[Phys-L] Re: student mathematical capability

[Hugh Haskell <hhaskell@MINDSPRING.COM>]

At 10:08  -0400 9/15/05, Edmiston, Mike wrote:
> Today, in general, students don't choose electives that could hurt their
> GPAs, or at least they avoid courses that will take considerable effort
> to assure the course does not hurt their GPAs.  More specifically, since
> many of the math majors are in the "rote memorization of procedure"
> mode, they not only view physics as hard... they don't even view it as
> fun or interesting.
The idea of taking "easy" courses as electives is a double-edged
sword as I found out when seeking to round out some of my "breadth"
requirements as an undergrad. I was told by some fellow students that
a certain course in public health, offered by the education school,
would satisfy a requirement and was a "snap" course--almost a
guaranteed A. So, naively, signed up for it. Now it turned out that
the course was, not surprisingly, almost entirely populated by
freshman women (potential elementary ed majors), a result that under
different circumstances could have been the answer to a dream, but it
wasn't in this case. At the time (I don't know whether it is still
true) my college graded on a fairly strict curve system (after
removing failures, the top 15% got A's, next 35% B, next 35% C, and
the bottom 15%, D). And this course *was* trivially easy, was tested
by simple multiple-choice tests, and put forth was seemed to me at
the time, and mostly still do, some perfectly outrageous ideas as
settled facts. I was set up. On the first test, the median score was
95%. I got a 94, and thus a C. My 94 was because of my absolute
disagreement with the instructor on three of the 50 M/C questions on
the test. Issues that I would still firmly disagree with the
instructor on today. Needless to say, I dropped that course the next
day, and transferred to a more rigorous course, in which, with the
moderate effort I was willing to put forth, I could assure myself of
a B. It also ended up being a much more interesting course.

Sometimes one finds that "not risking" their valued GPA can put it at
considerable risk, to say nothing of their integrity.

Hugh
--

Hugh Haskell
<mailto:haskell@ncssm.edu>
<mailto:hhaskell@mindspring.com>

(919) 467-7610

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