Do professors ever allow a change in the weighing of tests?

[Oscillator]

Specifically for UofT? I wanted to approach two professors for two classes where I did very horrible on the midterms. The worst part about it was that I understood the concepts but unfortunately pulled an all-nighter before the tests in a last attempt to retain more information and do more problems. I want to approach the profs and ask them if they could weigh the upcoming term tests and the final exam more than my first tests, as the final tests would be comprehensive and would test my knowledge of the material covered on the first tests.

[thorton70]

I had a prof do this once for me. He ended up offering the same deal for "fairness" to the class. It was a 3 class test, 20, 20, 60. He offered to drop the first one to 5 and make it 5, 20, 75. Was pretty stressful, but I managed a 91 in the class so it worked. Just make sure you offer a lot, like make or break.

[mottov2]

some profs do it.

I got a 65 in midterm calculus last year and ended with 91 after my prof shifted the weight lol

[nauru]

Just about everything is negotiable... especially at university.

[magictrickx]

This happens quite often. A lot of the time they even do it without being asked by students. Either a midterm mark gets dropped and your "top _" marks count or they just weight the midterms differently.

They will likely help you out, especially if they know who you are.

[Peripatetic]

I had a couple of science professors at U of T -- for a psychology course and a geology course -- who regularly awarded bonus marks to every student on tests and exams. An extra 5-10% worth, tacked onto your final grade, just because they felt like it. You don't see that much with humanities professors at U of T.

[BryceS]

This is a lot more common than bell curves.

[chinaboy1021]

Yea they are allowed to do it, but it would be a class-wide application of the new weight, it cannot be on an individual basis.