Currently in EE2FH3 the professor at the start of the semester said you had to pass the final to pass the course. Our midterm had an average of around 53% if I remember correctly.
Assuming there is a similar average on the final, there is going to be a lot of people failing the course. Are there any policies on the % of students who have to be passed and a bell curve implemented in engineering?

Just a guess, but I don't think so.

If that is the case, then students can "conspire" together and fail on purpose but still pass at the end.

Side note, the average doesn't tell you accurately that a large portion of the class is failing, you need to compare that to the median and/or knowing the actual marks of your classmates.

Lol, Microeconomics, 1st year, says that the conspiracy would fail. Everyone would want to get that extra little mark. It would never work that way.

No group of students will ever collude to the point of the whole class "failing for the purpose of passing". It's game theory. Take microecon (as mentioned above) and you'll see. Or, take the economics of game theory, and you'll understand it even better.

Humans are not creatures in the habit of attaining group-wide optimal solutions.

I see =O But did they teach you that so you won't even bother trying it out?

Originally Posted by Serene

I see =O But did they teach you that so you won't even bother trying it out?

Professors aren't that smart.

If the Professor wants he can but then after the grades are released, the faculty does what it wants. I took Biology 1A03 couple of years ago. I had Dr. Jacobs and he failed more than half the class and that was only a term test. The class got pissed off and took the matter to the dean and as far as I know, he was removed from that course for the next year or two.

I don't know what the professor can or can't do in this situation, but I'm sure it's not in their best interest to purposly fail most of the students. The professor is not the final say in marks - someone will see the marks that he submits and it will look fishy.

It's generally understood that each professor is required to have the average for their classes be at some predetermined mark. This predetermined mark is generally decided by the department.

Can the prof manipulate marks somewhat to help stay close to that predetermined mark? Yes.

Can the prof drastically manipulate grades such that a class of mostly F grades becomes D or higher? Probably, but it's probably frowned upon as universities in general have been criticized for grade inflation for the past decade at least.

Most of the students in my course today are currently on the low side of failing. The prof was going over some points for the final and his speech went generally as follows:

"Now now, if you do really poorly on the exam..." This is where you'd expect him to say if you did well in the rest of the course you may be okay, or something to that effect. But instead it finished, "but you still passed the course, don't forget I can ask to have you fail since that proves you don't know the theory." He wasn't joking. So his insanely hard course thusfar, with curveballs aplenty for every question, now has an additional clause that even if you happen to pass, you still might fail...

So I will let you know in a couple weeks if its acceptable or not for a prof to fail most of the class (I'm talking over 75% of the class...)

I heard this second hand, but apparently two years ago in 2FH3 the average was increased to a 60% from a failing average before the marks were posted. Even at that many people had failing final marks, though I don't know if they actually failed the course. I was never in that position, but I'd imagine she wouldn't fail someone that got a passing grade but didn't pass the final. It is odd that they post the marks online for the exam in that course (or they did at least).

1984, I think he's just trying to scare you (referring to him saying he can ask to fail you). If you pass, then you pass. As long as you didn't cheat, there's nothing your prof can do about it. There's no way he can prove whether or not you know the theory, so don't worry about that. If you passed without cheating, you're perfectly fine.

I would definately mention this on the course evaluation though. I don't think it's right to scare students like that.

"There's no way he can prove whether or not you know the theory,"

Well, he means one doesn't know the theory if they cannot pass the exam.

But that's not necessarily true. Some people go blank on the exam from nerves or the exams could be worded in a tricky way that some people get stuck on.

If he wanted everyone who failed the exam to fail the course, he should have weighted it differently. It's not his place to go around failing people after they pass just because he thinks they don't know enough.

Eh, I never said it was true, but that's how the professor seems to be thinking of it at any rate.

In either case, I don't think if someone passed the course that he would go and individually ask for each person who failed the exam to not pass the course.