CS46A/B Lab Rules

  1. The lab is a required part of your course. If you fail the lab, you will fail the course.
  2. You must be present in the lab at the scheduled time. You must arrive at the scheduled time and stay until the lab instructor dismisses the lab. (If you and your partner have completed the lab, you can work on something else.) Sign in and out in order to get credit for the lab. You can't make up a lab. You won't pass the class if you don't show up for at least 80% of the lab sessions.
  3. You work in pairs. (There may be one group of three if there is an odd number of students in the lab. Such an odd group has one driver and two scribes, each of whom writes up the answers in their own words.)
  4. If your lab partner is absent, you must contact the lab instructor and ask to be paired up with someone else. You receive no credit for a lab on which you work alone.
  5. If you are late and your lab partner has already been assigned to work with someone else, you must wait until the lab instructor assigns you a temporary partner. If you are lucky, someone else is late too and you get to work with that person. If not, you won't get points for today's lab. Don't be late—you have a 50% chance of not getting points for the lab. (Actually, that's an oversimplification that assumes that there are lots of latecomers. If you are very late, your chance of not getting points approaches 100%.)
  6. You and your lab partner switch roles each week. One week you are the scribe, submitting answers to the questions; another week, you are the driver, writing code and submitting the code and program output. In order to ensure that you switch, a scribe report is worth more points than a driver report. You won't pass the class if you aren't the scribe at least 40% of the time. Think of being scribe all the time? Not so fast. You only get 2 points if you are the scribe twice in a row.

    If your partner changed, either because your regular partner was absent or the lab instructor reassigned partners, then

  7. The lab instructor assigns the lab partners. Initial assignments are random, but as the class progresses, the lab instructor will attempt to match partners with similar skill levels. You can confidentially request that your lab partner be changed, and a new one will be assigned to you. Do not attempt to work with a self-chosen partner. You will not receive credit for a lab in which you work with a partner that was not assigned to you.
  8. You should attempt to complete each lab, but you are not required to do so if you run out of time. You get full credit for an attempt, provided you turn in your report. You need not finish the work on your own time, but of course it would be a good idea if you did.
  9. You upload in your reports to the learning management system before you leave the room.
  10. Some labs ask you to do work on paper. Turn in the work before you leave the room in order to get full credit for the lab.
  11. The lab instructor will deduct points for reports that are excessively sloppy or that don't follow the lab rules.
  12. If you and your partner are stuck, ask the lab instructor for help.
  13. Don't ask the lab instructor about the homework. The lab is not a general tutoring facility.

Lab scoring