An Introduction to Statistics

STAB22

STAB22: assessment

• weekly quizzes (20%)
• a 2-hour mid-term examination (30%) usually somewhere around week 6, which includes the material covered up to that point
• a 3-hour final examination (50%)  which includes material from the whole course

The examinations are multiple-choice; the quizzes will contain short-answer written questions. There will be no heavy calculation required.

Quizzes take place in tutorial time:

• The purpose of the quizzes is to help you keep up with the material: that is, their main purpose is education rather than assessment (which is why they are not worth more than 20%). An honest attempt at the quizzes will help you prepare for the exams.
• You will need to attend the tutorial for which you are registered (unless you prefer to get a mark of zero for your quizzes). 
• Each tutorial section gets a different quiz (we have a question bank from which we randomly draw the questions for each quiz). 
• Each quiz will have two questions requiring written answers. 
• Full marks for each part of each question can be obtained by doing a short calculation or writing one sentence of explanation (this is what "explain briefly" means on the quizzes). 
• If you write more than this, expect to lose marks. In particular, if you write too much, the TA may not be able to find even a correct answer, and you risk getting zero. 
• Likewise, writing too little can also lose you marks: unless the question asks only for an answer, you should give enough of your reasoning for the TA to figure out how you got your answer. This is what "calculate" means in a question: show the steps of your calculation rather than just giving your answer. If you give an answer only and it is wrong, you get zero, whereas a wrong answer with explanation might get partial credit.
• You will need to develop good judgement about how much to write.
• The quizzes are open-book - for these, you may use any books or notes you wish. Bear in mind, however, that your time is limited, and you will therefore need to spend time beforehand organizing your materials so that you can quickly find what you need. 
  
• The quizzes are designed to be completed in 10 minutes or so, but we will give you more time than that. 
• The first tutorial, and first quiz, will be in the 2nd week of classes, and there are 10 quizzes altogether.
• Each quiz is on the material from the previous week (and not the current week) of lectures.  
• At the end of the semester, your worst quiz mark is dropped (if you missed any quizzes, this will be a 0) and the remaining 9 quiz marks are averaged up to give your quiz grade.