Dear Students in PHY 184B and 234B,

This is a reminder message about our second exam. You are going
to take Exam #2 online. Between Tuesday, July 9th, 6:00 PM EDT and
Wednesday, July 10th, 4:30 PM EDT time you will have a 22.5 hour
long time window to start to take Exam #2. Exam #2 is one hour long.
The exam is going to be based on homework sets 4, 5 and 6; and
chapters 25 through 30 from the text book.

Please, schedule Exam #2 with Examity. Log in to LON-CAPA. Click on
the "Go to Examity Dashboard here" folder right after the syllabus,
then on the "Let's Go To Examity Dashboard" item and then on the
"Access Examity Dashboard" link. Don't wait until the last moment.

It is important to schedule your exam. The "On-demand" scheduling
didn't work well like it did in the past. The number of proctors
assigned to on-demand exams were low. When there were no on-demand
proctors available, the system didn't let the students start their
exams. Please, plan ahead, and schedule your exams. Scheduled exams
worked very well. If you paid $5 or more on the "on-demand" feature,
and you visit me this coming Fall, I will refund your fee. My office
is BPS 1253, you just have to knock.

For the exam you will need a generic handheld scientific calculator
(with sqrt, sin, cos, tan, exp, ln, rad, deg) with fresh batteries.
Graphing calculators are allowed, but not necessary. TWO single sides
of help sheets are allowed with formulas, laws and figures: one sheet
from the first exam and a second sheet for this exam. We will not have
explicit questions from the material covered by the first exam, but
the knowledge of that material will be implicitly assumed. You can
also have scrap paper. Please, also have your picture ID with you.
Without your picture ID the proctor will not allow you to start the
exam.

The exam will have about ten problems. Some of the problems will have
more than one part. The questions will be multiple choice type, some
numerical and some conceptual. The problems will be very similar to
the homework problems, so the best way to prepare for the exam is to
go through all the questions in the homework sets.

A practice exam and an answer key is now available at the
web.pa.msu.edu/people/nagy_t/ address. Try to take the practice exam under
realistic conditions: alone in a quiet room with a calculator and with
your help sheets only in 60 minutes or less. When you are done, you will
be able to grade yourself using the answer key.

After the regular exam you will get a second chance to answer the same
set of questions as a homework. It will be called "Correction #2". You
can work on the correction exam for several days, not just for one hour.
You will find the correction exam in the "Correction #2" folder. If your
score is higher on the correction exam than on the regular exam, then
30 percent (0.30) of this positive difference will be added to your exam
score. If your score on the correction exam is lower, or you don't touch
the correction exam at all (it is optional), then you just keep your
original exam score and you don't lose any points. My advice: solve the
correction perfectly to maximize your score gain even if you think you
did well on the exam. You will be able to monitor your correction score
as you solve the correction exam by clicking on the "Grades" link, but
the exam score will be published only AFTER the due date of the
correction exam.

The maximum number of points achievable on a midterm exam is 50. The
weight of a midterm exam in your final grade is 12% in PHY 184B and 20%
in PHY 234B. The exam score and the correction score are combined together
as shown in the following example: If your exam score is 31, and your
correction score is 48, then your total score is 31+0.3*(48-31)=31+5.1=36.1
giving you a contribution of 12%*36.1/50=8.664% toward your grade in
PHY 184B and a contribution of 20%*36.1/50 = 14.44% in PHY 234B. If
your correction score is between 0 and 31 inclusive (in this example),
then you don't gain anything, but you don't lose anything either. You
will just keep your 31 points without any change.

The correction exam will open up on July 10th, Wednesday late night at
around 10 PM, and it will be due on July 15th, Monday, at 11:59 PM.
The next homework set will be due on July 18th, Thursday, at 11:59 PM.

Thank you very much for reading this message and saving it!

Please, check your Examity profile, and update it, if anything has
changed, for example your time zone. Please, schedule Exam #2 with
Examity, if you haven't done it yet. Thank you!

Tibor Nagy (nagytibo@msu.edu, web.pa.msu.edu/people/nagy_t/)