1. Bill Bellinghausen:
Tom
Simple solution!!!
Let the students do it, the grading,.... and show their work...... they're rational.
But the assignment must have objective......"why the rain falls mostly on the plane"
Now a number of good things happen.
The student does research, and formulates his thoughts.
The student writes.
The student then evaluates the process and gives it a grade.
Then you, the big all knowing and loving person, show them where they are... how to express
themselves better.
"On my Honor I'll do my best." it's their best, your best is to kindle the fire!!!
Your job is to show them where they are at. then show them how to get on track and guide their
efforts on to a bigger way.
Then your grade is still subjective, but judgmental on their efforts.
A flash of brilliance or a big splat of bull,,,t
Bill B
...
Dear Bill,
Maybe splattered flashes of brilliant BS.
Okay. Yes, students need to learn how to evaluate. And, yes, the
big all-knowing and loving person is supposed to see the student's work in the larger context of, for instance, whether
he or she can survive sophomore lit. Beyond that is the realm of written discourse in general: Can this student
write a letter to the editor of the News that will not hit the wastebasket after a single editorial glance? As for
fire-kindling, students come with motivation built in. Those who come to college have las ganas - hopes, dreams,
& ambition - that's a given. In addition, there's the common drive we all
have, not merely to survive but thrive, even in a required course. The fire is already lit, the trick is not to put it
out.
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2. Kevin McNevins
I got my first Freshman Theology grade at Notre Dame from a notorious Dutch Dominican Priest
named Wilhelm Hegge - he had been in court with The University the year before to keep his job under fire for being radical
in his criticism of the Church (e.g., The Cardinals are nothing but skilled politicians and the Pope is the best politician
of them ALL!)
Hegge passed out the papers and as he handed the paper to the guy next to me with a large "B" he scowled
an admonition, "You can do better that this!" and as I got my paper with a large "D-" across the top he said with great sympathy,
"That's probably about the best you can do!"
What an asshole.
But, still one of my favorite teachers.
...
Dear Kevin -
Does your story have a happy ending? What was your course grade?
Other tales illustrative of how grades are arbitrary:
The infernal beast of my senior year at Southwestern University was American History.
I took 1st. semester at UT Austin that summer. That proved to be a mistake. UT used the state-required two-semester
course to get rid of excess students. Mastery of detail was the golden yardstick: "Some people died in the Civil
War - List." I skipped the final because a "D" wouldn't transfer.
And began again that fall at Southwestern - under a moonlighting UT
prof. "Some people died," and I was among them.
With my home-earned and therefore passable "D" I began 2nd semester American Hellstory,
taught by the chairman of SU's history department. "Evaluate the contributions of the U.S.A. to Western Civilization."
I have never in my life been happier to see an "A" on my transcript.
Another "D" miraculously became an "A" when my French prof. was asked to project my grade based
on my class standing, rather than my test grades. It was explained to her that my necessary graduation trumped her exalted
standards. And a 2.8 GPA in my minor field became 3.0 when my counselor replaced the median
with the modal average. Grades were merely massagable data.
Fast forward though graduate school to my first full-time college teaching position at Lamar University,
second year. Jim, a fellow teacher of sophomore lit., came to me unhappy because his students were flunking his exams
on Dante's "Inferno." He showed me one of his tests, which expected the student to have mastered the copious
background notes at the end of each Canto. I might have been able to squeak through with a "C-," but,
like him, I was teaching the bloomin' stuff.
Someone in the faculty lounge had mentioned a recent follow-up study on college education. It had
shown that five years after graduation from a college or university, former students remembered about 15% of all they
had been taught. I told Jim about the study, and asked him which 15% of Dante he wanted his students to remember
five years from now. He wanted them to remember that Dante was a great poet. Was he testing for that? Apparently
not, he would have to think about it.
No doubt he did think about it, and no doubt he changed the situation. He was a conscientious teacher,
who knew a high percentage of student failures was a pedagogical problem, not a triumph of high standards.
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