Ever heard that you’ve got Second Grade even after scoring a full monty, i.e, 100 of 100. And that is not even when you are tied with anyone. – Sheesh!! How is that technically possible brah! – Well, that is exactly what happened with the recent First Semester results at Delhi University (DU). Teachers and Students have found out that to achieve the top ‘O’ grade (‘outstanding’) in some subjects under the Choice-Based Credit System (CBCS), students have to score over, 100% marks.
And there goes your chance of becoming an Auror (Generic Harry Potter joke, I know!)
How Is That You Ask?
For Starters
The CBCS needs the examiners to convert absolute marks into letter grades and grade points through a UGC-devised formula. And when was this devised and how, no man knows.
For Main Course
To get an ‘O’ grade, Students need to obtain marks equal or greater than the sum of the mean and 2.5 times the standard deviation. This method has made ‘O’ unachievable for the students of Biomedical Sciences, Biological Sciences and Biochemistry.
For Crying Out Loud
Kirori Mal College Economics teacher, Saumyajit Bhattarcharya, used the UGC formula for 2013 scores in an optional paper written by 102 students. He realised then that to achieve an ‘O’, they would have score 108 and for ‘A+’, they need 100 marks.
For Even that is Odd
He also found out that while students in First Year History most students got ‘O’, but in the more scoring paper such as, Mathematics there was not a single ‘O’ grader. Instead, most of the students got B grade in the subject which Bhattarcharya says is due to the UGC grading method.
For The Love Of Mankind
Teachers fear that this problem may affect other subjects too, as a student’s’ grade is related to examinees across DU and has little to do with individual performance. “A candidate’s grade depends on the performance of all DU students who took that exam. The minimum passing mark too is decided by the cohort. A standard 40% is meaningless,” they concur.
All the best guys….Maybe the best cheat code win ( because this needs one already )!!
