Jim - Those are good points. It also depends on the "target" for grading. In grad school, I once made a 72 on the final (the ONLY evaluation). I felt horrible. I studied my sitting part off!! (No. I didn't complain I'd worked harder!) I was sitting in stunned silence - contemplating what I might do instead of finishing my PhD. My study partner leaned over and said, "What'd you get?" He'd made an 80 and was distraught- I pointed out "At least you passed." We were both thinking maybe we made the wrong decision when the Prof walked back in and put his hand on my shoulder and looked at my friend and said, "Congratulations, guys." We both looked puzzled. He explained that he'd given variants of that test to grad students for over 25 years- we'd made the highest two grades he'd ever scored (mine was actually just a tie with two others from past years- my friend had destroyed the curve!). The mean (passing?) was mid 40s. I was planning on celebrating but went home and slept instead. :) I always remind my students that half of all physicians finished in the bottom 50% of their classes. Doesn't mean much but it is funny to watch it wash over their faces that there is a 50% chance that it could be their physician! Tim _______________________________ Timothy O. Shearon, PhD Professor and Chair Department of Psychology Albertson College of Idaho Caldwell, ID 83605 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
teaching: intro to neuropsychology; psychopharmacology; general; history and systems ________________________________ From: Jim Clark [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tue 5/8/2007 10:49 PM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: [tips] Re: grading and standards and multiple institutions Hi It is common (standard?) in Canadian universities for 50% to define the pass boundary (at least in the 3-4 I have taught for). It is an interesting question whether students interpret it as meaning they need to know "half" the material, but that is of course not a necessary implication of 50% (on a single test, for example) being a pass. The average mark on a test will be some function of the proportion of questions of different difficulty on the test, as implied by Steven's comment about "raising the bar." Put enough challenging questions on a test and 50% might actually represent A performance, not simply a pass. Put enough easy questions and then 60, 70, or even 80% might be a more realistic value for a pass. It would be interesting to know how different grading standards relate to some common metric (e.g., GRE scores?). Take care Jim James M. Clark Professor of Psychology 204-786-9757 204-774-4134 Fax [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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