[HPCC-Conf] Unusual Calculator

[Richard Schwartz]

When I took my California electrical engineering board exams, I went armed
with an HP-97 and programs for the time value of money (avoided the need to
interpolate in tables), series-to-parallel conversion for capacitors,
inductors, and resistors, and delta-to-wye.   I finished the exam in half
the allotted time.   They probably made some kind of clerical error when
they passed me.   The year was 1978, and personal computing was not yet a
common practice among engineers.  I envision the examination writers to be
senile old men from the late 19th century.

. . . Richard

----- Original Message -----
From: "Philippe J. Roussel" <Philippe.Roussel@imec.be>
To: <hpcc-conf@lists.handheld.org>
Sent: Tuesday, October 01, 2002 5:39 AM
Subject: Re: [HPCC-Conf] Unusual Calculator


>
>
> Tony Duell wrote:
> >
> > > Yesterday at Starbuck's I observed a young lady working with a bright
red
> > > calculator.  It was a five banger with memory.  At the top it said,
"CPA
> > > Examination".    It this the ultimate tyrrany of the educational
> > > establishment?   Is the the ONLY calculator one can use in the exam?
> >
> > I know that some UK universities only allow one (or perhaps 2) models of
> > calculator to be used in their exams. It's not that they limit the
> > functions that said calculators can perform (e.g. 'Not programmable' or
> > 'Not graphical'), they actually specify the model (often Casio fx100).
> > You couldn't use an HP21, for all it does less.
> >
> > IMHO this is bias against RPN users, but...
> >
> > If _I_ was setting an exam, BTW, I'd let you take in any calculator you
> > wanted. And any books/notes. And it would still be fair-but-difficult.
> > Limiting what aids you're allowed simply means the examiners can't set
> > proper questions IMHO.
>
> IMHO, I had a professor that settled this problem once and for all
> already 20 years ago:
> He simply prepared two part exams:
> 1. A theoretical, "knowledge" part: only pen and paper allowed.
>
> After a break,
> 2. A more practical, "show me how you can use your knowledge" part:
> You could bring along and use any piece of computation equipment for that
part
> (even a PC, or a CRAY for that matter, if it would have fitted on your
examination desk at that time...)
> and have access to all of the course material to solve the problems
presented.
>
> I fully agree with the statement of Tony in that respect:
> It's up to the examiners to design proper questions
> that allow them to discriminate whatever they want to find out
> about the result of their teaching...
> In my experience, resistance against that kind of examinations
> mostly comes from examiners unwilling to put a serious effort
> into designing such exams...
>
> I had a steady state electronic circuit analysis program on my HP41C at
that time,
> and was allowed to use it during one of his exams.
> He even questioned me about parts of the code to prove him that I actually
> understood what the code was doing (I designed the program myself,
> so that was not a problem).
>
> > -tony
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > HPCC-Conf mailing list
> > HPCC-Conf@lists.handheld.org
> > http://lists.handheld.org/mailman/listinfo/hpcc-conf