In the
first part of this topic I had briefly explained about how to select the
subjects and how to use the time table and decide which subjects to take and
attend. Also, I explained how each subject is given as a Lecture and a Exercise
session which covers 1.5 hours each. If you want to get this info then please
check out the part 1 of this article at
In this part I will explain about the next
part of a student’s life – The examination period in Chemnitz.
The
examination period roughly covers around a month depending around the group you
are in, the number of subjects you are taking (the less you take the less your
examination period will be obviously) and also on the subjects you are taking. For
example this semester in the winter term 2013 the examination for me began on 4th
of February 2014 and on this day I had compiler construction. On 6th
I had multicore programming and so forth. So, the examination for me started on
4th while for students who did not take this subject it began much
later .
Also, the important thing is there are different departments in a study
program. For example the informatik(computer science) has different
professorships such as operating
systems, practical computer science , computer engineering. And the examination
begins with each the subjects in each department in a given order. For example
the practical computer science department keeps its examination first.
Then
comes the Operating systems department. And so on. So there is a order in which
the examinations are scheduled and also the results are also given in the same
schedule. Also, you may get results even
before your other examinations are over. For example before our third
examination Design of software for embedded systems was finished we got the
results for compilers and multicore programming. That’s scary !!!
And since
the examinations are roughly for a month the examination if it began on February
gets over by March first week. The intervals between the exams depends on the
subjects but sometimes you get one day in between and sometimes it can last
more than two weeks !!
What
happens during the examination period. Well you may be attending some classes
(mostly doubt session of the remaining examinations or lectures as well ) . It’s
also possible that your examination begins tomorrow and you may have lecture or
doubt session a day before that. But mostly, during the examination periods
students are sitting in the library studying or staying in a room and studying .
And I would advise here that people should do a get together kind of study (or
a group study) since that really helps if you have missed a lots of classes and
or having doubts in any topics. There are lots of good students here (experienced
and scholars) so don’t feel shy in
asking any stuff to them. Mostly students cook once in a day mostly at night or
in the afternoon time and eat outside (at least I did ;)).
What is the
stress level during examinations? Well actually I felt there is nothing to feel
stressed about here. You just have to study slides instead of the heavy book s
or any other material which we used to study in india and also you should know how to solve questions
given in the exercise. If you are able to cover these two then you are good to
go for the examinations. 99% questions are from the slides and exercises and
maybe 1% of the question may be a bit brain whacking but that doesn’t matter
unless you are really trying for 1,0 which is the maximum marks which can be score in a
given test.
How the
grading is done? Well there are two grading patters and basically its absolute
grading (percentage) or relative grading (percentile). It is fairly simple. If
you get 40 out of 50 marks then you have 80 percent which might correspond to
2,0 depending on the professors criteria (for ex he might have set 48+ as 1,0 :
46+ as 1,3 : 42+ as 1,7 : 40+ as 2,0 etc). But the other type of grading is
relative grading in which your marks are compared with the top marks which a
student has achieved. For example if the paper was difficult and if the maximum
marks were 45 then that is considered as 1,0 and then if you have 40 then you will
be given 1,7. So better hope for relative grading!
When do you
fail? Usually when you get 4,0 or more marks out of 5. Sometimes even 3,7 is
not enough to satisfy the professor and the students are asked to rewrite the
examinations. Yes , that’s possible !!
One thing
to be happy about here is , if you get
less in some subjects then there is nothing to worry about since for your
master thesis and internship/seminar you
are awarded the 1,0 grading so even if you have maintained 3,0 as an average then your
overall average becomes 2,0 which is a very good score. So, nothing to worry
about here.
How to
register for the examinations? Well during two months before the examination
starts you have to register for the examinations. You can do that by going to
the SBservice, clicking prufungsamt, and then register for examinations, your
course of study (for ex automotive software engineering) and then you can just
selec the subjects under each of the course modules. Before doing all this you
need to enter a tan number and this list you get after getting your TUC card
and immatrikulation form.
If you have
registered for a examination and if you are feeling that you might not perform well
then you can deregister 7 days before the examination day. After that you have
to take that examination no matter what (unless you are medically ill and you have to give one
medical certificate) and you can’t escape from that subject ever again!
Well, I hope
I have covered most of the education aspects in here in Chemnitz. If you have
any other question , feel free and post it here. Kudos
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