good god grading

The predictions of the future of computer-based assessment made me imagine a future where a John Henry-esque battle between a TA and a grading machine takes place. That's something I'd gladly lose.

I think Brian referred to the act of student grading as "onerous" in one of his articles, and that made me chuckle a little because the act of grading 50 student papers got in the way of me doing any "real" work this week (and will quite possibly result in my embarrassment whenever we show off our projects next week). At about 15-20 minutes per paper, I have to allot myself about 12 hours for any major assignments that need extensive grading. Since I'm teaching two classes this semester, I've cut back on the amount of assignments that require an in-depth, personal response from me, and transformed these things into group/blog work. So, in some ways, I welcome the electronic grading robots--unless of course we can live in an idealized society where I can focus all of my efforts on teaching one class. But I don't think that's gonna happen.

That being said, all of the work in the classes I teach is submitted and graded electronically. While I'm the one doing the grading, using a computer for this act shaves a lot of time off of the productivity I would have if I brought a giant stack of papers into Starbucks every couple of weeks. Here are the benefits I've seen so far:

• Organization. I'm huge on this. It helps with grading because I can keep track of all versions of a student's paper.


• Surface-level stuff. Because the new word can spell and grammar check most stuff in context, this is something that I don't necessarily have to worry about when I'm grading. Though I still need to tell students FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE RUN THESE CHECKS about a thousand times before they realize how much of a difference hitting F7 can make.


• Instant word count. It's always at the bottom of the screen, and it's infinitely useful.


• Grading via computer allows me to write more, and it allows the student to read everything I've written. Since my first semester of teaching, I've learned that students don't necessarily read all of the comments you put on their paper, so I don't write as much as I used to--but I still have the ability to do so. Of course, it seems like most students don't want to see more than their grade, which is why it's fun to piss them off with an evaluative non-grade. Takes a while to break 'em.

Strangely enough, grading does seem like the thankless "busywork" of academia--along with teaching comp classes. In my 90 years at college, I've seen enough TAs and GAs grading papers for real, live professors that I have to fall into John's camp and wonder just how useful and reflective grades can be when the process itself can be shuffled off like this.

I came to the conclusion Friday night--after I finished all of my grading--that I need to be in a field where my students hand in ScanTron sheets and I have way more free time. This is why I'm joining Kent's applied physics program. I'll see you guys there in the Spring.