A Few Last Thoughts on Grades

I've found out a bit more about academic honors. The top ten % of the class each year make dean's list. Graduates with a 3.6+ graduate summa cum laude; 3.4+ magna cum laude; 3.0+ cum laude. Also, for each section of each class one student is honored with the highest grade for that class. These students receive a CALI award (the awards are sponsored by the Center for Computer Assisted Learning Instruction) and have their name published on this website. One of my buddies had the best Crim Law test... He didn't realize he had received the honor until some other student, who had seen his name on the website, congratulated him.

I haven't found it anywhere on the Seattle U website, but I've heard from a number of students that the mean average grade for each class is 2.66. I've also heard that this is one of the lowest means in the nation.

Students seem to agree that there is little correlation between how they thought they did on a test and how their grades turned out. A few of my friends felt they might have made major mistakes on one test only to receive an A, but felt like they aced tests only to receive a B-. My experiences, as I noted in a previous post, are very similar.

My goals for this semester are to improve over last semester, and do more work as I go along so that finals might be less stressful.