One way to address the issue at the institutional level is to include information in students' transcripts about where they ranked in each class, or how many students in each class got the highest grade. That way, prospective employers, etc., have some context that allows them to see whether a particular student's 80 is an indication of truly legendary ability or just one of the 80s that professor X hands out routinely.
(I realize that the range may be somewhat arbitrary, but, thinking of the connotations or associations that may go with the numbers, if 70% being the highest is interpreted to mean that mastering 70% of the course material is the best any student can do, wouldn't that suggest that teaching isn't working optimally?)
Mai
Sent from my iPad
> On Apr 24, 2016, at 7:57 AM, Dave Sayers <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Hi TeachLingers,
>
> (Apologies for what has turned out to be a bit of an essay...)
>
> What are the collective's thoughts on the marking range for undergraduate work? In the UK the standard mark scheme is putatively a percentage, with 40 as the pass/fail boundary, then 50, 60, and 70 the totemic boundaries between 'classes' of mark (and then overall class of degree). (More info on the UK scheme, and a US/UK comparison, here: https://goo.gl/hf5FFR.)
>
> I said 'putatively' above because I've always understood there to be a convention in the UK that we don't in practice award marks over 80. However, I've recently learned this might vary between disciplines. I've also heard whispers of encouragements at some universities to begin doing away with that convention and start routinely awarding above 80 - not artificially, but just beginning to think of that space above 80 as routinely usable, and considering exceptional work in those terms.
>
> Although I've never graded above 80 myself, I don't in principle have an issue with it - I can think of plenty of examples from my students that would warrant it - but a few concerns do spring to mind...
>
> The first and most obvious is consistency. If I routinely award above 80 but my colleagues don't, does that make them look mean and me over-generous? Does that undermine the idea of standard assessment criteria? Partly this would be addressed by the moderation process in the UK (where a second party independently marks a sample of the assignments) though I know that isn't used in many other countries (when I lectured in Finland my decision was ultimate!).
>
> Then even if all my colleagues begin marking above 80, what about when our students talk to their friends at other universities and compare grades for similar assignments? Would that cause issues for the staff there, if those students started grumbling? Moreover, as I'm at a 'less prestigious' university, would this exacerbate a sense of our standards being generally low?
>
> To complicate matters further (!) there is currently serious consideration being given to complementing/replacing the whole UK structure with a US-style grade point average: https://goo.gl/GdeC00, https://goo.gl/fXl5d2. That would do away with the whole notion of degree classes. Perhaps this conversation will seem dated quite soon. But for now... any thoughts?
>
> Dave
>
> --
> Dr. Dave Sayers
> Senior Lecturer, Dept Humanities, Sheffield Hallam University | www.shu.ac.uk
> Honorary Research Fellow, Cardiff University & WISERD | www.wiserd.ac.uk
> [log in to unmask] | http://shu.academia.edu/DaveSayers
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