Monday, December 05, 2005

7 Down, 3 to Go

Meaning our exams, of course. This morning's was for Mol, covering RNAi, translation initiation regulation, and nonsense mediated decay. 'Twas, however, less difficult than expected (although this doesn't mean that I still couldn't have gotten things wrong), with several multiple choice questions and the rest short answer, most of which were fairly straightforward from the lectures, rather than being data interpretation or extrapolations from lecture concepts and assigned papers. This would be a welcome surprise, EXCEPT that (1) I didn't have time to finish the majority of the design-your-own-siRNA question (probably the most challenging question) and may not have gotten absolutely everything else right; and (2) the lower-than-expected difficulty level means that the margin for error for the test will be extremely small.

Why is this important? Well, the 1SD spread from the mean (the B range) is already fairly tight and high*, therefore a few points on the exam could have a large negative impact. Le sigh...you just can't win...

Aren't you all so nice to let me vent! Off for that staple food, free pizza...

*Due in no small part, I'm sure of the presence of post-1st year grad students. I'd thought it was primarily 1st years and some undergrads, but found out this weekend that there are 2nd year and at least one 3rd year in the course. Oy!!

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