Does USYD grade on a curve? (2 Viewers)

[Hannelore]

Hello

So, I was just wondering because I realised that I never figured it out before...does USYD grade on a curve?

Or is it maybe dependent on what faculty/course/unit it is?

So far all I could find on the website was an indicator of what grade equates to what band, like and 87% would be an HD.

I'm mostly curious because for one particular education unit, the vast majority of people seemed to really struggle with one particular assessment. Granted we haven't gotten grades back for it yet (only handed it in on Friday) but it's the first assessment for the unit and it was worth 50%. We had a little under 3 weeks to complete it and if my tutorial class was anything to go by, everyone seems really confused about how to complete it. I know other people who weren't in the same tutorial as me who also said that they were feeling like they still didn't quite understand how to do it properly, so it's unlikely that it was just all the people in my tute.

Assuming the worst, that the vast majority of students in a unit all do really badly in an assessment (and I'm talking more about things like they misunderstood an ambiguous question, not that they clearly know nothing), would the markers have to take this into consideration? Or is it just that we're all pretty much in trouble and our final grades and WAM are going to really suffer for it?

Thanks

 

[Librah]

From what i hear USYD is ruthless af. Little to no scaling. Whatever mark you get, is your mark. I may be wrong though. So say like, it's possible that no one in the course actually passes.

 

[Hannelore]

From what i hear USYD is ruthless af. Little to no scaling. Whatever mark you get, is your mark. I may be wrong though. So say like, it's possible that no one in the course actually passes.

I thought that might be the case. It's too bad this is a core unit

I feel like that would make the unit coordinator/tutors look bad though, if the vast majority of students don't pass or get really low grades O.O What does it say about USYD as a whole if most of the history teachers have to do an entire extra year to pass their degree though?

I COULD be catastrophising. But even people who haven't done the unit have commented, "oh you're doing that history unit? I've heard that it's really bad" so it looks like there are a lot of people who are struggling a lot XD

If they at least take into account the student feedback at the end of the unit, maybe that will make it better for future students. I don't know anyone who did this unit before this year, so I'm not sure if maybe they were trying something new and it's just not...well, working

 

[Silly Sausage]

Don't think USYD does any form of grade curving expect maybe of some advanced science as far as I'm aware. What you get is pretty much your raw mark. It would also depend of the faculty as well, I remember some people saying the USYD used to grade on a bell curve for a lot of subjects where only the top 3-5% of the cohort got HDs and you had to be in top 50% for credit average (There are still bell curves for law though).

 

[BLIT2014]

Might change grading criteria/outline

 

[Hannelore]

Don't think USYD does any form of grade curving expect maybe of some advanced science as far as I'm aware. What you get is pretty much your raw mark. It would also depend of the faculty as well, I remember some people saying the USYD used to grade on a bell curve for a lot of subjects where only the top 3-5% of the cohort got HDs and you had to be in top 50% for credit average (There are still bell curves for law though).

Thanks

Well, here's to hoping I'm catastrophising and won't fail my first unit ever. Of course, I plan to try my hardest to do as well in the other 50% task as I can, but to do badly at a 50% one is not good D:

Might change grading criteria/outline

That would be great I'm not overly optimistic about it happening, but it would be great.

 

[dinomyte]

You might want to ask your faculty? My arts units don't grade on a bell curve, but law does.

 

[someth1ng]

It depends on the faculty, most don't grade on a curve/scale. Science doesn't either, including advanced.

 

[_traveler_]

law does. Arts doesn't