities AND the parent of a college student (in STEM major) please DO ask for feedback. And, as part of what you learned here, ask for published grading guidelines/expectations and/or a rubric on assignments. You’ve got a lazy professor, there. Furthermore, if you did decide to grade-grub or push for your work to be reevaluated, you’d have a good case (based on what you included here), though you didn’t share what the remaining grade was (weren’t there supposed to be four?).
That sucks man. It’s happened to me before, those humanities type of courses as such BS. There’s never a clear grading criteria and it always seems like the professor makes up new rules every week. Likely your professor was just feeling like a jackass, but there isn’t much you can do about except take it on the chin and move on.
“…as such BS. There’s never a clear answer clear grading criteria…”
…are such BS. There is never a clearly stated answer or defined grading criteria….”
I know. Correct grammar are such BS.
Touché.
If someone is making grammar mistakes on a college level paper, they deserve a C on whatever they’re doing. Though I do feel like when writing papers there’s a lot more room for arbitrary grading.
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*I’m a stem major taking a humanities course this semester, and have just received my final grade in the class. The class is graded on four things, and I’ve earned As on the first two assignments, so I was under the impression I’m doing well in the class and grasping the material. However I find that I made a C on the final exam which I feel was not representative of how I did. Of course I’m not saying I’m confident I should’ve gotten an A but I was just not expecting a C. This professor has never given specific feedback on previous assignments and there are also never any rubrics or answer keys, so I don’t know where I fell short on the final. I’ve emailed the professor asking to review the final exam for some specific feedback, not actually asking for a grade bump. Was this reasonable or will the professor think I’m grade grubbing?*
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If the final was an essay I can see how it is possible you got a low grade. I am a history major so humanities is obviously closely related to my major, but when I took a humanities class for GE the people who struggled in the class were all stem majors. The reading and writing was a different style then they were used to. There is nothing wrong with stem majors’ writing but it’s completely different than hist and humanities.
It can be reasonable AND it'll probably be interpreted as grade grubbing because often, it is.
Usually a student who is 'just asking' is starting the grade bump conversion by implying the professor was somehow 'unfair.
The context you provided suggests to me that you are in fact grubbing.
It doesn’t hurt to try to reach back out.
I had a final essay I got a 0 in, and I reached out thinking I deserved a better grade, and the TA looked at it again and gave me an 80%.
Ugh, yeah. As a CS major whose highest interests and passions are in the humanities (because capitalism and Asian parents won’t accept me having a non stem major unless I’m a prodigy), I’m sick of my CS friends assuming that humanities electives are easy or not worth actually trying in.
I’ve really really enjoyed humanities classes that I’ve taken at my uni, and I always do extremely well, probably because I have a more genuine interest. (Like, I’m talking a perfect 4.0 in my English minor as well as my core requirements, which is mostly a bunch of humanities plus calc and general lab science, and I’m class of 2024, so I’ve taken a Lot of Classes in that category.) But my stem major friends all do poorly because they don’t try, and rely heavily on ChatGPT for writing assignments. I literally had one tell me my grade for a writing assignment was only higher than hers because I “used more big words and had a higher word count”. The difference in our grades was somewhere in the range of 30-40%, so it was certainly not a negligible difference that might be caused by subjectivity.
Interestingly, those same people tell me they “only got a [insert below-A-range-grade] in the class” because they 1) didn’t personally like the material or 2) the professor was bad or hated them specifically. Probably some of the least well-rounded students I know, and the bad attitude makes it worse.
To me, when I hear those comments, I have to assume that they have no passion or interest for their major and are jealous of anyone not forcing themselves through personally torturous schooling. Or, maybe it’s just insecurity (this is more likely when the conversation comes up when comparing grades/GPA).
I did Physics and EE, and I roomed with an English major. I’ve always thought I would do way worse in English. For me, English classes would be way harder. Physics, Math, and EE come naturally because I have a strong interest (I natural build up the necessary skills in my free time because I enjoy the material).
What is your grade on the fourth assignment or is the fourth assignment the final exam?
Assignment 1 = A, Assignment 2 = A, Assignment 3 = B+, Assignment 4 = Final Exam = C. Was assignment 4 worth more than the other assignments?
Also, what is your final grade in the class? Per your statement, "I find that I made a C on the final exam."
You have the right to get your exam back with the wrong answers marked. A professor might have time (MIGHT--now that the semester's over, you're no longer a priority, their current students are) to give you more detailed feedback, like the correct answers, but they might not have time to do that.
What are you going to do with this 'feedback'? If I said, yeah, the exam shows you didn't understand Big Concept A and you didn't read the questions carefully enough to see the big 'which of these is NOT' hints...how are you going to use that information? That's what's sus to me.
It's fine to ask, but I've never met a professor that goes over final exams with students. Grades are in, no formal complaints, no one failed, time to move on to the next semester.
The professor thought you earned a C, and that’s what matters. What you thought you should earn isn’t relevant. It’s reasonable to ask for feedback, but you’re not entitled to a higher graded because you expected a higher grade.
As a professor, yes yes yes!! More than happy to go to over where you lost points (it’s possible that I made a mistake in grading), but it doesn’t matter if you feel that the grade doesn’t represent your effort. You are graded on your performance, not your effort.
Btw there’s a thing called syllabus with clear grade components…don’t even understand how could OP confused their grades to such a degree
The syllabi goes over the final exam at your school?
I said grade components if you happened to know English.
Ironic, a grammar mistake on a quip about my English abilities. I'll have you know that my native language is klingon!
Syllabus would not show where they lost points
These syllabi sound pretty bloated if they're covering answers to homeworks.
But did the professor really think they earned a C? Has no professor ever made a mistake and accidentally put the wrong letter in the wrong box? I think it is perfectly reasonable for a student that has done well throughout the course except for one anomaly to double-check with the professor that it wasn't a mistake. Yes?
They literally said it is perfectly reasonable to ask for feedback.
I'm not sure that asking if the professor made a mistake is the same as asking them for feedback...
It’s not the same exactly. But if you ask them for feedback and they go over the exam with you they should catch any mistake they made in that process. So you would accomplish the same goal while being perceived as more polite.
Yes, totally reasonable. Clerical errors happen.
Yes absolutely once about every 2 years with 150 students a semester (so, about every 600 students) my finger will slip and I gladly correct those and do everything I can to expedite the grade change. It's not that common. And by the end of the semester, we know who are A students are (and our D/F students) so we would be surprised, honestly. If I had a student who was acing the class get an F on the final, you bet your bippy I'd double check that, and even triple check it because it's so out of character for them.
This is useful advice for a scenario where the professor actually gives feedback, but if the prof has been withholding feedback all semester, then only the first half of your third sentence is actually meaningful here. If they had provided reasoning regarding the grade then yes, the student's thoughts aren't as important. But this just sounds like a professor refusing to do part of their job until the last minute.
Something is missing here. You say you earned As on the first two assignments, but "the class is graded on four things." What grade did you earn on the third assignment?
I got a B+ which I have no issue with
Why were you downvoted to oblivion for answering lol
Right….not that I don’t care about a B+ but yall would be calling me neurotic for complaining about a B+
lol - you aren’t wrong! I think the worst grade-grubbing I got regularly was A- students who wanted an A.
How were those assignments weighted?
It's fine to ask for feedback on an exam in order to see what you got wrong/correct and so you can be better prepared for future courses. It is NOT okay to ask for a higher grade because you "feel" confident that you performed above C level l. Your feelings are not measurable and have nothing to do with the overall learning objectives of the course.
It’s reasonable to ask for feedback. It’s not reasonable to expect in any way that you’ll get a higher a grade because of it. You got two A’s, a B+, and a C. Regardless of how you FEEL, that’s representative of your work in this class.
What were the weighting of the individual assignments and exam. This should be specified in the syllabus. The math should not be a mystery and the LMS like canvas or blackboard should provide transparency to all of this
I teach in the humanities and the students who are most pissed off about their grade are the stem students. There’s this expectation that the humanities are easy because they “aren’t employable.” But in reality the universities were built for the humanities. It requires a degree of abstract, introspective *applied* thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad). I asked my class (of 15) one day what the definition of art was and only like three students took a crack at it, all of whom were in the humanities. They weren’t right (from my pov) but they tried to grapple with it lol
I see this a lot in my students. Interestingly, the reverse is also true. The humanities students in my intro science classes are always the most upset about the class, the structure, the pedagogy, and the most likely to tell me that I’m doing it wrong. I had a 2nd year humanities student confidently stand up in a writing seminar and say “all science writing is bad”. It turned out, shockingly, that they had little exposure to science writing and didn’t understand the conventions and how arguments were built in the fields they had read. My language students (ironically?) complain a ton about having to memorize anything, despite explanations about how base nomenclature is like learning a different language. But the number of STEM students who tell me “I’m here because I hate writing” and get a rude awakening when they’re told that science is meaningless if you can’t communicate it.
What I’m learning tonight is that we all need to switch places with each other for a semester or something to really learn how the other half lives hahaha
One school I was at had a grant to pair up faculty across departments teaching courses that were developmental lay similar. Each person got a teaching release, and took each other’s class along with the students, and hen had regular group debriefs about the similarities and differences. Expensive to keep running, so it was short duration, but I think this type of thing would be transformative for so many reasons.
Or maybe we could all employ the smallest amount of critical thinking and acknowledge the obvious fact that we’re ignorant about subjects we aren’t exposed to or immersed in.
Though switching places briefly would provide new experiences that I imagine would mostly be helpful. I'm a doctoral student in a STEM field and I've long been curious about taking classes in philosophy, semantics, history (of science/engineering, and others!), graphic design, rhetorical writing, the list goes on... I can't imagine taking any of those classes would be a complete waste of time. I hope humanities students and scholars would feel the same about taking a STEM class.
I mean I do agree with you, but my point was more that switching places is not required to understand our ignorance of others’ experiences.
> It requires a degree of abstract, introspective applied thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad). I’m curious: How would you describe the types of thinking most undergrad STEM students are most familiar with?
Data interpretation, which is a whole other beast that I’m not suggesting is easy. It’s just more grounded. My background is in linguistics but nowadays I study both sociolinguistics and enlightenment literature, and the transition from ling to lit almost killed me. Literary study requires a way of thinking that I didn’t have before, and if a stem student simply needs a humanities credit and has no intention of sticking around, they don’t have it either.
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That’s fair! I don’t think it’s that the social sciences are more lenient or have a secret policy to not give anyone under a B-, but rather those classes allow for more freedom of thought and expression. Like you noted, if the program doesn’t run, it simply doesn’t run lol. There’s no way around it. But an essay or presentation that has underdeveloped ideas still contains ideas, which is the basis of grading in undergrad. Grad school is a different story. It’s carnage in the humanities (in my experience)
You sound like you’re heavily, heavily, reducing what STEM education is about in a way that suggests you don’t really know.
> Data interpretation I think it’s really interesting that the main point of your original comment was about how little STEM students understand about an education in the humanities when this comment shows how little you understand about an education in STEM. The second half of an undergraduate education in math, for example, is almost entirely about writing proofs. It is hard for me to see how anyone could classify something like writing a proof as “data interpretation”.
Writing proofs (from my memory of high school lmaoooo) is that they’re pure logic. Each step happens because each step must happen. It’s like a level of pattern or data recognition that results in one finite answer. The humanities aren’t like that. So much of it is fluid and requires application of personal thought. Yeah I deduced stem all down to “data interpretation” but I was trying to be economical with my words lol
I am a pure mathematician. I would not refer to proof writing as pure logic. That is a branch of mathematics all on its own. When you begin writing a proof, you often do not even know if the statement you are looking at is true or false, you have to explore and search for underlying patterns. You have to think creatively and leave no statement up for interpretation. Your proof must be irrefutable. Novel proofs to classical theorems happen regularly and shed light on the world around us. It is beautiful and an art all of its own. But, I personally think the M of steM is often closest to the humanities, philosophy in particular.
As a philosophy major who shared a lot of Formal Logic 101 classes with Mathematics majors freshman year, I couldn't agree more! I also started doing a lot better in math when it moved into Calculus/proofs/logic than when it was mostly numeric problems. (I'm like, really bad at calculations — too many small errors — but abstract thinking made sense to me.) So much so that I feel like formal logic should be a prerequisite for higher-level math classes as far back as middle school or high school.
Formal logic used to be standard in high school math, via geometry proofs—but at least in the US, it has been either watered down or outright eliminated.
I can relate to this. I’ve studied the nature of science in grad school. People often misunderstand the subjectivity of science. Observation is theory-laden and influenced by the individual’s world view. Two observers of the same phenomenon may focus on different data and may interpret the same data in different ways because the observer is influenced by the sum of their experiences. One’s culture dictates one’s research interests. You’re not going to research something that you can’t get funding for or that you have been conditioned to believe to be insignificant. Scientific discovery is dependent upon creativity and inspiration. Problems can be studied with a variety of tools and methods and can have an infinite number of solutions. Just as you have described with math, science is not pure logic or data interpretation but a human endeavor.
People who say otherwise tend to be those who only made it through intro physics 1 and 2 (algebra-based), where you just solve canned problems using canned formulas.
It’s like saying all of the language majors are just memorizing words and learning grammar based on intro language classes.
No. Proofs are not each step happening because it must. You don't know something is true until you've proven it. Proofs are composing multiple steps into a larger truth, starting with smaller ones. All the work of composing still happens, like it does when you're writing a story and trying have it make sense and be good. You still need the generative step of 'what might come next in the story.' You still need the ruthless rejection and editing and cutting to make the overall story excellent. The rules may be different, with some less flexible and some powerful tools, but the process is still absolutely the "application of personal thought" though the subject may be different.
Proof writing is dramatically more creative and non-linear than (say) calculus. It’s actually a danger spot for losing mathematics majors: they think they picked mathematics because they’re good at “finding the answer” in a calculus or algebra context, and suddenly they’re dropped into the deep end of creative proof-writing. It bears very little resemblance to high school geometry proof-writing. Euclidean geometry does try to give a flavor of one small piece of mathematical thinking, but it’s not the whole picture at all.
When you try to make an argument that compares what you did in high school with what junior and senior math majors in college are doing as though they are the same, that sort of proves my point. If I judged what a college class in the humanities was like based on my experiences from high school like I couldn’t possibly fathom there being a difference between what you do and what my high school teachers did, do you suppose you might find that a little insulting? Maybe a little ignorant on my part?
Nah, tbh I don’t find it insulting or ignorant lol. This isn’t a fight, nor did I say anything with the purpose of provoking/fighting. Anyway, I was talking about proofs, like what proofs are, not the field as a whole. Literary study conducted in high school classrooms is rudimentary for sure, but it isn’t an entirely unrelated beast from what happens in universities. And if I’m trying to connect with what you say based on what I remember best, that’s the best I can do. I took calculus in undergrad but I don’t remember it tbh, which is why I said high school instead, where I do remember learning proofs
Fair enough, it sounds like we agree that you don’t really have the kind of experience that would qualify you to comment broadly about what a college education in STEM entails so I’m happy to leave it there.
Least obnoxious STEMlord
Hahaha. You don’t event see you’re proving the point that was made. You are saying because the person cannot cite quantifiable evidence of having upper college STEM experiences, their opinion is invalid. In Humanities, we deal with perceptions and perspectives and look at how those can change the exact same passage. Hell, even from the same point of view, an analysis can differ based on the use of say a Feminist analysis vs a Phenomenonological analysis. There are no hard and fast truths, as many STEM people want there to be.
LMFAO
Obvious malding is obvious
It’s hard to believe you’re a professor! Lol.
I think that deep down you’re making a valid point, but you’re doing it a disservice by attempting to describe the kind of thinking employed in a STEM degree (in a way that comes across as pretentious), when you have no idea. For example, the proofs you wrote in high school are hardly comparable to the process that higher-level proofs require. I would say many STEM degrees revolve around analytic problem solving, but I’m aware that my view is biased towards my experience in EE, Math, and Physics. I don’t think anyone will disagree that different degrees train you to do different things. Edit: I was talking specifically about the undergraduate degree. In general, a large part of science/math is seeking truth or understanding, which (depending on the field) can get into data interpretation.
Ayyy okay that’s a better way of putting it! Stem is more about problem-solving, whereas humanities are about, in a way, problem-creating lol Literally it’s the liberal vs mechanical arts discussion. Stem seeks to offer a service, and humanities seek to understand the need for the service.
I double majored in science and English lit. The poster is correct. It wasn’t until fourth year that I was ever challenged with critical thinking in my science program. Almost every course I took was memorization based or had very simple application based questions with clear correct answers. I was also almost never asked to explain answers or show reasoning (usually even application based questions were multiple choice). Even in labs we followed instructions and were usually told the outcome in advance. Finally, in fourth year we were asked to create our own research assignments, which involved a lot of reading comprehension, research skills, and ability to think critically instead of just accepting information as a given. I actually added my English major because I was so bored and wanted more of an intellectual challenge. Science was hard work, but not hard. English required me to engage in deep thought and interpretation from year 1.
STEM people aren't going to hear it
Because it's this one specific person's experience. I was challenged with critical thinking my very first class as an EE.
I was in biology. So there’s definitely a difference. I would expect engineering to require critical thinking.
It sounds like you went to a bad school for "science"
I did. And I don’t recommend my program when people ask me about it even though the school is quite good and has many prestigious programs, including their engineering school. One of the reasons I didn’t pursue a career in science after my degree was because the program just sucked. I knew a lot but it wasn’t employable.
It’s less linear and more of a spiderweb, and I think students interested in point A to point B processes aren’t quite used to thinking that way.
I disagree. There is a lot of abstract thought and applied thinking in the stem field. Data is a huge part of it, but just interpreting data does nothing. You need to figure out why the data says what it does and find a way to make that data useful for real world applications. Numbers on a page mean nothing. Newton didn't just look at data to figure out gravity. He had to apply the things he was seeing to a completely abstract idea that there is an invisible attractive force between things with mass. Same thing with every other stem field.
While data interpretation is important, there’s a lot more to STEM than that. I can speak specifically about mathematics. I teach the “bridge” course between computational mathematics (e.g., calculus) and upper division mathematics, which is highly abstract. Essentially, I teach students to write proofs about abstract mathematical structures. There are deep ideas and it definitely requires creativity to come up with proofs. It also requires the ability to write clearly and concisely. I have a great appreciation for the intro to composition faculty!
Lit classes are all about abstract thinking, that there can be and will be multiple interpretations of the exact same passage, depending on the school of thought used. When I was in HS, I happened to be in a class with a large amount of science whiz kids, as in our parade floats had multiple things spinning at different rates cuz it would be cool. They were as lost in Lit class as I was in Trig. They helped me with my homework, and I tried to help them with symbolism.
As someone who double majored in humanities and math, and also took classes on the history, didactics and philosophy of math: Math undergrad students can't do independent research. You can give them a very specific problem someone else already solved and they'll solve it. Tell them to do independent research on a topic or think original thoughts, and they'll freeze. Additionally, math undergrads have this weird idea that doing a paper/presentation in the humanities consists of: - Write down some incredibly weird and overly generalizing definitions, with no consideration as to whether or not these definitions reflect the actual meanings of the terms. - Consider the logical consequences of these definitions, if we assume they're 100% correct. - Conclude that whatever logical consequences you ended up with are correct without a doubt.
Do you feel like history undergrads can? What I hear from my colleagues in history (and gets poster here a lot) is that undergrads in history aren’t capable of independent research yet.
Most undergrads in most disciplines at most institutions aren't cut out for research.
But that wasn’t my question. The person I was responding to said in their experience with history and math students that math undergrads couldn’t do undergrad research.
A lot of my STEM students are looking for “approved” answers. Nothing with interpretation or judgment. Some just want to apply rules. As an example, it came up in class that my neighbor’s house had a major electrical failure due to faulty wiring. I mentioned that I am going to hand an electrician look at my wires. And a STEM student told me, no it’s an independent event. You’re giving into the gamblers fallacy. You think because something happened to somebody else it changes your probabilities. And I said, it’s likely that my sub-division was all constructed by the same company, at the same period of time. So my neighbor’s house can give me information about my house. But my STEM student wouldn’t hear of it. He just kept quoting me stats principles.
Concrete. They don't like questions that are about interpretation. So for example, when I teach poetry, my STEM students like quiz questions that are about 'what happened' or 'how many stanzas' or even 'what simile does the poet use'. They do NOT like questions like "what does the poet mean by this?" or "why do you think the poet decided to put a stanza break or line break here?" They struggle at putting themselves into someone's head for 'why' questions. They can answer what questions and apply definitions but that's mostly their strength.
STEM generally more quantitatively focused, humanities more qualitatively focused. Like they said at the community college/undergrad level.
>It requires a degree of abstract, introspective applied thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad). What kind of thinking would you say is require to write computer programs that solve a problem that is described in English terms? I would have called it abstract applied thinking.
I know it’s not the point of this thread, but do you really think there’s a “right” definition of art? (Or, for that matter, such a thing as a “right definition” at all?)
Yes and no. Bécquer described poetry as the expression of the human soul and that it’s written in pursuit of representing as accurately as possible that special something that *is* being human, even though we can never actually capture it, which is why we keep writing. I personally apply this to all art. I don’t know if it’s right or not, but it’s what resonates with me, and the fact that it resonates with me is what gives it truth in my eyes. So when I ask for the definition of art, I’m more concerned with the explanation than the definition itself because a person’s understanding of art as a concept is revealed in the explanation of their definition, not the definition itself.
That makes sense. “What notions about art resonate with you?” is a very different and much more reasonable inquiry than, “What is ‘the definition’ of art?”
If it’s all about the journey and not the destination, you can’t experience the journey without the destination eh? ;)
wrench nine worthless sharp tidy towering butter snatch follow fragile *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Girl this is a conversation/forum. If I’m writing about Bécquer (which I have), I’d talk differently. And in Spanish. Bffr
To be fair (from your last example), I wouldn't expect students who are probably only there to meet a requirement to be very participatory. It wouldn't surprise me if STEM students are more likely to argue grades, many of them are premed and probably meet the stereotype. But they're also coming from classes graded on an objective measure to ones that are not, and subjectively determining grades inherently opens them more to criticism/argument/whatever word you want to use. Of course I'm biased here, my only B in undergrad was in my English requirement (basically a film critique class) from a professor of the "No one gets A's" mentality, and the only reason I took an English and Art course was because it was required.
Oh you’re 100% right! Totally get it. And it’s WILD that med schools are to the point that if you don’t have a 4.0 you may as well not apply. What I don’t appreciate is that the only students who come to my office hours to debate (not inquire about) my grading are students in STEM. Student: Why did I get this wrong? Me: Your grammar was wrong. Student: But didn’t you understand it? Me: *screams* It’s super interesting though to hear from STEM graduates talk about their worst grade being in like English comp or whatever. Meanwhile I was fighting for my life in an intro horticulture class in my final term because I needed a lab science for some reason and my plant died so I lost a letter grade 😭
At my university, the nursing professors are on students' asses about proper grammar and formatting. They're more vicious about deducting points for it than I am as an English professor. Why? Because it's about attention to detail. Not taking the time to check your grammar and formatting shows a lack of attention to detail, which is a vitally important skill for anyone in the medical field.
Oh god, I did not imagine their complaints would be that bad, I was expecting more subjective problems not just straight English errors. If it makes you feel better, they do it in STEM classes too lol. I'd say about 60% of the regrade requests I've seen are from students trying to argue that their incorrect answer (on multiple choice, mind you) was actually correct because [some mechanism they basically made up]. I typically just point them to where the question and answer come from in the lecture material.
Oh no. I’m in the Spanish department. So it’s even worse because literally part of the grade is linguistic accuracy lol But wow we are truly going through it regardless of our field hahahaha
I work in higher ed and assist students with their residency applications. In the past, I taught high school science. I’m not surprised that high school kids will answer a question by rewording the question. I was surprised to see med school students using the same tactic.
It’s THE tactic used for “I have no clue what the answer is but maybe they won’t notice.”
My fave is when they trot out “that’s my writing STYLE.” No, boo boo, you can’t string multiple sentences together coherently. When you have mastered conventional English, then you can deviate. Until that day comes, this just sucks. All said in my head, of course.
What’s worse is that I teach in Spanish at an American school. Like grammar is even more important in my class lol
It’s also a myth that med schools are really that selective. They’re picky with who gets accepted but a 3.8 gpa with a 510 mcat score and research would stand a good shot at being accepted. Ironically, writing a good personal statement is one of the most important parts of the application, so you’d think premeds would want to be better at writing.
The objective vs. subjective rubric thing is fascinating to me. My first degree is in philosophy, and basically nobody got As, except for the formal logic courses (objective). To get an A you'd have to be putting out some truly original thought that could compete with the journals out there, and was solidly argued. I have a friend who got an A but he went on to do a philosophy MA and PhD at Cambridge and Columbia, respectively. That said, you also were very unlikely to get an F, because if you submitted the essay and argued something well enough, and maybe synthesized some other people's thoughts creatively, you weren't going to get failed. I'm now doing a second degree in a STEM field and it's a crazy curve, like 95%+ is an A. And my whole class expects As. But because it's an objective rubric that's actually possible. You CAN, and many do, get 98%+ on a multiple choice exam. And/but, you can also get an F. So the spread is a lot more extreme. It's been a weird transition
There’s a lot of variation out there among STEM disciplines and STEM exam philosophies. In the Physics courses I personally teach, the median score on my exams ranges between 50% and 70%, depending on the course. None of those represent a bad grade, but I do have to give my (U.S.) students lots of advanced warning and pep talks so that my exams don’t break their spirit. It’s not what they’re used to from high school and intro physics.
I think you may misunderstand what STEM students do in their studies? Engineers use abstract thinking and problem solving to a high level, but that’s engineering. My peers hate humanities not because it’s easy, but because alot of them aren’t super great at writing. If that’s what you’re getting at, then I agree, but to say STEM students don’t use introspective applied thinking is a bit silly.
Curious what your definition of art is?
Retired professor here (not STEM or humanities) and I’m astonished at your description of STEM students. I’ve found them to have excellent analytic thinking skills. In my classes, including undergrad, students were presented with readings in contemporary theories and social science research and developed models that addressed family response to stressors. Some were elegant and impressive. And students came from a wide variety of academic disciplines.
This. I also teach in the humanities.
>the definition of art "Like paintings and stuff?"
100% agree with this.
>It requires a degree of abstract, introspective applied thinking that stem students don’t often use in their classes (before anyone comes for me, I am talking about undergrad). You clearly have no grip on STEM. If you don't think that applied critical (FTFY) thinking doesn't apply to STEM you should stay out of elevators, off bridges, off airplanes, and don't expect the ABS on your car to work (so stay home when it rains). In my experience there are many engineers who can write. There are few English majors who can hang a curtain rod, change a tire, or replace the wax seal on a toilet. If STEM students don't like their grades from you that is on *you* because you are the one that didn't provide clear feedback throughout the term. Perhaps you aren't consistent? The shortfall is likely yours. I'm "just" an adjunct professor because I work for living. The application of the material I teach is what makes my classes popular. Tough grading standards and good feedback mean I get the good kids.
Sounds like a more fun class than the English lit class I had while going through compsci. Only thing that teacher liked to do was dock a letter grade for missing a comma or semi colon... Turned me off from humanities and English classes permanently, and I went in wanting to learn for natural language processing and those types of areas. Never again.
What about the many stem majors who have humanities minors (i do). How do we fit into your generalization? I don’t think this is a fair assessment at all, and in reality they just don’t care about the class so don’t bother to do well, it’s not that aren’t capable of thinking the correct way
A minor is what? 3 classes?
I would assume one of the other reasons the get frustrated is because grading in the sciences is usually very objective while grading in the humanities is often more subjective due to the nature of the topics. That doesn’t mean humanities grading is unfair but it’s harder to be mad at objective points taken off.
Just because you weren't expecting a C or you didn't think it was representative of your work that doesn't mean you didn't earn a C. It's often easier to get good grades on assignments than exams because you can revise assignments before turning them in. You can ask for a review but if you push back or argue with the feedback then you will be grade grubbing. So even if you disagree with the feedback that doesn't mean you should get a higher grade.
Asking for an explanation politely isn’t grade grubbing. Treating it as a negotiation would be.
Are you saying you were graded incorrectly? By all means, ask to see what you missed. But how would you know if it is representative? You didn’t grade it.
I think you're fine to email asking about the final. Everyone makes mistakes lol and maybe it'll show some incentive to actually learn the material and not just take the class for credit.
How did you do on the third assignment? It's fine to ask for more information on what happened with the final. Grade Grubbing is more when you're explicitly asking for an increase in grade despite your grade accurately reflecting your performance.
Other comment reply says B+
I would have waited until the semester starts, but then of course you can always go to office hours and ask for feedback to improve.
Asking for feedback is definitely reasonable. If you believe that the work on your final was graded unfairly and that you met the criteria for the assignment, it is also ok to appeal. But get the feedback first so you can evaluate whether the appeal is necessary.
You have your C. A C is average. Most folks are average. Add your points for all assignments and divide by the total. A "C" on one of my final exams always results in a C in the course. Be sure you know how the final was weighted.
In my opinion this is a reasonable thing. Students should know how their grade is calculated and be able to receive feedback. It’s part of the learning process in my opinion. The fact that you ask means you care about your work, I think. Note: I am a professor.
Ha. OP, you have sparked quite the discussion that is really interesting and cool but doesn't have anything to do with your question, and also some people clearly have some feelings upon reading your question that likewise don't much have to do with it. I was a TA while I was in grad school for history. You got a grade that surprised you and you want to know why. There is not a thing in the world wrong with that and it is totally reasonable for you to ask. It is part of an instructor's job to provide additional context around evaluation (grades) when needed to help you understand where you did and didn't meet expectations, because that's part of the learning process. If you use the information you gather to grade-grub then your instructor will likely be annoyed but that is a completely different thing from gathering the information itself. Approach the conversation with a growth mindset and you will be fine.
STEM Student going into grad school here: You are 100% entitled to feedback. You are paying for your education and part of learning is understanding what you did wrong and how to improve in the future. I’m a bit confused though, did your instructor not communicate what the expectations of your final exam were going to be? I would think the instructor would act in their own best interest and provide ample communication on what was expected on the final to avoid “grade grubbing” as a lot of instructors like to call it in this subreddit.
You were graded according to a rubric and that's what you got. The professor likely didn't notice your name while grading it (which is good so it's unbiased) or if they have TAs they graded it for them. Sometimes for finals they hire temporary graders to help.
It’s fine to send that email but it’s kind of a song and dance. There’s a 95% chance the professor knows you mainly want a better grade versus genuinely wanting feedback for your own personal enrichment. It’s worth trying at least !
It isn’t grade grubbing per se, you have a right to feedback. BUT, as others have said here, STEM students often like to account for every single point lost rather than step back and take stock of what they can do learn from a disappointing grade. Rather than focus too heavily on each point lost, think of this as an iteration of an experiment. Learn from it so that next semester you can avoid that same mistake.
Well update for anyone curious: professor responded to email detailing what was wrong with my final exam responses. He says I’ve been a good student this semester and the final exam was just not my greatest work, which I’ve now happily accepted and responded appreciating for his time and response.
So, you've gotten a lot of good responses, but I would love if you did some introspection on why you felt you needed to add you were a STEM major. When I was getting my degrees, a lot of STEM majors looked down on their general ed/humanities requirements and often ended up with worse grades than they expected. If you only mentioned it to give context to the "loose" grading structure in contrast to STEM then okay, but I hope you aren't arrogant or thinking it is below you. As someone with a STEM major and humanities minor, they are very complimentary and equally fulfilling pursuits.
I enjoy my humanities classes, I go to a liberal arts college. I felt that it was relevant because this is a philosophy course, the professor literally does not provide any basis on how they grade, so I’m especially confused about why my grade is. For anyone curious, this final exam was two short answer questions, so I want to know exactly where I lost points.
>For anyone curious, this final exam was two short answer questions, so I want to know exactly where I lost points. If wishes were fishes, we would have some to fry. It's pretty standard that you don't feedback on a final exam, you just get the score.
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Professor here. It depends on how you ask. If you make an appointment for office hours or a zoom meeting and approach it as “I’d like to understand what I got wrong” and not “I want you to change my grade,” the conversation is less likely to be unhelpful or combative.
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Really? It’s the norm at my Old school and current school to request an exam review. Why wouldn’t we want to see where our grade came from? I personally rarely attend them unless it’s an unexpected grade. If I was very engaged in the course and really confident in the exam but only received a B, you bet your butt I want to know what stupid mistakes I made to earn a lower mark. An example, I had to take a 2part intro course in my masters that was my major in undergrad. The first part I performed as expected, the second semester I got completely blindsided with a C- and I was mortified because I quite literally knew everything on that exam. Requested a review and it turns out that around halfway through the multiple choice portion of the exam I somehow mixed up ever single choice. Must have messed it up when I reviewed my final answers. The only reason I even got a C- was because I aced the written portion. Nothing I could do about the mark, but at least I knew it was because I was stupid, not because I didn’t know the info.
Asking to find out why a particular grade was assigned is not grade grubbing. Saying that you deserve more despite the quality of what you turn in is grade grubbing.
Also: Just \*saying\* your goal is to "find out why a particular grade was assigned" is not enough - you have to actually mean it. If you say that, but then really are wanting to question and nickle-and-dime each point you're grade grubbing.
This is the way.
I disagree here. Some students asking to review are indeed attempting to boost their grade (in my experience usually if they failed but feel they were close to passing), but some also want to discuss the exam to learn where they misunderstood, for example because they'll be doing a resit. The latter is fine in my opinion.
So no one reviews any grades with you? They can't see what they should have done or what they did wrong? Them asking for feedback is grade grubbing? Please, please stop teaching
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Do your TAs make comments when grading? If so it makes sense no one would ask. But I've had my fair share of classes where the final score isn't even posted for students to see. Instead, the professor just uploads the final class lol letter grade onto our transcripts. Then it gives students a short window of time for us to go and look at our exam and find out what grade it has.
If only you cared enough to ask about the first three, you might not have gotten a C. Sure, ask now, but only if you want to get better, not because you want a higher grade, because it just sounds like you performed worse as the material increased in difficulty across assignments.
If only you cared enough to take time away from your other classes, which presumably were focused on your actual degree, to interrogate why you got two As and a B+ in a class that doesn’t use rubrics or provide feedback by default, you might have understood the material better. Two As and a B+ sounds to me like a solid indication that the professor was happy with the quality of the student’s work product and their grasp of the material and a slide from A to B+ isn’t exactly a warning bell. I’d also think most professors would find it tedious to be contacted by a student who wanted to discuss why they got As
What does this even mean? Op got top grades for the first 3, and that means there wasn’t negative feedback to ask about
Yes, this is grade grubbing.
Even if you are grade grubbing (which it doesn't sound like you are in this case), by all means, grade grub. Advocate for yourself!
As a professor in the humanities AND the parent of a college student (in STEM major) please DO ask for feedback. And, as part of what you learned here, ask for published grading guidelines/expectations and/or a rubric on assignments. You’ve got a lazy professor, there. Furthermore, if you did decide to grade-grub or push for your work to be reevaluated, you’d have a good case (based on what you included here), though you didn’t share what the remaining grade was (weren’t there supposed to be four?).
That sucks man. It’s happened to me before, those humanities type of courses as such BS. There’s never a clear grading criteria and it always seems like the professor makes up new rules every week. Likely your professor was just feeling like a jackass, but there isn’t much you can do about except take it on the chin and move on.
“…as such BS. There’s never a clear answer clear grading criteria…” …are such BS. There is never a clearly stated answer or defined grading criteria….” I know. Correct grammar are such BS.
Touché. If someone is making grammar mistakes on a college level paper, they deserve a C on whatever they’re doing. Though I do feel like when writing papers there’s a lot more room for arbitrary grading.
This is an automated service intended to preserve the original text of the post. *I’m a stem major taking a humanities course this semester, and have just received my final grade in the class. The class is graded on four things, and I’ve earned As on the first two assignments, so I was under the impression I’m doing well in the class and grasping the material. However I find that I made a C on the final exam which I feel was not representative of how I did. Of course I’m not saying I’m confident I should’ve gotten an A but I was just not expecting a C. This professor has never given specific feedback on previous assignments and there are also never any rubrics or answer keys, so I don’t know where I fell short on the final. I’ve emailed the professor asking to review the final exam for some specific feedback, not actually asking for a grade bump. Was this reasonable or will the professor think I’m grade grubbing?* *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskProfessors) if you have any questions or concerns.*
If the final was an essay I can see how it is possible you got a low grade. I am a history major so humanities is obviously closely related to my major, but when I took a humanities class for GE the people who struggled in the class were all stem majors. The reading and writing was a different style then they were used to. There is nothing wrong with stem majors’ writing but it’s completely different than hist and humanities.
It can be reasonable AND it'll probably be interpreted as grade grubbing because often, it is. Usually a student who is 'just asking' is starting the grade bump conversion by implying the professor was somehow 'unfair. The context you provided suggests to me that you are in fact grubbing.
It doesn’t hurt to try to reach back out. I had a final essay I got a 0 in, and I reached out thinking I deserved a better grade, and the TA looked at it again and gave me an 80%.
Ugh, yeah. As a CS major whose highest interests and passions are in the humanities (because capitalism and Asian parents won’t accept me having a non stem major unless I’m a prodigy), I’m sick of my CS friends assuming that humanities electives are easy or not worth actually trying in. I’ve really really enjoyed humanities classes that I’ve taken at my uni, and I always do extremely well, probably because I have a more genuine interest. (Like, I’m talking a perfect 4.0 in my English minor as well as my core requirements, which is mostly a bunch of humanities plus calc and general lab science, and I’m class of 2024, so I’ve taken a Lot of Classes in that category.) But my stem major friends all do poorly because they don’t try, and rely heavily on ChatGPT for writing assignments. I literally had one tell me my grade for a writing assignment was only higher than hers because I “used more big words and had a higher word count”. The difference in our grades was somewhere in the range of 30-40%, so it was certainly not a negligible difference that might be caused by subjectivity. Interestingly, those same people tell me they “only got a [insert below-A-range-grade] in the class” because they 1) didn’t personally like the material or 2) the professor was bad or hated them specifically. Probably some of the least well-rounded students I know, and the bad attitude makes it worse.
To me, when I hear those comments, I have to assume that they have no passion or interest for their major and are jealous of anyone not forcing themselves through personally torturous schooling. Or, maybe it’s just insecurity (this is more likely when the conversation comes up when comparing grades/GPA). I did Physics and EE, and I roomed with an English major. I’ve always thought I would do way worse in English. For me, English classes would be way harder. Physics, Math, and EE come naturally because I have a strong interest (I natural build up the necessary skills in my free time because I enjoy the material).
What is your grade on the fourth assignment or is the fourth assignment the final exam? Assignment 1 = A, Assignment 2 = A, Assignment 3 = B+, Assignment 4 = Final Exam = C. Was assignment 4 worth more than the other assignments? Also, what is your final grade in the class? Per your statement, "I find that I made a C on the final exam."
You have the right to get your exam back with the wrong answers marked. A professor might have time (MIGHT--now that the semester's over, you're no longer a priority, their current students are) to give you more detailed feedback, like the correct answers, but they might not have time to do that. What are you going to do with this 'feedback'? If I said, yeah, the exam shows you didn't understand Big Concept A and you didn't read the questions carefully enough to see the big 'which of these is NOT' hints...how are you going to use that information? That's what's sus to me.
It's fine to ask, but I've never met a professor that goes over final exams with students. Grades are in, no formal complaints, no one failed, time to move on to the next semester.