Course Components
Here are the basic (by which we mean "important" (by which we mean "they affect your grade" (of course))) components of this course — in alphabetical order.
Exams
There will be three exams, not including the final. Each will focus primarily on the material covered since the previous exam, but anything covered during the semester up to that point is fair game. The final will be semi-cumulative: about half of the exam will focus on material since the previous hour exam, but the other half will range over material from the entire semester. Barring extenuating circumstances (and it is entirely up to your professors to decide what is an acceptable circumstance), no make-up exams will be given. You are strongly encouraged to contact your professors in advance if you know you will be absent for an exam.
Lab Notes
Keeping an accurate, legible, and complete laboratory notebook is an absolute requirement of this course. Your notebook may be maintained electronically (although using a laptop or tablet in lab is not without risks) or on paper. If you want to re-copy your notes, that's fine, but we are only concerned with your "official," written-in-lab notes.
Your professors will examine your notes weekly and give you feedback on them; your lab notes will be factored into many of your lab report grades. They will also collect your notebooks at the end of the semester; your notebooks will be available to you for a portion of the final exam, so do a good job with them!
Lab Reports
Your professors will be asking for lab reports for almost every lab we do. Usually these will be in a straightforward short-answer format, but we will let you know what we expect for each lab as they arise. Each report will be worth 50 points.
For group reports, they must be group efforts. Every group member's name should of course appear on it, and every member must initial the front/top somewhere, indicating that he or she has read the final report and accepts responsibility for its contents.
Only your top 10 lab reports will count toward your final grade. This means that you only need to turn in 10 lab reports over the course of the semester (but may of course turn in all 11).
Assignments
We will give occasional miscellaneous assignments over the course of the semester. These will be worth whatever points we announce at the time. We anticipate that there will be a total of 100 to 200 points in this category by the end of the semester.
Participation
Class participation will necessarily be somewhat subjective, but will encompass just that: participating in class. It's important that you are present; we will give you 1 point for every class session you attend in its entirety (so don't be late!). Beyond that, the remaining 80 points of the participation category will reflect active participation. You will earn these points by asking questions, answering questions, being prepared to discuss whatever topics arise — you're not children, you know what is meant by the term "participation."
For reasons that are not entirely clear to me, Moravian College considers this to be a personal page. Therefore it is incumbent on me to point out that "The views expressed on this page are the responsibility of the author, Christopher Jones (cjones-at-moravian-dot-edu) and do not necessarily reflect Moravian College or Moravian Theological Seminary policies or official positions."