Yup, I hear you and agree - but again, I would let the grades be legitimate. I gave Cs to grad students at midterms when they earned them; many dropped the class. The system self policies, to some degree. And sure, administrators freak. That's their job. IMHO, it isn't your job as a Professor to worry about the immediate repercussions of a poor grade. It's absolutely your job as a Professor to worry about the long term repercussions of a poor grade (ie, someone loses a scholarship), but there's a fine line between "worry about" and "prevent".
Jon On Mon, Oct 20, 2008 at 11:20 AM, Christine Boese <[EMAIL PROTECTED] > wrote: > Jon, I agree with you on all points, and basically operated under those > principles. > > However, there is a fly in the works with a weak class, one I ran into head > on. #1: You can't give Cs in grad school. Basically, as a student, if you > make more than one C, you're out of the program, or at least on probation > and could lose an assistantship, if you have one. Administrators who need to > keep their program numbers up for funding would FREAK if Cs were showing up > with any frequency. > > #2: Grad students know this, and will not risk getting even 1 C. If it even > remotely looks like they are at risk of getting a C or worse, they'll drop > the course, if it isn't a core requirement course. Obviously core > requirement courses are different, and there's other stuff to take special > care with on those. > > But, for a case in point, in a technology-intensive, Flash and > RIA-interaction design course I taught which was dual-listed, 400-600 (at > the time, a new course I had proposed and gotten thru curriculum cmte, so > definitely not a core requirement), I had drawn in a number of my > engineering undergrads, some very talented honors kids, to work alongside my > master's students studyingg IA and interaction design. I thought, cool, I > can put them in collaborative groups and they can help each other, > Vygotsky's "zone of proximal development." > > The problem? The undergrads ran circles around a very weak class of grad > students (to keep the numbers up, administrators had even admitted folks > UNDER our previous GRE cutoffs) who could barely manage the technology, but > weren't doing well on the design or theoretical issues either. It was a > disaster, and the grad students were crashing under the rigors big time. By > six weeks into the course, all but one of the grad students had dropped. > Meanwhile, the undergrads finished with flying colors, produced an > incredible CD of rich and fantastic projects. But boy was I in the doghouse > with my administrators. > > Chris > > > On Mon, Oct 20, 2008 at 12:03 PM, jon kolko <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> Hi, >> >> I've heard a number of times that some faculty (and program heads) >> consider their programs as contracts with the students - that you pay a >> certain amount of money, and you get a degree. "Professional" programs are >> often framed this way (those that attract more disciplined and often older >> students). While I can certainly see the appeal of this (particularly from >> an administrator's point of view), if a program is accredited, there needs >> to be a sense of rigorous assessment built into the grading schema. A "C" >> has always meant "average", and if your students are doing average work, >> give them average grades. The flipside of aggressive and difficult grading >> is that you need to be prepared to do aggressive and difficult >> rationalization, and I know a lot of professors who are turned off by this. >> But this seems only fair to me - if you give a harsh grade, you need to >> offer both constructive criticism and a thorough substantiation of the >> grade. This is no different than a harsh critique - "It sucks" doesn't cut >> it in Design, as you have to explain WHY it sucks. >> >> So I guess my answer to your question about administrative imperatives is >> that your grading should be in no way connected to or influenced by that >> imperative - you can give fair grades and still have 15 students in a class. >> And I truly think you owe it to all paying students to give fair grades, >> because when someone who gets straight As and naively thinks they can get a >> job at a high pressure consultancy has no design skills to speak of, they >> get a rude awakening during their interview and they begin to negatively >> taint the reputation of the institution. That isn't fair to the company, to >> the student, or to the school. >> >> "And it annoys the pig..." >> >> :) >> >> Jon >> >> >> On Mon, Oct 20, 2008 at 10:11 AM, Christine Boese < >> [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> >>> These are excellent points Jon, and many programs sincerely strive to do >>> this. >>> >>> But having worked in such programs through bad economic times as well as >>> good, I have another question to pose to you. What do you do when >>> administrators REQUIRE numbers, and the quality of your students, for >>> various reasons, is not that good, and the majority can't survive the rigors >>> you want to put them through? >>> >>> There are two sides of this, particularly with grad class recruitment >>> efforts and admissions. In good economic times, the primo students are being >>> snagged up straight to industry, so you can end up with weak classes of >>> students that way. >>> >>> And in bad economic times, really bad times, beyond when layoffs send >>> folks to grad or second degree programs, people just don't have the money to >>> spend on an expensive school (esp if student loan sources are completely >>> drying up). >>> >>> There is a sweetspot, I suppose, where bad economic times fill classes >>> with great students, before they start to cull them due to lack of funds. >>> >>> But there's an administrative imperative (you must admit a new class of >>> 15 grad students every fall, for instance) that can be quite demoralizing >>> for a faculty member, I have to say. And then the next thing you know >>> (probably not at SCAD, but elsewhere), you've got a class of students you >>> have to show how to open and close multiple windows and save files on a >>> server for collaborative projects. >>> >>> It's a dilemma, so if you don't have an answer to my question, join the >>> club! If you do have an answer, tho, please share! It will make me feel >>> better. >>> >>> Chris >>> >>> >> > -- - Jon Kolko Author, Thoughts on Interaction Design http://www.thoughtsOnInteraction.com/ Co-Editor-In-Chief, interactions http://interactions.acm.org/ ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
