Barry Westling

Hi Leslie: Interrater reliability is a technical term that defines the action of different individuals rating (or grading) an assignment. If there is high reliabilty, that would suggest there is a good chance that mutltiple graders would arrive at the same score. There are two components in play: one is the grading system and the other is the instructors that use the system. One or both could contribute to evaluating or assessing individual student performance inconsistently. I try to teach to the predefined student learning objectives, then measure how successful the student was in achieving those objectives. But I'll admit,… >>>

Anthony: You've listed a lot of good factors that bear considering. Student learning outcomes (SLO's) define what a student should learn, know, perform, assess, etc. at the end of a course. I believe that if we teach to the SLO's, then assessing if they have achieved those goals makes grading a bit easier a task. How we go about setting up those assessments still needs to be fair to all students and consistently applied in the same fashion. A key is to assure that the students know what the expectations for grading are at the outset. This helps minimize disputes… >>>