My Latest Special Snowflake

Received via email tonight (per­sonal data changed to pro­tect the student’s identity):

hello pro­fes­sor

this is ********** in your ********** class, accord­ing to a friend in the class that you gave back the exam 2 grades in class which i asked you for it before i left the class on mon­day, you told me you didnt have them graded yet and do not know when you will, may i please know my first exam grade(after cor­rec­tions) and the 2^nd exam grade please?
if pos­si­ble, i would like to know my aver­age up to this point before the final exam so i can esti­mate how much i need to get on final in order to get an A in your class, since i do not know any assign­ment grades after the midterm drop point. it was very hard for me with school work this semes­ter. Regard­less of my (med­ical con­di­tion), i kept up with the assign­ment due days (except ch9 hw, my (med­ical treat­ment) pre­vented me to do them on time).

greatly appre­ci­ated if i could get my aver­age in the class.

Dear Stu­dent,

You are cor­rect. Your class’s tests were not yet graded when you asked on Mon­day. They were graded and returned on Wednes­day in class. How­ever, you chose to not come to class on Wednes­day. Your test, along with those of the other stu­dents who were not in class, is in my office.

It is Fri­day night, I am at home, and I am not going back to my office until Mon­day. I do not have a copy of my grade­book at home, nor do I mem­o­rize each student’s test grade as I enter them. There­fore, I will not be able to inform you of your grade until Monday.

As for giv­ing you your aver­age in the class, there is no such thing as an “aver­age” in my classes. Your grade is cal­cu­lated with a rather com­plex for­mula which weights assign­ments, tests, and the final exam dif­fer­ently, and at this point would only tell you your grade for the class if you made a zero on the final.

Rather than worry about “how much you need to get on the final,” I sug­gest you worry about mak­ing sure you have com­pletely mas­tered the mate­r­ial that will be on the final exam. That way, you can ensure that if it is math­e­mat­i­cally pos­si­ble for you to earn a grade of 90 or above in the class, you will do so.

Sin­cerely,

Your Pro­fes­sor