Easy A’s

Grade inflation has been a topic of serious conversation in educational circles since I was in college forty plus years ago.

Here’s an interesting take on it from the Dish.

I’m particularly interested in computer scoring of essays.

When Beggrow and her team analyzed the data, they found that professors’ and computers’ scores of students’ short essays were almost identical, the correlation was 0.96 to 1.

When I taught years ago I preferred to ask essay questions to multiple choice questions. Now it seems computers can evaluate them almost as well as human teachers.

And don’t forget that computers can also fairly easily disclose when students have copied their essays wholesale from other sources.

About the author

Harry is a ferociously good natured eccentric in Duluth Minnesota who detests traitors dressed up as Uncle Sam. You can find somewhat better edited writings of his at the Duluth Reader "contributors." page. The URL is:

https://duluthreader.com/contributors/h/84/284-harry-welty