https://philosophicaldisquisitions.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-moral-problem-of-grading-extended.html
Reading Notes;
The Morality of Grading:
After much discussion about assessment models and graded assessment in the workshop last week, Tim shared this article with us. A question that I found myself asking at the end of the session, was; Who, or what is assessment for? Who or what is it serving? Particularly with regards to graded assessment. Is this serving the students, the university (a consumer education system) or ‘industry’? The latter, opening up debates about teaching and learning employability.
John Danaher discusses 4 possible benefits of grading;
- Motivation for students = a practice of reward & punishment.
- Grades play a role in the allocation of ‘distributive goods’ like better job opportunities – which underpins the equity of a meritocracy. He points out, however that this would only be justifed if the grades were a true reflection of ability.
Grades as ‘easy to interpret’ signals – communicating information about a person’s strengths & abilities to peers, employees etc. These signals of course have consequences for how that person is percived & treated. - Offers a way to minimise risk / guard against harm to people and society. i.e no one wants an incompetant doctor. This is most relevant for those subjects & professions which have human or wider societal consequences.
- Grades can make students feel good and validated.
All of the above also have a flip side, which can bring about the opposite consequence or effect.i.e in relation to number 4; grades can also make students feel bad and invalidated.
If grading has moral consequence, then it’s obviously imperative that we try to be as fair and objective about it as possible. But there are many pitfalls. Grades norms differ among teaching staff but also bias can exist in the way in which one person marks, for example when marking we can adopt a relative standard of evaluation, i.e comparison to what has come before.
John Danaher identifies some of the different ways in which grading could be approached:
(a) Grades could be an absolute measure of competency
(b) Grades could be a relative measure of competency
(c) Grades could be an output measure (in design, focusing solely on the creative output)
(d) Grades could be, at least in part, a process measure (the research and development, iteration ideation, reflection etc.)
(e) Grading could be an entirely backward-looking task (evidenced)
(f) Grading could be, at least in part, a forward looking task (nurturing potential)
Challenges of Grading in Arts & Design
When compared to maths or some sciences where there are objective wrong & right answers, arts subjects are more subjective it could be argued.
The argument against grading;
1. It’s unfair, as it’s prone to bias and other subjectivities. (when a right or wrong answer doesn’t apply, as in design education)
2. Some research suggests that grades have a minimal, possibly counterproductive, impact on motivation (Grant and Green 2013) Many researchers have shown that grading induces anxiety more so than in provides positive motivation.
3. Grading reinforces the hegemony of the educational system and is coercive in this way.
4. Grading can cause high levels of anxiety & depression and as such, actually hinder performance.
But to not grade is also problematic, because it will prevent students from getting some of the benefits, of grading, including motivation, reward and subsequent opportunities as reward for their efforts.
Can we make grading more Ethical?
A. The Triage Model William Rapaport (2011)
No detailed number grading, but instead three general grade classifications: full credit (if an assignment is substantially correct), minimal credit (if it is substantially incorrect) and partial credit (if it is somewhere in between). His rationale is that in many disciplines there is no correct way of answering a question; there are, rather, more or less competent ways of doing so (as in the arts).
B. The Strict Relative Ranking Approach Christopher Knapp (2007)
A relativistic approach which suggests ranking students work relative to one other. There are obvious issues, including size of sample and differences in sample year on year. It would have to be applied across the board, rather than in one situation for there to be any value.
C. The “No Grades” Model as proposed by Robert Paul Wolff in The Ideal of the University (1969)
Instead give critical comments and feedback, and enter into a dialogue with students about their work.
Another advocate of a no grades system, Jesse Stommel states,
“…grades are the biggest and most insidious obstacle to education… Agency, dialogue, self-actualization, and social justice are not possible in a hierarchical system that pits teachers against students and encourages competition by ranking students against one another. Grades (and institutional rankings) are currency for a capitalist system that reduces teaching and learning to a mere transaction. Grading is a massive co-ordinated effort to take humans out of the educational process…”
D. The Moral Compromise: An acknowledgement that it’s an imperfect system, without a clear solution or resolution.
John Danaher states that if we adopt this approach, there are some things we should do;
– accept that grading is an inevitable system
– be very clear with students on how they are to be graded
– Acknowledge the limitations, but make every effort to be as objective as possible when it comes to allocating the grades that determine 1st, 2nd, 2nd lower, 3rd class degrees.
My Reflections:
To think about the ‘problem of grading’ feels very timely at the moment because I’m currently marking for two assignments, one at LCC for L4 (pass/fail) and one at Herts Uni L5 (graded).
Given the moral and practical consequences of grading I am feeling a lot more concerned about the graded assignment.
My own approach which obviously is heavily dictated by the university assessment protocols, has been to allocate a grading band against each learning outcome using a matrix. I do this so students can see which LOs they provided better evidence for than others.
I will then focus any written feedback on specific parts of the work that strong and parts of the work that are either failing to meet elements of the learning outcomes or where evidence could be increased.
I feel that students want to know what they did well and where they can improve, this is more meaningful to them and allows them to learn from the assessment and carry the learning forward into their next assignment. I would question, how helpful simply getting marks against what can be quite opaque or general learning outcomes can be. For me both direct response to how well the LOs have been achieved and more detailed constructive feedback feels like it will be the most useful. The same students, will hand in their semester B assignment in April, so it will be interesting to see if some of the learning has been adopted and put into place in their second assignment of the year.
I have thought about the need to be very clear with students on how they are to be graded and as a result plan to introduce a learning outcome and assessment workshop in late March, before the Easter break, after which they hand in their Semester B assignment. In this workshop I plan to reiterate the learning outcomes, but also to task them to consider how these could be evidenced in their work. I have four learning outcomes, so I’d like for them to work in groups with large sheets of paper, and for each group to pin their sheet of paper on the wall share their ideas with the class as a whole, at the end of the workshop. I don’t think I would have introduced this workshop, if it weren’t for my work on the PG Cert, because I wouldn’t have developed a better understanding of grading, the problems and pitfalls and how I can at least help mitigate some of these in my practice.