Allowable Help from Peer Educators

CSC 161 - Imperative Problem Solving and Data Structures - Weinman

The Computer Science Department provides evening tutors and class mentors to help you with computing problems. However, in CS 161, the role of these assistants is limited on some assignments, as discussed below.

1 Help allowed on all assignments

For any assignment (e.g., participation activities, challenge activities, and lab activities), a tutor or mentor is allowed to provide help to:

interpret error messages,
clarify the format and meaning of C programming statements, and
explain the syntax, semantics, and workings of procedures in standard C libraries

Of course, following the expectations for academic honesty that apply to all academic work at Grinnell College, help obtained from any source must be cited in any written assignment. See the syllabus for additional guidelines.

2 Help allowed on participation activities (PAs) and challenge activities (CAs)

In addition, groups or individuals working on learning or collaborative tasks may ask tutors or mentors for the following:

help in locating arithmetic or logic errors,
help in finding infinite loops,
background information related to an activity,
ideas on how to approach the problem, and
insights regarding difficulties with proposed solutions and programs.

In short, groups may ask tutors or mentors for assistance on any aspect of a participation and challenge activities.

3 No additional help on lab activities (LAs)

Under no circumstances should a tutor or mentor be asked

how to approach a problem or
how to write a substantial piece of code

related to any homework assignment (lab activity) problem. As a general rule, a section of code that is four or more lines long-perhaps even less when the logic is particularly complex-will be considered substantial. In sum, tutors and mentors may answer only short questions that have short answers. If you have any doubts about the matter, please speak with the instructor first.

Questions seeking to clarify what the lab activity is asking for may be posed to Piazza.

Adapted from The Role of Tutors For Computer Science 161 by Henry Walker. Used by permission.