Dropping an exam common in college?

[1010btf]

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Hi guys, I go to a University where every science class pretty much offers you to drop the lowest exam...
You usually get 3 exams, and a final,
and you drop one of the 3 exams..

Is this common in other schools?

 

[GoSpursGo]

This happened in a lot of our intro classes, but it wasn't the case in the upper division classes. We're a small liberal arts school where our common curriculum requires everyone to take at least one class in the natural sciences, so it's basically a way so that all of the humanities people won't fail horribly.

 

[bluesmd]

i'm at a big research school and i know a few econ profs who did this but no other teachers. however, if you do real well in the final they may re-weight the midterm so it counts less against you. and once again, not all profs do that. i think it's all very subjective

 

[efitzpat]

The chemistry department at my school does it.

 

[JeetKuneDo]

My physics dept. does this. You take 3 exams and a final, all are equal in weight. Lowest weighted test is dropped, so if you aced all tests, then you can choose to skip the final.

 

[hedgehog1]

I wish. 🙁

 

[JeetKuneDo]

I wish. 🙁

I wish I had a pet hedgehog too. 😀

 

[NDPitch]

That was only the case in my huge intro classes. In some of those classes, an 85 was A. Oh how I miss those days. Now it seems impossible to get a 93 average to get that A.

 

[ksmi117]

This has happened in all of my biology and physics classes, even the upper level ones, and most of my chemistry classes. I, personally, think it's stupid, but maybe I'm just bitter because my department doesn't do that. It just seems to me that my school is trying to make it as easy as possible for our science students to have high GPA's, even when they don't exactly deserve them.

Now, if dropping the final was an option, I wouldn't be so annoyed by it. I'd love to drop a final. I usually have 6 or so during that week, so one less would make my life so much easier.

 

[DrWookie]

At my school it depended on the class/teacher. In Ochem we actually had 4 exams and a final (It was really dumb...the last exam was like 2 weeks before the final) and so one of the exams could be dropped.

I didn't think it was that bad considering the average on exams tended to be like 60, a little low.

More teachers I've had let you drop 1 quiz, of which there are maybe 6-8 in the semester. Aside from Ochem i can't think of a class I've taken with an exam drop...I skipped all the intro courses though.

 

[cubssox2000]

Almost all biology classes at my school allow a student to drop the lowest test. Some make up the points by doubling the final if the grade was better than one of the other tests as opposed to straight dropping a test.

 

[Spiker]

I had that for like 2 class so far but it seems that almost all college classes especially the big ones offers some kind of curve, which may be

Dropping 1 exam
or Use final to replace 1 exam
or lower the A cut off
or Curves on every test.

 

[RoadRunner17]

Such things were unheard of in my undergrad classes. But I was an engineering major and did not take any Biology classes. At my post-bac, pretty much all of my classes let us drop a test, which I found to be pretty refreshing after undergrad.