Job Description—Coordinator of Proficiency Exams
1. Regular Proficiency Exams, five times a year.
Proficiency exams in nearly all undergraduate Mathematics courses are offered on
the first and seventh Saturdays in the Fall and Spring semesters, and on the first
Saturday of the Summer II term. Graduate students are paid to proctor the exams
and grade the calculus and other 100 and 200-level exams. The faculty coordinator
must find faculty graders for the 300 and 400-level exams, approve the grading
done by graduate students, and get the results to the Undergraduate Office within a
week or so after the exams.
2. New Student Week Math 220 exam, twice a year.
A special computer-based multiple choice Math 220 proficiency exam is given just
before the Fall and Spring terms to entering students only. Again, graduate
students are paid to proctor the exam, but the faculty coordinator should see to it
that someone gets the computer answer sheets to the Armory (Chris Migotsky, 247
Armory, 3-3490) for grading and the results are then returned to the Undergraduate
Office promptly.
3. Proficiency Exam Maintenance.
Three large cardboard boxes contain copies of current proficiency exams and
handwritten solutions for most. Cherri Davison maintains the TeX files for the
exams in the main office. During 2004-2005 several misprints and coverage errors
were found in the regular exams, and the faculty coordinator had to make
appropriate changes in the exams. At the time of this writing, the Undergraduate
Affairs Committee feels that the special Math 220 exam may need to be changed
because its importance may increase.
4. Student consultations.
Sometimes students considering taking proficiency exams have questions which
need a response from a faculty person, and Cherri sends those students to the
faculty coordinator. Sometimes students want to see their graded exams or
question the grading, and the faculty coordinator has to handle such inquiries.
Written by Larry Dornhoff, April 1, 2005