
    Design a function that calculates the combined value of a student's highest and lowest assessment scores to determine their learning range and help adjust future content difficulty. The function should accept an array of assessment scores as input and return the sum of the maximum and minimum scores to establish the total performance span.
    

    
def big_sum(nums):
    """
    Design a function that calculates the combined value of a student's highest and lowest assessment scores to determine their learning range and help adjust future content difficulty. The function should accept an array of assessment scores as input and return the sum of the maximum and minimum scores to establish the total performance span.
    

    """
def big_sum(nums):
    """
    Design a function that calculates the combined value of a student's highest and lowest assessment scores to determine their learning range and help adjust future content difficulty. The function should accept an array of assessment scores as input and return the sum of the maximum and minimum scores to establish the total performance span.
    

    """
    sum = max(nums) + min(nums)
    return sum