The Department of Computer Science has course exemption examinations available for CMSC 131, 132 and 250 and 212. (The procedure and dates are described at the end of this page.)
These examinations aid in determining the most appropriate initial placement of a student into CMSC courses at UMCP and cannot be used to receive credit (i.e. they are not credit-by-examinations). Prior to taking a particular CMSC course, a student must have all prerequisite courses on their UMCP transcript, or they must have passed the departmental exemption examination for the prerequisite course(s) in question. A student is allowed to attempt the exemption examination for a particular course only once. Also, a student may not take a CMSC exemption exam once they have enrolled in a CMSC course here at UMCP - “enroll” is defined for purposes here as “having taken the course and attended it beyond the end of the schedule adjustment period”. Typically an incoming student will take the exemption exam during their orientation.
No sample exams are available and the contents of the exams may require writing code, tracing code, answering questions, and solving problems. The exams are all paper exams and may last anywhere from 60 to 90 minutes. Not all topics listed below may actually appear on each exam. There is no charge to take a CMSC exemption exam and only one exam may be taken during each testing date.
Introductory CMSC courses may require 5-7 substantial programming projects to be written independently by each student throughout the semester. Written exams, by their very nature, cannot fully assess ones capability to complete an electronic program which contains 100’s (to 1000’s) of lines of code (100’s for CMSC 131 projects, to 1000’s for CMSC 212 projects). Students placing into CMSC 131, 132 or higher should be prepared to write computer programs on the order of several hundred lines of code (for the 1st 132 project) or a thousand or so lines of code (for the 1st 212 project).
If you have any questions after reviewing these webpages, please feel free to contact a CMSC advisor.
CMSC 131: Object-Oriented Programming I (using Java)
CMSC 132: Object-Oriented Programming II (using Java)
CMSC 212: Introduction to Low-Level Programming Concepts
PROCEDURE AND DATES
Exemption exams are typically administered at or shortly before the start of a semester to assist in our advising and placement. (Dates are announced on this page once they are scheduled.) If you wish to take one of these exams, then you must reserve a seat at least two business days prior to the scheduled exam date, by emailing ugrad@cs.umd.edu. (Please use the subject line “Exemption Exam: date” in that e-mail (where date is the date on which you plan to take the exam, so your notes gets priority among the million messages we receive! In the body of the e-mail include which exam you plan to take, the date you plan to take it and your full name and University ID number. After we receive your email, we will confirm with the room information.)
Exemption exams are generally graded the same day as they are given and the results are available on the next working day in person at the CMSC education office (room 1119 AVW).
