Re: Eric and Fred's ideas on grading

[Neal Lerner <nlerner@acs.bu.edu>]

Lately, it's seemed that efforts Eric describes below, our attempts to 
"distribute authority" by putting the onus for evaluation on our 
students, are so anomolous not only to most of the rest of the students' 
educational experience, but to their working and political lives outside 
of and after college.  I'm thinking of the recent announcement by AT&T 
that 30,000 folks will be fired.  Will these 30,000 have much power of 
this decision?  Can they argue that they've achieved the performance 
criteria they and/or their managers established and thus should be 
retained?  Somehow I doubt it.  Similarly, the current federal budget 
standoff and the machinations in Washington further instill a relative 
powerlessness on our parts (and hence our nation's abysmal voting 
turnout).  

In many of our students' classes, the criteria for success are quite 
clear:  you memorize the appropriate body of knowledge and you get the 
corresponding grade.  Writing classes that involve students deciding upon 
criteria for success and then judging how well the've met those criteria 
might seem like worthwhile experiences at the time but seemingly out of 
touch with so many dominant experiences in their lives.

Sorry to be so cynical on this snowy day in Boston, but I guess that's 
what happens when I listen to news radio too much.

	Neal Lerner
	nlerner@acs.bu.edu

On Tue, 2 Jan 1996, Eric Crump wrote:

> I did something similar, Paula. 
> 
> Basically, I attempted to distribute authority, something that gets 
> talked about a lot but is very difficult to accomplish. Can't claim my 
> class was completely successful. When I asserted that I would not *give* 
> grades to anyone, that everyone would determine their own grade based on 
> their own criteria, some flat out didn't believe it. Some tried to 
> believe. A few got it. 
> 
> And those who couldn't manage to really grasp the authority laid at their 
> feet are blameless. The situation was utterly anomalous in their 
> educational experience. Sort of like someone walking up to you on the 
> street, someone you've never met, and saying you can have three wishes. 
> Any sane person will be very skeptical.
> 
> by the way, I also had a number of students ask that their list and 
> moospace be kept available so they could keep in touch. Whatever else 
> went right or wrong in that class, this evidence of a sense of community 
> made the whole thing worthwhile for me.
> 
> --Eric
> 
> // Eric Crump
> \\ wleric@cclabs.missouri.edu
>    --------------------------
> // "Quality is not a *thing.* It is an *event.*
> \\                            --Robert Pirsig
> 
> 
>