|
| 2023-12-14 | Initially, I heard many negative feedback from seniors about the course, but I quickly realized they were mistaken. |
| 2023-12-12 | An awakening! |
| 2023-05-25 | Templates on sale, anyone? |
| 2023-05-23 | Who is to blame? The Observatory? Or yourself? |
| 2023-05-20 | I hope all students would be just as willing to learn and reach out for help from us! |
| 2023-05-05 | Can students late-drop their worst performing course? |
| 2023-01-16 | We shall overcome! We shall overcome the GPA killer's challenge! |
| 2022-12-30 | Rules! We follow rigid rules! |
| 2022-12-30 | I am honest. Why don't you trust me? |
| 2022-12-17 | How many times do I have to repeat before you listen and follow my instructions? |
| 2022-12-06 | Teaching Innovation Award |
| 2022-11-07 | Our expectation: 10 hours per week for 12 weeks! |
| 2022-09-28 | Is it possible to late drop? |
| 2022-06-21 | Why not implement zoom invigilation on top of personalized exam papers? |
| 2022-03-21 | DO NOT PANIC. YOU CAN DO IT. WE CAN HELP YOU, ABSOLUTELY FREE!!! |
| 2022-01-27 | Can you help supervise my project? |
| 2022-01-19 | Please help me to enroll in Introductory Microeconomics NOW! |
| 2022-01-15 | Thank you, for putting in your best effort, thus letting me achieve what I wanted to achieve. |
| 2022-01-06 | It is never easy to face failure, but it can be an important learning experience. |
| 2021-12-30 | University life is not just about getting good grades, but also exploring your limit and understanding yourself. |
| 2021-10-04 | Reasons for disapproving late drop requests |
| 2021-08-04 | It takes two to tango! |
| 2021-08-02 | ECON1210 a killer course? KF Wong a killer? |
| 2021-07-20 | Shock and sad to see student's poor performance in 2021 Spring |
| 2021-07-14 | Cooling-off period |
| 2021-03-17 | Online data are cheap and easy to find, but they have limitations! |
| 2021-02-08 | Mini-projects to build up research ability (1) |
| 2021-01-11 | Be our advisor, please! |
| 2020-12-21 | Why do we need this transparency? For fairness! For learning! |
| 2020-11-23 | You want to build some muscle but do not want to use your time exercising? I can help by exercising for you! |
| 2020-11-18 | Feedback to feedback |
| 2020-11-15 | General comments on participant's performance in a competition |
| 2020-11-04 | Yes, 1200+ personalized versions of the test paper! |
| 2020-02-18 | Let students focus on learning, teachers on teaching, and thus together achieve the intended learning outcomes. |
| 2020-02-10 | Online learning requires Discipline, DISCIpline, DISCIPLINE! |
| 2019-01-15 | Supposedly not difficult to get a B grade. |
| 2018-12-11 | This quality is more important than grades. |
| 2018-11-15 | Late dropping |
| 2018-11-15 | Unreliability of average SETL scores due to the high non-response rate |
| 2018-11-13 | Let go! |
| 2018-10-24 | No, please do not use my lecture time for your society's announcement. |
| 2018-09-26 | Scheduling an appointment |
| 2018-08-27 | None of my business |
| 2018-08-21 | Course evaluation bounds and response rate |
| 2018-08-09 | Be a responsible job applicant |
| 2018-02-10 | No calories browsing.... |
| 2018-01-24 | Would "uncertain" help your postgraduate study application? I would say, CERTAINLY NOT! |
| 2017-09-14 | When helping your friend is NOT HELPING YOUR FRIEND! |
| 2017-09-13 | My life as a student -- AGAIN |
| 2017-09-05 | You like easy grade, easy honor, easy graduation? |
| 2017-07-18 | My Facebook friends, please protect me just as I protect you. |
| 2017-07-12 | An internship |
| 2016-03-01 | You know me. But, do I know you? |
| 2015-12-17 | Why learning fails to happen despite the great design of the course and the great teacher? |
| 2015-10-20 | Can I trust you, my friend? |
| 2015-10-17 | If we have the second chance to "retake", failing or getting a low grade would not be so stressful. Currently, at the University of Hong Kong, students are not allowed to retake courses they have passed. They are allowed to retake only courses they failed. This is unfortunate because there are students who would like to retake a course to strengthen their foundation to better prepare themselves for the next advanced courses. At the same time, teachers would like weaker students to retake the foundation courses before they move on to the more advanced ones.
At issue are students who barely pass a course. These students are eligible to move on to more advanced courses, but are likely to have trouble performing in the more advanced courses due to their weak foundations. For instance, I would love to ask our Economics and Finance major students who have gotten a grade of "D" in their first take of Introductory Microeconomics course to retake it before they advance to Intermediate Microeconomics. I would not impose the same requirement on students who have no intention to pursue Intermediate Microeconomics. The problem is, under the current university regulations, I cannot advise and allow my students to do so.
(While it is possible, I consider it unlikely that students who barely passed a foundation course can sit in the foundation course again by themselves or review the foundation materials before taking the advanced courses.)
What I propose here is to give students a "nudge". Let them retake any courses they have passed as many times as they want to. Their grades on these retaken courses will be based on the grades of the latest take. To make it fair to students who make it through in one take, students retaking a course will be awarded a maximum of grade B range, instead of the usual maximum of grade A range. And, we can also limit the number of courses to retake and the type of courses to retake. For instance, we can stipulate that retake is allowed only on "core" courses with a maximum of three times.
The policy will likely improve our intended learning outcome and the maintenance of our standard (as specified by standard referencing). With such policy, academic advisors will be able to prescribe a retake to a student before advancing. By pulling up the level of our student's foundation, I believe the intended learning outcome is better served. Teachers may worry less about failing students because students failing a course will have the chance to "replace" his failure grade by a maximum of "B" range. Standard is thus more likely maintained.
In addition, knowing that they can retake a course, students are less likely to stress out due to examinations. And, we would not need to see so many students in Faculty Review Committees and CEDARS seeking counselling.
I checked briefly. Many universities have adopted similar policy. I list only a few for your reference:
University of Illinois at Chicago: https://registrar.uic.edu/student_records/course_repeat.html
Johns Hopkins: http://web.jhu.edu/registrar/students/registration/gradeRetake
University of Pennsylvania: https://www.college.upenn.edu/retaking-courses
UC Berkeley: http://registrar.berkeley.edu/staff_resources/academic_records_transcripts/courserep.html
My proposal is preliminary and may seem naive and immature. Nevertheless, hopefully it will generate some useful discussion within this University.
| 2015-09-18 | My first-hand experience on why learning is not taking place in lectures! | | 2015-08-20 | Are you sure Econometrics is useless? | | 2015-05-04 | Eating 100 bowls of rice in a day | | 2015-01-31 | You say you love me. How can I tell whether you truly love me? | | 2014-10-24 | I would be happy to write recommendations letter for your PhD or Master application if .... | | 2014-10-23 | Master of Finance at MIT | | 2014-10-06 | Are you sure what you saw was black? | | 2014-03-05 | GOLDEN opportunity -- only to the hard-working students. | | 2014-03-01 | What to do when your teacher's teaching style does not fit your learning style? | | 2013-11-28 | A negative experience? Not completely. It can be made into a positive one! | | 2013-11-27 | Many thanks for your appreciation of my teaching (II) | | 2013-07-23 | My next stop is Barcelona! | | 2013-06-01 | Her decision to pursue Master of Finance after her undergradaute study at HKU | | 2012-11-10 | What should I do at HKU (activities versus study and many other things)? | | 2011-09-12 | Coach, can you teach me to swim? | | 2010-02-18 | How government policy with good intention can create frustration and political instability? | | 2009-12-01 | Cherish our beloved ones who are still around us -- when we still can! | | 2009-11-27 | Trust your teachers, but don't trust them blindly! | | 2009-11-26 | You can give me a low score but please write some comments to help me improve my teaching. | | 2009-08-26 | The similarity in health care service provision and fire fighting service provision | | 2009-03-23 | Be brave. Visit your teachers. Ask them questions. Your teachers are a lot nicer than you think. | | 2009-03-14 | How can you verify this is really you -- Dr. Ka-fu Wong of HKU? | | 2009-03-09 | I dream to work in the business sector. Should I pursue a master degree before I join the private sector? | | 2009-02-19 | Any economist can predict this... Can you? | | 2008-12-21 | My students performed poorly in the final exam.
Help me help them.... please. | | 2008-12-20 | Learning should not end with the final exam! | | 2008-11-19 | Exchange in Europe can be very rewarding! | | 2008-11-18 | UC Berkeley is my top choice for exchange! | | 2008-11-02 | Why did we not have fresh mushrooms twenty years ago? | | 2008-02-23 | Dialogue is preferred to monologue. | | 2008-02-13 | If I were a single unemployed old man who lives on Comprehensive Social Security Assistance (CSSA) | | 2007-12-17 | Is forecasting a pure guessing game? | | 2007-12-16 | I want zero emission of CO2! | | 2007-11-30 | How would I choose universities for exchange? | | 2007-11-28 | Excuse me. Can you write a recommendation letter for me? | | 2007-11-12 | No pain, no gain! | | 2007-09-14 | Teaching is to be enjoyed, and so is studying. Grades should only be secondary. | |