Author: Douglas F. De Boer

DORDT COLLEGE ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT
Fall Semester, 2005

HOMEWORK STANDARDS
For Professor De Boer's Classes

0.)	The overall goal of doing homework is to LEARN BY  EXPLAINING HOW PROBLEMS ARE SOLVED.  To do this you need to present a clear and reasonably detailed sequence of rational statements to show HOW a problem is solved.  The correct answer is not the goal, learning is.  A fuzzy presentation with too many skipped steps may be interpreted as a lack of understanding on your part and may be graded down accordingly. 

Your grade will be based on HOW WELL YOU SHOW how to solve the problem, not simply on the final answer.  Getting a correct answer from the text or from a friend is not educational, unless you fully understand how to get that  answer.  Similarly, grades are not based on what you were thinking but instead on what you write that SHOWS HOW to solve the problem.  This concept—that you learn by SHOWING HOW to solve problems—is numbered “zero” because it comes before everything.  (Of course correct answers are also required in addition to the explanation of how to get the correct answer.) 

Some texts give some answers so that you may check your method of solution.  Especially when the answer is in the textbook, be sure your homework solution demonstrates how to solve the problem.  Given answers will not count toward the grade.  Only the quality of the description of how to get a given answer will count.  If you write only a given answer, you get zero points even if the answer is right.  (After all, you could have just copied the answer.) 

It is no good coming to my office after you get a disappointing grade to argue that you knew how to solve the problem and deserve a better grade because the answer was correct.  If you forgot to write down the intermediate steps or forgot to mention a principle or theorem then you did not explain HOW to solve the problem and that is the goal.  (This applies whether or not the answer was given).  You must EXPLAIN HOW PROBLEMS ARE SOLVED. 

1.)	TYPE OF PAPER:  Use 8-1/2 by 11 inch paper (or nearly that size). 
	--Legal size paper is not acceptable. 
	--Paper ripped out of a spiral binder is not acceptable unless you use a scissors to neatly cut off the ragged edge 
	--Engineering paper is recommended but not required. 

2.)	ONE SIDE ONLY:  Use only one side of each sheet of paper (do not write on the back side of the paper).  Exception: computer-printed pages may be printed on both sides in order to conserve paper. 

3.) PAGE LAYOUT AND NEATNESS:  Start each new problem at the top 
of a new page.  (Exception: if the problem is short enough 
to finish it on the same page you started it.)  Write 
legibly.  Consider using white space to set off 
important parts of the problem or answers.  Boxes and 
underlining can also be helpful for the grader.  You may 
be graded down if the grader has difficulty deciphering 
what you have written or finding an answer. 

4.)	WRITE WITH A PENCIL, USE A GOOD ERASER:  Mistakes are expected.  By using a pencil you can erase your mistakes and save the grader the effort of looking through scratched-out lines.  You will spend enough time on the homework to justify good quality equipment.  A 0.5 mm mechanical pencil (e.g. Pentel brand or equivalent) and a white plastic eraser (e.g. Pentel "Click") will pay for themselves with time saved.  This equipment is available at the Dordt Bookstore and at other local merchants such as The Pencil Box and Walmart.

5.)	PROBLEM SUMMARY:  Start each problem with a summary of the problem statement.  As an alternative, you may photocopy the problem statement page, cut the problem statement out of the photocopy, and paste it onto your homework.

6.)	UNITS:  When the problem statement includes units (seconds, volts, etc.) then the answer should include appropriate units. 

7.)	NUMBER FORMAT:  Use an appropriate number of significant figures for your answers (usually 3 unless the answer is obviously an integer quantity) and use engineering or scientific notation appropriately.  Do not allow leading decimals.  (Right: 0.125    Wrong: .125) 

8.)	GRAPH FORMAT:  Graphs should be an appropriate size.  If the graph is an answer, this usually means at least two inches high and 3 inches wide.  It is also necessary that the graph be appropriately scaled.  If you can cover the 
interesting area of the graph with your thumb, the graph is either too small or not scaled appropriately.  Title the graph and label both axes with quantity and units where appropriate.

9.)	USE OF CALCULATORS AND COMPUTERS:  Use calculators and computers appropriately to perform routine and tedious operations and calculations.  If you will not be allowed to use a calculator during the tests, consider doing more calculations by hand so that you are prepared better for the tests.

You may be graded down for using a calculator or computer to do a trivial operation.  (For just one example, you should know that sin(0) = 0 without needing a calculator.)  Your professor's experience is that calculators and computers are sometimes used inappropriately for non-routine symbolic work—work you don't know how to explain—and underutilized for producing clear and accurate graphs. 

If you use a computer (e.g. Mathcad) to help you solve a problem, print the file and staple it to your homework. If you write a program (Visual Basic, Java, Matlab, etc.) print the source code (use a fixed pitch font if you have a choice) and print the output of the program.  No printout?  Credit may be denied! 

If you use an unusual feature of your calculator, say an equation solver, definite integral solver, or matrix inverse operator, make a marginal note.  (e.g. "Used matrix inverse on my TI-89 calculator.")  If you use such a feature repeatedly, you only need to note your method once, near the first instance. 

10.)	NO TEAMWORK:  I require you to do your homework individually.  For example, you may not divide the homework assignment into pieces, assign the pieces to a group of friends, and then get together to copy what the others did.  Each of you must do all of each assignment yourself.  

You may talk with others to share answers and discuss solution methods.  This helps you discover how to solve problems.  Such communication about homework ought to be verbal, not in writing.  It ought to be person-to-person, not a group meeting (Exceptions: for meetings outside of class that are arranged by your instructor or for e-mail or written notes which function in lieu of a verbal conversation.)  In your discussions you may mention answers you have arrived at, and you may mention techniques and equations that you used, and sections of the textbook, lectures, or other reference materials that you found useful, etc.  You may also share in writing and compare previously graded homework from your class (NOT from previous offerings of the class) with your classmates. 

Teamwork is a technique for doing more work than one individual acting alone can do.  Homework is for your individual study, thus teamwork is not appropriate for doing homework.  We use teamwork in the lab, partly as a necessity, and partly as an introduction to the type of working environment found in industry.  Do not confuse the goals of the lab work with the goals of homework. 

11.)	PLAGIARISM:  Professor C.S. Lewis was once asked by another professor what he did about plagiarism.  Here is his advise, which Prof. De Boer follows:  

I only once detected a pupil offering me someone else (Elton) as his own work.  I told him I was not a detective nor even a schoolmaster, nor a nurse, and that I absolutely refused to take any precaution against such a puerile trick; that I'd as soon think it my business to see that he washed behind his ears or wiped his bottom.  He went down [dropped out] of his own accord the next week and I never saw him again.  I think you ought to make a general announcement of that sort.  You must not waste your time constantly reading me and Dowden and Churton Collins as a sort of police measure.  It is bad for them to think this is “up to you.”  Flay them alive if you happen to detect them; but don't let them feel that you are a safeguard against the effects of their own idleness.  What staggers me is how any man can prefer the galley-slave labour of transcription to the freeman's work of attempting [the assignment] on his own.
--Letter from Lewis to 
Dr. Alastair Fowler, 
December 10, 1959.

You can go too far with discussions on homework.  For example, working directly from another student's paper, or from an e-mail or a computer file that essentially contains the solution, is plagiarism.  Using someone else's computer file that contains a solution or a portion of a solution (e.g. a Mathcad file could be of this type) is also plagiarism.  Using someone else's graded homework from a previous offering of the course is plagiarism.  I count giving such information as plagiarism also.  Keep your computer files private.  For a general statement, see Dordt's policy on “Academic Dishonesty” in the “Student Life and Housing Policies” section of the Student Handbook.

12.) REFERENCE BOOKS:  If you use a table of integrals or trig. ID or a theorem or other such material from a reference book, you need to cite the source.  (e.g. “Used table of integrals in calc. book by Edwards & Penny, 4th edition.”  Subsequent citations can be even shorter, e.g. “Integral Table.”)  Since this is homework, a full citation (such as in a bibliography) and the format of the citation is not important—just so that a reader knows you did not pull something out of thin air, and that you could go back to the source. 

13.) PROOFS (ALSO "SHOW," "EXPLAIN," "DERIVE," ETC.):  Engineering is about people, ideas, creativity, etc.  It is not simply applied math and science.  This means that an engineering proof needs to expose the thought process used to establish the believed truth of some statement.  Generally, you cannot do a proof by computer because the computer does not expose the thought processes, it only gets “the right answer.”  When you are asked to prove something, be sure to name the appropriate principles and theorems and show how they fit together to establish that which is to be proved.  Note:  words like “show,” “explain,” “derive,” etc. usually mean the same thing as “prove.” 

Just for contrast:  The difference between a regular homework problem and a proof is that for a regular homework problem you may assume that your reader recognizes the common axioms, theorems, laws, etc. that you are using (name only the unusual ones).  For a proof, you must tell the reader what all the axioms, theorems, etc., are, even if they are routinely recognizable. 

14.) PAGE HEADING:  Put your name, course number and problem set number on each page.  Staple in the upper left corner.