I’m super confused how grades are calculated in University. I have a sim who did all of his homework, turned in outstanding term papers, always attended class, and studied and yet he got an F and a C+?! Maybe I’m wrong here but I feel we don’t have enough control over what grades Sims recieve.
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I just had 2 sims going through together, they both did everything they should. When emailing professors they even got the response of 'nobody has such a high grade as you' or whatever the wording is.
But I guess they must have missed something cos the gal got A+, A+, B and the guy got A, A, F. I was really shocked at the F.
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^ In my experience with three students so far, this is the key! You need to increase the skill listed for each class. Or if they've already maxed the skill, your Sim needs to still do things related to that skill.
Doing homework, writing term papers/doing presentations and editing both until they get the message nothing else can be done to improve them before turning them in, and getting to class on time are all things that should be done too. But, if they're not increasing their class skills or using that skill consistently, they'll get a lower grade.
My Sims didn't even study, not even once and they all got A+ in every class. Two graduated earning Distinguished degrees with Honors and the other got a regular degree with Honors. Don't bother buying those expensive study books, they're not needed in my opinion. Also, always choose the 'take notes' option while your Sim is in class.
One last tip, look at the degree description to see which skills are recommended for it. Sometimes your Sim won't have a class that requires a particular skill mentioned during their entire time at university. Have your Sims do that skill anyway. For instance, my Sim going for a degree in Biology, never had a class that required Logic, but I still had him increase that skill since it was mentioned in the description.
If it's difficult or seems almost impossible to get/increase a skill while living on campus, for instance the Rocket Science or Gardening skill, use the Research and Debate machines to increase the skill or buy skill books from a bookcase to read. I think the particular level they are at matters as well. For each skill I tried to have my students get them up to at least level 5 for the 1st term, 6-7 for 2nd-3rd terms and the last term level 8-10 or whatever number would max the skill. They didn't always max the skills, but got them up to at least 8 before the final term ended.
I hope this helps!
Happy Simming!
The mod is incredibly helpful, but also left me confused, because skills didn't seem to have an impact at all during my testing. So, exactly the opposite of what my experience so far was.
Details under the spoiler:
Here are a few observations:
- Grades seem to follow real life scales, meaning at least 50% are required for a D (Numbers from my game: 61,9 = D-, 64,2 = D, 72,1 = C-).
That comes with downside of sims lingering in the F range for a long time and then shooting through the rest within a single lecture. As a result the grades are skewed towards the low or the high end, either Fs or A+s. This lines up with my experiences from playing blind.
- Sims can never lose study progress from not attending lectures, only gain it. That explains why missing the finals didn’t have an effect that one sims of mine who missed several lectures as well as the finals but finished with all A+s.
- I haven’t tested cheating yet. Getting caught at cheating SHOULD bring down the grade.
Studying from home, anybody? It’s possible:
- Homework is factored into course performance even if the sim does not attend the lecture.
- Term papers and presentations already add a small amount of course performance (2 pts. per quality stage) while being worked on, even if the paper never gets turned in.
- A single hour of study adds about 5 points to the performance.
- For presentations/term papers the quality levels add ~16/24/32 points regardless of skill. Variations from mood or traits may apply, but not from skills.
- Attending lecture base performance gain: ~16 pts.
- Homework done before lecture: + ~14 pts.
- Taking notes during lecture: + ~8 pts.
- Not attending lecture at all: +0 pts.
- In general performance during lectures can vary. I believe there is a random factor involved besides modifiers for mood and traits. The variance is greater for sims taking notes than for sims attending lectures normally, but not significant (+/- 5 points for taking notes compared +/- 1 point for attending normally).
- Not grades related, but perhaps of note: Sims in the same household with exactly the same major and classes have different schedules. That made my test semester a nightmare when two sims had their C2 class 8:00-9:25, but the other two had the exact same class 11:00-12:45.
- Those numbers apply to first semester students, all copies of the same sim.
- I didn’t finish a semester with my test group so far. Might be that skill rank gets factored in at the very end, after all.
Maybe this is helpful to some of you. Add or correct as needed, please!
My Sims grades went up each semester and I'm interested in how she will finish. I do like that it's a challenge. It's definitely a change ^^
Thank you for the link. I will definitely try this mod.
Does it help when they go to class focused? What about being tense for the final? Does that make a difference?
OK. So that would mean being tense for an exam makes no difference to the grades. Interesting.
I have them get to class on time (or close to it) take notes in class, do the homework, and do any term papers/presentations (which I turn in at about the half-way point in the term for papers, just before the end of term for presentations)
All five University students ended with at worst a high B for the term, and I think a solid A for their time in Uni.
(I also play on long life and have them only take three classes per term, and always start the term mid-week so I have a weekend to work on presentations and papers.)
There was no extra skill building. She did all homework on time, got to classes on time, took notes in class, edited her presentation and term paper to the max and submitted them on time. Nothing else.
My very first failure. My previous Sim got on probation but I got her through the last 3 semesters with really good grades.
I think his problem was his schedule didn't leave him much time to do homework and go to class along with presentation and term papers. But his biggest problem was he was always late to class. The irony of him living on campus was that there were too many opportunities for him to be late rather than I'd he lived in any other world other than Britechester lol. Sigh. Oh well. Live and learn.
I checked in with my tutor for one class and it said 'you are falling behind, focus on coursework and studying etc to catch up'. I studying for about 4 straight hours and increased my required skill, but when i checked in with my tutor again, i got a message saying my sim was going to fail if she didn't work harder. So even after she had completed homework, studied and improved her skill level, she was still at worse off. I haven't got to the end of this term yet but I'm pretty sure she is going to fail.
She graduated with honors after 3 semesters doing 4 classes each time.
I don't know if you can and want to use mods but here is the link just in case.
https://modthesims.info/d/637945/quickly-check-course-performance.html
I can help with this! (Hopefully.) (I think.)
I had the exact same thing happen to me. What I think kills the grade is the activities in class, if that makes sense... if you click on your Sim’s portrait while in class there’s the “work normally/ talk to classmates, etc.)
What you’re going to want to do is click on the “take notes” option. It lowers the Sim’s fun need, but it improves grades. I’m not sure what “actively listen” does, but I think it must raise either the skill, or be similar in raising the grade.
Once I made sure to check that, my Sim has been getting incredible report cards! I also found that living off campus is helpful too, because your Sim is rarely ever running through campus and resetting and whatever. Professors in game seem to really hate lateness.
Edit: when University first came out, many people were getting D’s and F’s, so they made an update that told players what each choice did, because people were going above and beyond in doing the right stuff, but it just wasn’t made clear. It sucked because I made some of my Sims drop out prior to the patch, when it was something I could’ve amended very quickly.
I can confirm. It's not just going to class. It is also what they do when they get there. Making sure their behavior is set to Taking Notes or Actively Listening (I think that is the wording). I just had them go to class and was getting the same results because they were putting no effort in class.