Students read this

melancholly

talksalot81 wrote:

Most unis seem to award a First to anyone above 70%. That really isnt a very high percentage. You can get nearly a third of the degree 'wrong' and still get a first class degree. You can get basically half wrong and still be getting a 2.2 degree which I guess is 'average'. I think the grading is way too easy. Bump it up 10% and then a First really means someone has done very well and it also means slackers at the bottom get less and have to work else they have a genuine risk of failing.

I will note that I am irked because I got a First with nearly 90% yet I get absolutely no acknowledgement above someone with 20% less. That is just plain stupidity.

i would say i know the feeling but for my undergrad degree a first was 67% and i got 67.2 as an average!! but in an essay subject, markers just give a percentage that corresponds to a grade, so it;s slightly different. it;s also really tough for unis to fail students now..... i;ve done some undergrad marking and had to shift everything up by 10% so that the class mean would be 62%....... it;s all quite scary!

how did you get 90% btw? i;m very impressed (and more than a little intimidated!!!)

cupid_s

melancholly wrote:

i would say i know the feeling but for my undergrad degree a first was 67% and i got 67.2 as an average!! but in an essay subject, markers just give a percentage that corresponds to a grade, so it;s slightly different. it;s also really tough for unis to fail students now..... i;ve done some undergrad marking and had to shift everything up by 10% so that the class mean would be 62%....... it;s all quite scary!

how did you get 90% btw? i;m very impressed (and more than a little intimidated!!!)

can i just ask what percentage of your course got a first if you only needed 67%?
it seems low, but as i said before it depends on how individual unis set questions and mark things. it might be easier to get 90% at talksalots uni than to get 67% at yours

DrFluffy

My over all percentage from my first degree is well over 70% - I wont say how much - I think that can be a little crass. I have a 2i, as my uni had a firsts cap - two per subject per year.

Mrs_pbradley936

Melancholy and The Doomed are being unkind to each other. I have this to say. By the time someone reaches their teens and are ready to make choices their backgrounds have already played a part in what those choices will be. The background was not open to choice. Somewhere in between those that went to the local comp and “pulled themselves up by the bootstraps” and those that went to an elite public school and for whom money has never been an object are the rest of the population.

In my experience money does not make a difference to educational prospects. It can buy smaller classes and more books and ensure a certain parental attitude. However, that parental attitude is not a commodity that can be bought and sold. I hate to say this but it is a class issue rather than a financial issue. They are far from being the same. Middle class homes have values and priorities which have been in place since the child was born. Children of middle class mothers will be read to, listened to and encouraged. They will be introduced to a wide range of interests such as music, sport and art galleries quite independently of school. This has got nothing to do with money because Chavs have a different set of priorities i.e. designer clothes for the children. When it comes to GCSE’s middle class homes will be able to talk about Shakespeare, George Eliot and so on. Even if they know nothing about the subject they will ensure that their son or daughter has a quite place to study, all the right equipment and devotes plenty of time to it.

I think any pomposity comes from people like me who having tried to ensure the best for our offspring are compared to those who have as much or more money coming in but who let their children under achieve.

cupid_s

DrFluffy wrote:

My over all percentage from my first degree is well over 70% - I wont say how much - I think that can be a little crass. I have a 2i, as my uni had a firsts cap - two per subject per year.

go on - how much over 70%

how many people generally take one subject at your uni? if there are 200 people then 2 allowed a first is a bit harsh. if there's only 15 on the course it's completely justifiable.

DrFluffy

Just under 100 people.

The year before my graduation year (which was my original year - I took a self organised year in industry), 10% of the year got firsts - hand on heart (and given I can compare them to the year I graduated with) it was because there were some seriously bright bunnies on the course. However, the statistic stood out big time, and the uni imposed a cap for my year.

The decision for the first first was an easy - a total brainiac! The second first was between myself and another girl. Viva apparently couldn't separate it, and she got it because I did my disertation on my year in Industry - apparently having an advantage.

The thing that really narked me was that she did hers in Industry too - over the summer holidays. All she had to concentrate on was her project, while I had to do 'normal' work as well. The committee didn't know that though, and because I'd had a year out, it was obvious on my record.

Heh ho! I'm over that though - didn't stop me getting in to Oxford, so must not grumble. Plus I always put my over all % on any application form that asks for degree result - you can almost guarentee interview, for no other reason than they want to ask you why you *only* have a 2i!

melancholly

cupid_stunt wrote:

can i just ask what percentage of your course got a first if you only needed 67%?
it seems low, but as i said before it depends on how individual unis set questions and mark things. it might be easier to get 90% at talksalots uni than to get 67% at yours

i'm not sure - but i think 10/15%.........
with essay based exams, people just give a 'first' %age or a '2:1' %age on whatever scale they use. i'd like to hope it wasn't easy to get a first on my degree but that's obviously a biased opinion because i don't want my degree devalued!!

melancholly

pbradley936 wrote:

Melancholy and The Doomed are being unkind to each other.

i know.... and i shouldn't rise to the bait - i just really resented being called a "****ing moronic pompus ****" for no reason!!

cupid_s

melancholly wrote:

i'm not sure - but i think 10/15%.........
with essay based exams, people just give a 'first' %age or a '2:1' %age on whatever scale they use. i'd like to hope it wasn't easy to get a first on my degree but that's obviously a biased opinion because i don't want my degree devalued!!

all our exams were essay based in the third year also. we did a bit of coursework - normally 10-20% of the final module mark. apart obviously from lab based modules.
from drfluffy's quote just above it was about 2% of students on her course that got 1sts. Here it was 13 out of just under 300 - so about 4%.

therefore 10-15% getting firsts is ridiculously high and well above national average.

melancholly

cupid_stunt wrote:

all our exams were essay based in the third year also. we did a bit of coursework - normally 10-20% of the final module mark. apart obviously from lab based modules.
from drfluffy's quote just above it was about 2% of students on her course that got 1sts. Here it was 13 out of just under 300 - so about 4%.

therefore 10-15% getting firsts is ridiculously high and well above national average.

i can see how it can look like that...... the explanation is that to get onto it as a third year option you had to get a first in your second year exams - so it's a course that had a lot of high scoring people. other third year options had a distribution of mainly 2:1's and 2:2's and others still had mainly 2:2's and 3rds..... so it isn't that high over the entire yeargroup - but I don't know exact numbers. i do know that my uni didn't have capped numbers of firsts, but exceptional students got starred firsts (although no-one on my course in my year managed that!)