Ah Christopher Green beat me to a few points ... only _partly_ tongue-in-cheek, I would add that letter grades are close to the magical number of categories (7 +- 2) that limits some of our cognitive processes. When grading essays or artistic performances, can we reliably segregate students into more than 7+- 2 categories? I can't. I think a numeric grade on say, a 0 to 100 or 0 to 1.0 scale may work if we were teaching classes with a very prescribed set of outcome criteria such as (I am scrambling for an example ....) a physical fitness test where # seconds and # push ups matter and can be counted, and you were training people to do a very prescribed physical job. We can't reliably reduce the arts and sciences to uni-dimensional scales. I am sympathetic to the "no grades" approach, which would reduce what we do to pass/fail. I am sure we can find some data out there showing very weak correlations between college grades and life success (whatever that means). The advantage of a good standardized test is that we can compare people across different backgrounds and school districts. The use of standardized tests coincided with the liberalization of admissions at elite schools which used to rely heavily on family history .. see:
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/04/nyregion/henry-chauncey-dies-at-97-shaped-admission-testing-for-the-nation-s-colleges.html p.s. I notice that the recent $150 million donation to Harvard U was earmarked for qualified but less-than-wealthy applicants ========================== John W. Kulig, Ph.D. Professor of Psychology Coordinator, Psychology Honors Plymouth State University Plymouth NH 03264 ========================== ----- Original Message ----- From: "Christopher Green" <chri...@yorku.ca> To: "Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS)" <tips@fsulist.frostburg.edu> Sent: Thursday, February 20, 2014 8:54:48 AM Subject: Re: [tips] SAT and High School grade study First, on the history, I believe that grades of A, B, C, etc. are a descendant of the older 1st class, 2nd class, etc. Second, on lost information, I doubt very much information is lost at all because no teacher can actually reliably distinguish between 100 categories. Five to seven is about right. It is mostly noise that is lost. When you include "pluses" and "minuses" on just As, Bs, and Cs (plus a D and F with no E) that gives you eleven categories, which is too many already. What about numerical, multiple-choice tests? They aren't (and shouldn't) be given in every subject. Third, on redundancy with SATs, even if it were true that the content of SATs overlaps completely with that of school grades, the quality of schools varies far too widely to take school grades entirely at face value (especially in the US, where schools are (insanely) supported by highly variable local property tax bases, rather than by more stable state or federal levels of gov't). SATs allow you to compare apples to apples (even if it is, sadly, a few narrow slices of the apples). I will take this opportunity to propose (again) the abolition of grades. Grades serve no positive purpose other than to communicate to the next level of education how the student did in the last level of education (and they do it poorly, by trying to squeeze and entire year's worth of evaluation into a single character or two, and even that they do unreliably). On the down side, grades divert students' attention from what they actually learned to what grade they got. If there were no grades, then there would be nothing for students to focus on but what is in their heads at the end of the course, not the letter that is sent on to the next potential level of their education (and they might even read our comments on their essay and assignments instead of just flipping to the grade, and throwing the rest out). So, you will ask, how would a university select new students from those who apply if they didn't have grades from high school? The same way they did in the old days -- matriculation exams (e.g., entry exams). It only makes sense that the cost of selecting new students should be borne by the institution selecting them, not by the one "before" them. Indeed SATs and similar tests are, in effect, nationwide standardized matriculation exams. They could be improved, to be sure (what couldn't?), but imagine if, instead of endlessly testing, marking, and then debating grades with students, parents (and ultimately lawyers), you could spend that time discussing aspects of the course material they didn't understand the first time around. Chris ....... Christopher D Green Department of Psychology York University Toronto, ON M6C 1G4 chri...@yorku.ca http://www.yorku.ca/christo > On Feb 20, 2014, at 12:46 AM, Mike Wiliams <jmicha5...@aol.com> wrote: > > Given the level of education debt in the country, it's obvious that colleges > and Universities are making far more money than test companies. Has anyone > ever calculated how much information is lost by converting a perfectly good > test average into a letter? Did I say letter? We actually convert scores into > letters? Imagine if we converted IQ scores into letters. Does anyone know the > history of using letter grades? The error in grading as a measurement device > contributes to the lower predictive power of grades. If we scored courses > better, I am willing to bet that they would be completely redundant with SATs > etc and standardized testing would have no unique predictive power. > > Mike Williams > >> On 2/20/14 12:00 AM, Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) digest >> wrote: >> Assessment companies and the test prep companies that live symbiotically off >> of them make a great deal of money. The test score is held up and apart from >> the grades as being somehow more fair. So I think they invite the scrutiny. >> >> I think any individual grade from the student's middle school or high school >> record might be less useful than an aggregate GPA. The 20-30 instructors >> together make an index with considerable predictive power. Not that they >> shouldn't be held accountable also. But it's unlikely that all 20 or so are >> grading too easy or too hard. And no individual instructor has the same >> financial investment in his or her product than the handful of institutions >> making coin from theirs. >> >> That being said, SES, for both grades and test scores, is a problematic >> variable to tease out from merit/ability to succeed in higher education. >> >> Nancy Melucci >> Long Beach City College >> Long Beach CA >> -----Original Message----- >> From: Mike Wiliams<jmicha5...@aol.com> >> To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences >> (TIPS)<tips@fsulist.frostburg.edu> >> Sent: Tue, Feb 18, 2014 11:10 pm >> Subject: Re:[tips] SAT and High School grade study >> >> These studies of SAT and grades as predictors or criterion just >> >> highlight how grades are poorly designed as a measurement device. What >> >> is their reliability and validity as measures of performance. Somehow >> >> the college board and SAT makers get the scrutiny that we don't apply to >> >> ourselves as grade makers. The error goes both ways. >> >> >> >> Mike Williams > > > --- > You are currently subscribed to tips as: chri...@yorku.ca. > To unsubscribe click here: > http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=430248.781165b5ef80a3cd2b14721caf62bd92&n=T&l=tips&o=34403 > > or send a blank email to > leave-34403-430248.781165b5ef80a3cd2b14721caf62b...@fsulist.frostburg.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: ku...@mail.plymouth.edu. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13338.f659d005276678c0696b7f6beda66454&n=T&l=tips&o=34410 or send a blank email to leave-34410-13338.f659d005276678c0696b7f6beda66...@fsulist.frostburg.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=34413 or send a blank email to leave-34413-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
