It's essentially a rating based on the aggregate quality/quantity of your contributions, and it's highly subjective. Unless he's changed his practice, he doesn't "notify" people how many points they received--it just gets lumped into your final grade. I know I got three points, but only because I talked to him after the exam and he explained how the grading worked.RareExports wrote:This is a question for those who have taken (and hopefully done well in) DeGeest's Contracts.
The syllabus indicates that he gives up to ten students up to three bonus points each for "excellent contributions in class." If anyone knows -- does he notify the recipients? And is it a system where each excellent contribution is one point and up to three are acknowledged, or is there a gradient of excellency in which two or three points may be earned for a more excellent contribution?
Thanks!
Given how huge 3 points can be (in terms of the grading scale I was on, from 70-100), I was willing to contribute way more often than would normally be acceptable in law school. It probably didn't endear me to my peers, but I didn't do it in other classes, so hopefully they didn't judge me too harshly. But I will say, it's probably not worth gunning for those points unless you have a pretty good feel for what he wants to hear (and you get what's going on in class). One of my friends (she may chime in here, if she still checks these boards) spoke up pretty often, but she was never able to phrase ideas in the idiosyncratic way he wanted to hear them. I think he gave her 1 point.
