ENGR 101 | University of Michigan

Assessment Logistics

Assessment Goals

Our goal for assessments in ENGR 101 is for you to be able to assess your knowledge level of the course material. Therefore, we are creating assessments that directly mirror the work we have been doing in ENGR 101. 

We will not create purposefully difficult assessments just so we can get an “exam distribution” of grades. We will try very hard to create a good assessment that thoroughly checks your understanding of the course content, especially those topics and skills that are most important for your future engineering careers.

We intend for this assessment to be a good “in the moment” indicator of your ENGR 101 knowledge and skills. We hope that you will take the assessment seriously in that you will prepare for the assessment and put forth good effort in taking the assessment. But we do not recommend that you spend hours and hours preparing for the assessment – that defeats the purpose of having this assessment check your “in the moment” knowledge. Some preparation and organization would be great (see below for some tips), but it is not our goal to have you overly stress about assessments in this course.

Assessment Procedure

• You will take the assessment online via PrairieLearn. Each assessment has a practice assessment and the real assessment. The practice assessment will be available one week prior to the real assessment. The real assessment will be available when the assessment window opens.

• The assessment dates are as follows for the Fall 2024 semester. All times are Ann Arbor times.
  • Assessment 1: Wednesday, September 18, 2024 at 12:01 AM through Thursday, September 19, 2024 at 11:59PM.
    • The late submission deadline for Assessment 1 is Thursday, September 26, 2024 at 11:59PM.
  • Assessment 2: Wednesday, October 2, 2024 at 12:01 AM through Thursday, October 3rd, 2024 at 11:59PM.
    • The late submission deadline for Assessment 2 is Thursday, October 10, 2024 at 11:59PM.
  • Assessment 3: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 at 12:01 AM through Thursday, November 7, 2024 at 11:59PM.
    • The late submission deadline for Assessment 3 is Thursday, November 14, 2024 at 11:59PM.
  • Assessment 4: Wednesday, November 20, 2024 at 12:01 AM through Thursday, November 21, 2024 at 11:59PM.
    • The late submission deadline for Assessment 1 is Thursday, November 28, 2024 at 11:59PM.

• You may start the assessment anytime during the “open” window.

• The assessment will be randomized. Each student will receive a randomly selected version for each question, selected from a large question bank.

• Once you start the assessment, you have 75 minutes to complete it. The PrairieLearn system will keep time for you. (If you have extended time accommodations through the SSD office, your allowed time will be adjusted accordingly.) We have designed the assessment to be comfortably completed in less than 60 minutes, if you are a well-prepared student. We added 15 minutes extra to account for technology issues and to help make sure no one is unduly rushed in taking the assessment.

• But it is up to you to make sure you have enough time to finish the assessment. Here is a graphic from PrairieLearn with more detail about starting the assessment and how that may impact the amount of time you have available to complete the assessment (note that this example is for a 90 minute assessment, and our assessment is 75 minutes): 

• You may answer the questions in any order.

• In line with the CoE honor code, the assessment will not be proctored (i.e. you don’t need to take the assessment with a webcam).

• You will sign an abbreviated version of the CoE honor code at the beginning of the assessment, just prior to starting the assessment on PrairieLearn.

• Make sure to save your answers by clicking the “Save” button for each question.

• When you are done, you can click “Finish assessment” to close out your assessment session. If you forget to do this, PrairieLearn will automatically close your assessment when the timer runs out.

Assessment Content and Online Practice Assessment

• The material each assessment covers is as follows:
  • Assessment 1: content from Homeworks 1-8, Labs 1-3, and high level concepts for Project 1.
  • Assessment 2: content from Homeworks 1-11, Labs 1-5, Project 1, and high level concepts for Project 2.
  • Assessment 3: content from Homework 12-17 and Labs 8-10, and high level concepts for Project 3.
  • Assessment 4: content from Homework 12-20 and Labs 8-13, Project 3, and high level concepts for Project 4.

• There is a practice assessment available on PrairieLearn. Please make sure to take this practice assessment prior to taking the actual assessment so that you know what kinds of questions to expect on the actual assessment.

• You are able to “grade as you go” for the practice assessment. Please do this to help yourself understand which topics you understand well and which topics you should review prior to taking the actual assessment.

• The practice assessment IS available during the actual assessment, but please PLEASE be careful to take the actual assessment before it closes!

Asking Questions During the Assessment Window

• We have thoroughly tested all of the assessment questions, and we are confident that the questions are working the way they are supposed to. Please make sure you understand the practice assessment questions prior to taking the actual assessment, as this will help you to be well-prepared for the assessment.

• We will not answer questions about the actual assessment until after the assessment has closed, to be fair to all students taking the assessment. This includes no assessment questions during in-person office hours or on Piazza.
• We are happy to talk about the practice assessment, however, as much as you want.

Allowed Resources & Cheating

• The assessment will be “open everything” including notes, homework, your lab and project code, other course resources, or Internet resources, including online MATLAB documentation. You’re also welcome to use MATLAB during the assessment if you find it helpful.

• You are welcome to search for anything online, but you are not allowed to solicit help from others (e.g. posting an assessment question on StackOverflow, Chegg, Slader, Course Hero, ChatGPT, etc. asking for help).

• As always, collaboration with others in any form is prohibited and considered an honor code violation.

Common Student Concerns About Cheating

• ENGR 101 is not graded on a curve. This reduces the temptation to cheat “because everyone else is going to cheat so I have to as well otherwise I will get a bad grade.”

• Open notes/resources reduces, or even eliminates entirely, the need to memorize course content; therefore, there is less temptation to cheat by having unauthorized resources.

• This is a timed assessment and the questions are randomized. We expect this combination to make cheating by collaboration much more difficult. 

• This assessment is designed to be finished with time to spare by a student who is well-prepared for the assessment. If you are organized, have reviewed your project code, and can quickly locate examples to use as a “template” for your code writing/code assembling (see the PrairieLearn practice assessment), then you should have plenty of time to complete each question and have time to review your answers.

• You can save your answers after each question. Therefore, if your internet temporarily goes out, you can return to the assessment with all of your answers saved. No need to cheat because all your answers were lost!

• The assessment may also include other unspecified countermeasures to make cheating more difficult, or at least incredibly confusing for the would-be cheaters. We wish we could share the details, because they’re entertaining, but that would defeat the point.

Preparing for the Assessment

• We recommend that you prepare for the assessment by getting organized. You have many resources that you are allowed to use during the assessment, but if you are not organized, you will waste time looking for information and you run the risk of running out of time.

• You can get organized by creating some quick reference guides for yourself: 

  • Common patterns we’ve used in homework, lab, and projects. List the pattern, what it does, and at least one example that you’ve used.

  • Example functions. List the function, what it does, and at least one example that you’ve used.  

  • Examples from homework and lab. List the example how you remember it (e.g. “Finding the minimum value of a vector” or “the one with the people using scooters” ). Explain to yourself in your words what this example does and then include the code for the example.

  • Project code. List what you’ve done in the projects, describe it in your own words, and make sure you can find your project code quickly for examples. 

• The assessment will follow the same format as the practice assessment, so make sure you have looked at that practice assessment at least one day prior to when you plan to take the assessment.

• Look at your schedule for the semester NOW and find a time when you will be able to take each assessment in an environment that is comfortable for you. Then, go ahead and add “take ENGR 101 Assessment” to your schedule so that you will remember to take it! 

Assessment Retake

As previously stated, our goal with assessments in ENGR 101 is for you to check whether you have a solid understanding of the course material. It follows, then, that if you do not have a solid understanding, we want to help get you back on track!

• If you earn < 90% on the assessment, you may retake that assessment for up to 90% of the original points. Here are the steps to retaking an assessment:

  • Come to in-person office hours after the original assessment has closed
  • Ask for an assessment consultation
  • A GSI/IA will privately and confidentially go over your assessment answers with you and help you straighten out any misunderstandings and answer any questions that you have about the assessment
  • After your consultation, you will receive access to the assessment retake on PrairieLearn
  • Complete the retake before the last day of class
  • Your final score for the assessment will be whichever is higher: your original score or your retake score

• To answer some anticipated questions about retakes: 

  • If you earn ≥ 90% on the assessment, you are not eligible for a retake. You are still welcome to come to office hours to have a staff member go through your assessment with you.
  • Assessment consultations will only be done at in-person office hours. Consultations will not be done via Zoom, not even “just to see my answers”. 
  • In order to be eligible for an assessment retake, you must take the original assessment within the submission or late submission period. If you do not attempt the original assessment during the open period, you will not be eligible for an assessment retake.

Questions About Assessments?

We know that this is a LOT of information. If anything is unclear, please post on Piazza so we can clarify things for you. We want you to be as comfortable and confident as you can be for each assessment.