Sometimes it's tough to figure out how to calculate your grade during the semester, but once your grades are in with only a single grade left, your final, it's easy as a single equation below which are the examples I did in the video.

FE = Final Exam Grade Needed

RG = Required Passing Grade

FW = Final Exam Weight Percent as Decimal (.30, .20, . . . )

CG = Current Grade

FE = RG – ((1 – FW) x CG)) / (FW)

FE = 77 – ((1 - .30) x 100) / (.30)

FE = 77 – (70 ) / .30

FE = 7 / .30

FE = 23%

FE = RG – ((1 – FW) x CG)) / (FW)

FE = 77 – ((1 - .30) x 70) / (.30)

FE = 77 – (49) / .30

FE = 28 / .30

FE = 93%

FE = RG – ((1 – FW) x CG)) / (FW)

FE = 77 – ((1 - .30) x 67) / (.30)

FE = 77 – (46.9) / .30

FE = 30.1 / .30

FE = 100.33%

Auto Generated Transcript::

Welcome to the Memorizing Pharmacology podcast. I'm Tony Guerra, the pharmacist and author of The Memorizing Pharmacology book series, bringing you mnemonics, cases, and advice for succeeding in Pharmacology. Sign up for the email list at memorizingfarm.com to get your free suffixes cheat sheet or find our mobile-friendly self-paced online pharmacology review course at residency.teachable.com.

Let's get started with the show. This is a question that comes up a lot: How do I figure out what my final exam grade needs to be for me to pass the class? It depends on a couple of factors. What is your bar? Do you need to pass with an 85, 80, 75, or is a 73 passing like a C minus? So, what is needed to pass is the required passing grade.

First, you need to calculate what your final exam grade needs to be. Then we'll figure out what is the required passing grade. This is usually set by your program. Then you want to know the final exam grade as a percent. So what we're saying is, if your final exam is 30, you want to put 0.30. If your final exam is 20, then put 0.20, and so on.

The last one is what is your current grade? The current grade is going to be the opposite of the final exam weight and we just need that as a number.

Here's the equation itself: The final exam grade needed is equal to the required passing grade minus (1 minus the final exam weight as a percent) times the current grade, divided by the final exam weight.

So what does this look like in practice? We're saying that our final exam grade needed is going to be our required passing grade of 77 minus 70 divided by 0.3 which ends up being 7 divided by 0.3. This person has a 100 in the class going into the final and just needs a 23 percent.

So if there are four questions on multiple choice, it literally means that probability would say that if they picked all C they should pass with the final. But what might be is that you are actually below the line. So let's say right now instead you have a 70 in the class, can you still pass the class? Well, the answer is yes.

So what we do is we put in a required grading and we're just using 77 as a number which is a C plus or close to it. The 1 minus the FW (final exam weight) of 30 is going to be a 0.3 and that gives us 70 times 0.7 and then we multiply times the current grade and we're just saying you have a C minus or 70 and then we end up with 49 over 0.3 our final exam weight so total you would need 28 out of 0.3 or a 93 percent to get a 77.

So in this case it actually helps you that the final exam is worth so much because it means that it's still mathematically possible for you to pass the class where it becomes mathematically impossible to pass the class is right around 767 for something like this and we can do that calculation as well.

So let's say at your school the passing is 85 instead of 77 it would be 85 minus (1 minus 0.3 times your current grade) right over 0.3 assuming that 30 percent is your final exam.

Again it's very flexible you can change it however you need but the idea is to be able to go into the final exam knowing exactly where you stand in every class so that you can better divide your time so that you make sure that you spend most time on classes that you're a little bit behind and a little bit less time on classes that you're way ahead.

Thanks for listening to the Memorizing Pharmacology podcast! You can find episodes, cheat sheets, and more at memorizingfarm.com again you can sign up for the email list at memorizingfarm.com to get your free suffixes cheat sheet or find our mobile-friendly self-paced online pharmacology review course at residency.teachable.com.

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