Finally Finals – How Different Instructors Prepare and Administer Final Exams

By Cleary Percy
Staff Writer
IG: @cleary_percy

December is here, and for Hutchinson Community College students, it’s a time of hustle and bustle, daydreaming about winter break, and yes, studying.

Although Winter break is only a week away, there’s only one dreaded word on the minds of students.

Finals.

As Blue Dragon students begin to prepare (or not) for finals, it raises an interesting question.

How do professors structure their final exams?

Ryan Pinkall, one of HutchCC’s biology instructors, said that his final for lecture is a test that covers a singular unit, for lab, around half of the semester’s content.

“It’s not comprehensive,” Pinkall said.

Pinkall said that the format of having the biology final over Unit 5 was the same before he became one of the biology instructors

“I would like to have it maybe 25 percent comprehensive, and then 75 percent of new material, just to ensure that retention,” Pinkall said.

Pinkall said he believes that with a general education class, like general biology, a comprehensive final isn’t as essential as one in a class specifically for your major.

On the other hand, Eric Dudley, one of the history professors, has a similar format to Pinkall’s final, but a notable difference.

“I do try and keep a portion of the final as standard to what I do with my earlier exams,” Dudley said.

The first part of the final, which includes multiple choice, fill in the blanks, and identification of lecture terms questions from a group of lectures, is what makes up a normal test.

The second part, however, is a course-long essay question.

“The essay prompts that I use are meant to get students to bring in concepts that we covered throughout the course … big picture ideas,” Dudley said.

The essay, Dudley said, like the first part of the exam, is done in person, on the day of the final.

Length wise, Dudley says he expects three to five pages in an essay format; that is, introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion.

Kim Newberry, a sociology professor, structures her final like a normal test.

“It’s the remaining chapters that we cover from exam three to exam four,” Newberry said.

“It’s multiple choice, it’s a couple of short answer questions, it really looks like every other exam.”

While Newberry’s final isn’t cumulative, she says that the content in the last few chapters covered still relate back to questions that are posed to the class at the beginning of the semester.

“We still address issues that we were talking about at the beginning of the semester (in the final exam),” Newberry said.

Finals week at Hutchinson Community College begins Monday and goes through Thursday.

Views: 97