Nursing exam

FutureNurse0201 · Nov 27, 2017

Went to see her. She wasnt at the office, showed up 15 min later and told me to come back in 1.5 hours. Fine, I came back... nope still not at the office.

As much as students can be lazy, annoying and looking for excuses when they fail the exams, there are so many professors who are there just for the salary and think they can do whatever they want. Oh, and also , they are busy and that is an excuse for crappy tests.

I have two exams tomorrow and she just wasted 3 hours of my day. Why not? She is almighty professor

KrCmommy522, BSN, RN · Dec 2, 2017

While I agree that I should have handled the situation better (even when I was cut off in the middle of the sentence by professor's rude remark), I don't think that alternating responses and guessing the right way to answer the questions is acceptable. My program is one of the most expensive and demanding in the country. My scholarship depends on this grade. On top of the demanding program, i work full time, and taking the exams that look like first-grader was writing them is just unacceptable. If school is going to expect maximum from the students, the same goes for professors.

I think what llg said was a great idea for how you could have answered the questions - much better than just skipping the questions you didn't know how to answer.

You say you don't think alternating responses and guessing the right way to answer the questions is accetable? But skipping all the questions was acceptable?

What does your program being "one of the most expensive and demanding in the country" have to do with what llg suggested? llg suggested alternating the method of answering so that you would have gotten at least half of them right - so instead of skipping all the ones you didn't know you to answer - one you could answer by selecting all of the choices but not "all of the above," the next you could answer by just selecting "all of the above" select all of the choices but not "all of the above" or just "all of the above," the next you answer by selecting all of the choices but not "all of the above," the next you answer just "all of the above," etc. It seems like a much better option (in that you would at least have a chance to get half of them right because you answered them both ways, so one of them would be correct), rather than for sure getting all of them wrong for completely skipping them. I think you program would be more "accepting" of trying it both ways since you didn't know which to do than they would be of what you did by just skipping them all.

I can try talking to her but I am afraid it will look like I am trying to boost my score. And I am definitely not saying that "she was worse" but her response made me shut down completely, and I was unable to continue conversation. I had the feeling, one more word and she would kick me out of the classroom (she seriously got mad). So, I went back to my sit and kept staring at the questions, not sure what she wanted us to do. And btw. when she explained the first time what she wanted, I hadn't encountered these questions at that point and had no idea what she was talking about. Also, I was so focused on reading the questions, and didn't fully pay attention when she started talking all of a sudden... but still not sure why it made her so mad.

Why would you be worried she would think you are trying to boost your score? I would hope you wouldn't go in saying something like, "I think these questions were written really poorly and should be thrown out." You just need to go in, eat your pride, and say something along the lines of "I'm sorry, for some reason I really didn't understand how to answer these questions. I wasn't sure if I should have selected all the choices and not "all of the above" or if I should have just selected "all of the above." I have never encountered questions like this before, so when you first brought it up I wasn't completely sure what you meant. Then when I asked you during the exam I was confused about the questions and focused on the question that I didn't fully understand you. So, I just wanted to discuss it with you so I am prepared for the next exam."

Based on what you said she said, the key word is AND. Don't do both. If all of the answers are correct, then you can select them all individually or just select the "all of the above" answer by itself. Do NOT do both.
By your decision to completely skip the "select all" questions, you got them ALL wrong. Don't ever skip questions. At least guess. Most tests don't punish wrong answers. You only get credit for correct answers. No credit for skipped answers.

Mavrick seemed to explain it clearly - your instructor said not to select all the answers AND also select "all of the above" because it will mess up the computer and mark it as wrong. Instead PICK ONE - Either select all the answers OR select "all of the above." No one said anything about getting partial credit. Just that you had to choose one or the other.

By choosing not to do anything YOU are the reason for your poor grade. Sometimes instructios aren't going to always be clear for you to understand - some people explain things differently than you would or make it harder to understand. It's just a fact of life. You need to learn to deal with it. You asked your instructor and didn't get a clarifying response, so you just gave up and didn't answer any of them? That's not your instructor's fault.

If you only have 2 weeks left of this class, this isn't the first exam you've taken. So, is this the first exam that had poorly written questions? As other posters have said, someone else could have typed up this test or there could be a lot of other reasons for the errors in the test. Either way, it was your fault for choosing to completely skip the questions. Also, when the instructor first explained the instructions for answering the questions - wasn't there a student near you that you could have quickly asked for clarification on what the instructor meant before the test started OR better yet, raised your hand and asked the instructor for clarification right then? Why, if you didn't understand what she meant, did you wait until the test had started? I understand you said you never had questions like that so didn't know what she was talking about at first, but you simply could have raised your hand and said that - "I'm sorry. I guess I've never seen a question like what you are describing. Do you mean you want us to choose one or the other - all the correct options or "all of the above"?

Here is an update: got my grade, it is 67% (lowest grade I have ever got). Good news is that the prof made the exam worth 10% instead of 20% (I assume we all did terrible). So far i have 100% on all previous assignments and this does bring my percentage down but not too much. She sent an email to go see her at the office and see the test.
My question is: how do I bring the problem I faced during the exam and not sound as I am blaming my poor grade on her. Do I even say anything? I still feel like her attitude and communication were really poor but, on the other hand, I just want to do be done with class (in two weeks).

It sounds like your instructor realizes the mistakes that were in the exam by taking it down to only 10% credit. That doesn't seem like an evil instructor to me. She could leave it at the original 20%. In that case, you would have to follow the chain of command - discuss the issues with the test with her, and if that gets you nowhere, go to the next person in the chain of command. But, fortunately, you don't have to do that since she dropped the percentage of your grade its worth by half. That sounds like she realizes there were mistakes and is trying to make up for it.

How you bring it up to her?

Again....say something along the lines of "I'm sorry, for some reason I really didn't understand how to answer these questions. I wasn't sure if I should have selected all the choices and not "all of the above" or if I should have just selected "all of the above." I have never encountered questions like this before, so when you first brought it up I wasn't completely sure what you meant. Then when I asked you during the exam I was confused about the questions and focused on the question that I didn't fully understand you. So, I just wanted to discuss it with you so I am prepared for the next exam."

Went to see her. She wasnt at the office, showed up 15 min later and told me to come back in 1.5 hours. Fine, I came back... nope still not at the office.
As much as students can be lazy, annoying and looking for excuses when they fail the exams, there are so many professors who are there just for the salary and think they can do whatever they want. Oh, and also , they are busy and that is an excuse for crappy tests.
I have two exams tomorrow and she just wasted 3 hours of my day. Why not? She is almighty professor

The main point I want to make in this long rant:

You don't know what happened. She might have had some sort of family emergency or something else occur - you just don't know. You havent mentioned once that the instructor has had exams like this before or that the instructor always makes you wait and/or doesn't show up for meetings. Give the instructor the benefit of the doubt - life happens. You never know what is going on in someone else's life.

I had an instructor whose husband was very ill she was his primary caretaker and she had 2 young children. Of course, the student's didn't know any of this. One time a student asket a question and she was very short with the student. Another time she gave us a test that was filled with mistakes and we all did horrible. Of course we were all upset with our grades, but this was so out of the norm. She never gave us exams like that before. She was never short with students before. Not that any of us knew. Then, I went to her office for a meeting. I waited for 2 hours and she never showed. I was so annoyed because I'm a single mom and it was finals week. Turns out, her husband passed away. I felt horrible that I was even annoyed!!

Okay, I'm done with my rant!! Good luck! I hope everything gets resolved!

FutureNurse0201 · Dec 2, 2017

Everything is resolved. Thanks for replies.