M359: Exam

Tuesday last week (9.Oct) I took the M359 exam.  I haven't written about it until now as I came away from the exam very unhappy.

The reason for this was the layout of the exam paper.  Although I was aware that for the 12 short questions we had to place our answers in the exam booklet itself in spaces provided directly after each question, I did not appreciate what a pain this would be.  Each question tended to be a piece of description followed by 2 or 3 sub-questions, and the problem lay in if the question stretched over more than one page.  This meant that I had to keep flipping backwards and forwards between pages, which was very time consuming.  The worst culprits were questions 6, 7 and 8, as each of these questions referred to an appendix at the end of the exam booklet.

I am not the only one who feels this way about the exam paper, as there has been a general outcry from a lot of students concerning the layout, with a number of us making official complaints.

In conclusion the layout of the exam paper made a stressful situation even more stressful, wasted time and has cost me marks.  I now just have to wait until the 14.Dec to find out what my final grade will be.