ACC 2510 Examinations

Mid-Term Exams: Two Parts

Each mid-term exam is a "take-home" exam, available to the student at the Course Documents section of the Blackboard site for this course on or before

Part One (multiple choice) must be completed in one sitting within one hour. This is done in exactly the same manner as Quizzes. However, the student will experience a few differences between Exams and Quizzes, as follows:

Before taking an exam, carefully read the Blackboard Student Assessment Guide.

While taking an exam, only one multiple choice or true false question will appear at a time.
The student must answer each question in the order presented; questions cannot be skipped and answered later.
The student will not be able to "backtrack:" to review or change an answer once it is entered and submitted.
Exam questions typically cover a wider range of materials than quiz questions, such as lecture notes, course requirements, outside readings (including Wall Street Journal readings), etc., than quiz questions.

Part Two (short essay) must be completed in one sitting in one hour. Use your own words, and follow each of the recommendations below. Each essay may be as long as a maximum of 500 words, and is graded on content, clarity, thoughtfulness, reasoning, punctuation, capitalization, grammar, syntax, vocabulary, and scholarly tone. Of these, thoughtfulness is the most important, but all affect the grade.

Before taking an exam, carefully read the Blackboard Student Assessment Guide.

Essay Exams are Windows-Sensitive. Never attempt to take an exam from an unstable connection, because if you lose your connection during the exam you will be locked out and lose all credit for the exam (exams may not be taken more than once on the Blackboard system). Also, do not have other software or windows open on your computer when you are ready to take an exam. If you attempt to multi-task during an exam, you run the risk of being locked out of the exam. If you are locked out, you will likely receive zero credit for that exam.
Essay Exams are Graded Manually. Upon completion and submission of your essay exam, you will receive a status notice ("Needs Grading") and a score of "Grade Not Available." In addition, if you View your Grades in the Tools section of Blackboard, your Grade will have a black or blue or purple or gray exclamation mark ! . If you click on that exclamation mark and receive your status notice about the essay exam needing grading, and grading not available, this indicates that you have successfully submitted your essay exam.
Check for Padlocks! If you start to take an exam and you do run into a problem or interruption prior to hitting the button, you might see a padlock symbol instead of a grade when you attempt to View your Grades in the Tools section of Blackboard. In any event, always View your Grades to check for a padlock immediately after submitting any online multiple-choice or essay exam. Unless you are able to have your essay exam reset, you will end up receiving zero credit for that exam, because a padlock symbol is an indication that none of your work was received on Blackboard.
If you start to take an exam and you do run into a problem or interruption prior to hitting the button, and you see a padlock symbol instead of a grade when you attempt to you View your Grades in the Tools section of Blackboard, there is a small chance that you will be able to ask Prof. Spalding to reset your exam (and even then, probably no more than once per semester). Email Prof. Spalding right away (remembering to follow the email protocols for this course), asking him to reset your exam, so that:

(1) IF you email Prof. Spalding plenty of time prior to the deadline for the exam; and
(2) IF Prof. Spalding happens to receive and read your message in plenty of time prior to the due date and time for the exam; and
(3) IF you have not already established a habit or pattern of asking for your quizzes and exams to be reset, then Prof. Spalding may, in response to your email request, agree at his discretion to "clear" your failed attempt to take the exam. (Note, if the error message is simply that you took too long to complete and submit the exam, your exam will not be reset. Instead, a score of zero will eventually be assigned on the Blackboard system.) And, then,
(4) IF you still have time prior to exam deadline, and IF Prof. Spalding has agreed to reset it (#1 through #3 above), you will then be able re-taket the exam "from scratch" and hopefully earn more than the zero that would otherwise have been earned. You will likely have different exam question(s) than you had on your first attempt to take the exam.
No guarantees, of course, so the earlier you take each exam (for example 12 hours before the deadline rather than 2 hours before the deadline), the more likely you will be able to complete it on time. If you wait until two or three hours prior to the deadline to take your exam, you will have assumed the risk of not leaving Prof. Spalding sufficient time to receive and act on your request in time for you to re-take your exam prior to the deadline, and you will therefore receive a zero for that exam.
If you are unsuccessful in having your exam reset in time for you to re-take it, consider that you have invested all of your 50 "slack" points into that exam. But in the future, find your way to a more reliable computer and internet connection (such as a campus lab or library computer), and be sure to re-read this page regarding multi-tasking and the opening of too many windows.

Warning: if you run over the time allotted for the exam, even by one second, you will also not receive credit for that exam. If you start to take an exam and and take one second longer than the allotted time prior to hitting the button, you will likely receive a red exclamation mark ! (or possibly a red question mark ? or a padlock symbol) instead of a grade. When this happens, the red exclamation markor other symbol will eventually be removed, but will be replaced by a zero.

"Accidental" Submission. If you accidentally submit an exam, you will not be able to re-take it. Once an exam is submitted online, it is not subject to change or replacement.

Final Exam: Three Parts

Part One (multiple choice) must be completed in one sitting within one hour. This is done in exactly the same manner as Quizzes the the multiple choice portions of the midterm exams (above).

Part Two (short essay) must be completed in one sitting in 90 minutes. Use your own words, and follow each of the recommendations below. Each essay may be as long as a maximum of 500 words, and is graded on content, clarity, thoughtfulness, reasoning, punctuation, capitalization, grammar, syntax, vocabulary, and scholarly tone. Of these, thoughtfulness is the most important, but all affect the grade.

Part Three. A third part of the exam will be given in-class. This will consist of multiple choice questions, and/or some "fill in the blanks" test (perhaps in the form of a crossword puzzle). The emphasis will be on the vocabulary of terms learned in this course from the lectures, textbook, and readings. Part Three is completed in pencil by the student. This third part of the final examination will be closed book, closed notes, closed everything, and will run for 50 minutes. Be on time.

On the Day of the In-Class Final Exam. The student should arrive on the day of the exam with pencils (#2 pencils preferred) and erasers.

Date of Final Exam. The final exam will be given on the date and at the time scheduled according to the University's Final Exam Schedule. Check the syllabus for further details regarding date, time, and location.

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View Grade and Blackboard "Averages"

After completing a quiz or exam, it is a good idea to Vew your Grades at the Tools section of Blackboard to make sure you did not trigger a padlock (see above). When you do, you might notice "class average" scores on Blackboard. Those averages are automatically calculated by the Blackboard system, and have absolutely nothing to do with your grade or your relative standing in class (the Blackboard averages often include scores of zero for students who have dropped the class, or other irrelevant or confounding data). This course is not graded on a curve, and your Points are calculated in the manner described in the Syllabus. Just ignore the class average statistics shown on Blackboard. They mean nothing.

Disappointed in your performance on the multiple choice portion of your exam? Remember that your exam consist of more one part, and that only the score for the multiple choice part appears automatically upon submission. It is not uncommon for students to perform better on essay exams than on multiple choice exams, especially if the essay exam answers are thoughtful and well-written, and reflect the student's engagement with the lectures, readings, and other activities in this course. Also, as in the case of quizzes, students who do not earn high scores on multiple choice exams, are often able to at least partially offset those lower quiz scores by earning 100 percent of the available points on homework, surveys, class participation, email assignments, and other tasks where thoughtfulness, timeliness, good grammar, and carefully following the instructions, contribute more to the earned points than the technical correctness of the work.

Additional Note Regarding the Writing of Essay Exams

1. Avoid alliteration. Always.
2. Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
3. Avoid cliches like the plague. (They're old hat)
4. DON'T use bold, underlines, italics, CAPITAL LETTERS, and other stylistic flourishes simply for EMPHASIS!
5. Ampersands & abbreviations, etc. are N.A.
6. Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.
7. It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.
8. Contractions aren't necessary.
9. Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.
10. One should never generalize.
11. Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know."
12. Comparisons are as bad as cliches.
13. Don't be redundant; don't use more words than necessary; it's highly
superfluous.
14. Be more or less specific.
15. Understatement is always best.
16. One-word sentences? Eliminate.
17. Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.
18. The passive voice is to be avoided.
19. Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.
20. Even if a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.
21. Who needs rhetorical questions?
22. Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.
23. Eschew obfuscation.
24. Don't use a big word where a diminutive one will suffice.
25. Proofread carefully to see any words left out.
26. You should not address your writing to the second person (i.e., you should not use the word "you"). I don't recommend that you or I use the first person, either (i.e., I should not find the word "I" or "me" or "my" when I read your paper).
27. The word "feel" is not "fair", so don't use either word.