What if student work were posted online and everybody could post comments?

[Boojatta]

Suppose that each student submits work not to a particular instructor, but to a particular department. The department posts the work online. The instructor who is to grade the work doesn't have special priority access, but sees it online as anyone else would see it online, and can post commentary as anyone else might post commentary.

Now, the question arises: why should anyone be told which commentary is associated with the official grade? Why should there be an official grade? Everyone has an opportunity to post an evaluation and an argument supporting the evaluation.

You might say that for there to be no official grades would be unfair to students who achieve excellent grades and unfair to people who want to know something about the students/graduates. However, one could just as easily say that textbooks that omit ad hominem arguments are unfair to students. "The authors of this textbook don't like the following argument. Therefore, that argument doesn't support the claim that it purports to support and it should be ignored." Aren't student's entitled to see that kind of argument? Isn't the main goal of identifying some evaluation as official to ensure that other evaluations are ignored on that kind of ad hominem basis?

[thunder rising]

1. Well there is always YouTube.

[cloudbase]

2. The premise is that in some way

all comments are valid and have some measure of equality. 'Tain't so.

[Boojatta]

4. "Everyone has an opportunity to post an evaluation and an argument supporting the evaluation."

That's one of the things that actually appeared in the Original Post. How do you get from that to "in some way all comments are valid and have some measure of equality"?

Is there some part of the Original Post that you can quote to support your claim that "the premise is that..."?

[cloudbase]

9. You're kind of making my point for me.

It appears your idea isn't finding much traction, but you somehow take umbrage that the rest of us don't think it's all that good. You're looking for a fight, and I'm not going to give it to you.

Just because everybody with an internet connection has an equal opportunity to inject their thoughts/opinions/beliefs/feelings into just about anything doesn't make one any more valid than another. You're free to disagree with me. Whether you do or don't won't have any effect on me.

[Boojatta]

10. "you somehow take umbrage"

You began by telling me what the Original Post says, but for some reason you didn't actually quote any part of it. Now you are telling me how I feel.

I feel like quoting the Original Post:

Isn't the main goal of identifying some evaluation as official to ensure that other evaluations are ignored on that kind of ad hominem basis?

However, I would actually like to not merely quote, but actually ask that question.

[MrModerate]

3. Let's see . . . education as a standards-free bull session . . .

That would be really effective.

Not to mention, no one in their right mind would bother reading the submittals of 50 million little darlings except those people who had an axe to grind against the student in question. Which would skew this silly idea right into cyberbullyland.

I think you need to go back to protesting the use of red pens as too damaging to young scholars' egos.

[Boojatta]

5. "Let's see . . . education as a standards-free bull session . . ."

I don't recall making any recommendations about how to maximize student learning or even making any recommendations about how to ensure that some student learning occurs. After all, it's possible for a professor of English literature to submit an essay to be evaluated by a teacher of grade 9 English literature. At least, I can't think of any laws of physics that would be violated by such an event. So we can talk about evaluation without necessarily talking about a situation in which someone is being educated.

Also, I didn't say that students would be permitted to go online during classes to post either an evaluation or an argument in support of an evaluation.

On what basis do you characterize the Original Post of this thread as calling for "education as" anything?

[MrModerate]

13. "each student submits work . . ." clearly indicates an educational context.

Although, given your proposal, I can certainly see how nothing of the sort would take place.

[Boojatta]

14. Yes, it indicates an educational context, and within that context the topic is evaluation.

[MrModerate]

17. Now I'm really hoping you're not a professional educator . . .

Or planning to become one. That would be entirely too depressing.

[Boojatta]

15. Re: red pens

Is the website at this link a hoax created in response to ego trauma experienced by murderers who are reminded daily of their own guilt? Yes, just as red ink draws attention to a student's errors, prison clothes draw attention to the guilt of a convict.

Before one can ask whether or not all people convicted of murder are guilty, one needs to be willing to distinguish between two ideas: the idea of an official evaluation, and the idea of an underlying reality that the evaluation is supposed to reflect.

What kind of system would occasionally put an innocent person in prison for murder, and keep the person there for many years, but guarantee that every evaluation given to a student for a school assignment is an appropriate evaluation? Why not achieve guaranteed correctness for a decision that someone is guilty of murder?

[MrModerate]

16. Excuse me, but except for the extremely slender thread of "evaluation" . . .

These two subjects have absolutely nothing to do with each other.

How much time do you spend coming up with these utterly obtuse comparisons? Or are you an amateur satirist who sadly lacks any sense of what's funny?

I suppose that your pifflicious pronouncements could be cobbled together into some sort of mock-academic parody of the very worst of sophomoric bull-session insight, but I think it would be a much better use of your time to shovel bat guano out of Carlsbad Caverns using only your tongue.

[Boojatta]

18. "your pifflicious pronouncements"

Perhaps there is a misunderstanding. I will start at the beginning of the Original Post and look for an example of a Boojatta pronouncement.

Suppose that each student submits work not to a particular instructor, but to a particular department.

"Suppose that..." indicates that the sentence posits a hypothetical scenario. To describe a hypothetical scenario isn't to assert anything. It's simply a thought experiment.

The department posts the work online.

This certainly appears superficially to be of declarative form, and not of interrogative, imperative, or other form. However, it's a continuation of the hypothetical that began with the initial sentence.

The instructor who is to grade the work doesn't have special priority access, but sees it online as anyone else would see it online, and can post commentary as anyone else might post commentary.

Again, this has a declarative form, but it is merely a continuation of the hypothetical scenario.

Now, the question arises: why should anyone be told which commentary is associated with the official grade?

I suppose you might request a demonstration that the question actually does arise, but the turn of phrase "now, the question arises" is merely an introductory phrase that is not intended to make any claim.

Why should there be an official grade?

That is clearly a question, not an assertion.

Everyone has an opportunity to post an evaluation and an argument supporting the evaluation.

This has a declarative form, but it is intended to be understood as a reminder of the nature of the hypothetical scenario.

If you dispute anything in the above, then please identify what you dispute. I don't see any pronouncements above. I could continue, but given that you have referred to "pronouncements" of mine, perhaps the onus should be on you to identify at least two of my "pronouncements."

Now, unless I am misreading your intentions, the following does appear to be an actual pronouncement:

These two subjects have absolutely nothing to do with each other.

I am unable to guess even a general outline of how you intend to demonstrate that the assertion is true. I also fail to see the significance of the assertion. Can you provide a hint? Of course, I'm presuming here that it is intended to be an assertion (what you refer to as a "pronouncement.") If it isn't intended to be an assertion, then please correct me.

[MrModerate]

19. Thanks for providing such a target-rich environment of such stunning fatuity.

Evidently, you've spent so much time pleasuring yourself in playing mumbletypeg with *data* that you've lost sight of the fact that what you're babbling about has no value as *information.* But, purely for the recreational benefit I'll derive, I'll address a few of your points.

• Red Pens/Murderers: Your tortuous stringing together of these two subjects can't be characterized as a "leap" but rather as a "bellyflop." The rhetoric follows what I assume is your usual crackbrained pattern where, immediately after you've laid out some inapt comparison between two unrelated topics, you then pose a question that superficially derives from the inapt comparison, but in actual fact is a third, badly shoehorned-in and completely specious notion. You then demand that the question be answered before argument can continue. To which the facepalming observer has no choice but to reply "give me a frakkin' break." There is no requirement whatsoever (including in natural law) to be "willing to distinguish" between evaluation and reality to question the guilt of a murderer. Also -- just in case you hadn't noticed -- the "system" that imprisons people (innocent or otherwise) is entirely separate from the system that grades student papers. If you are an educator -- god forbid -- I'm somewhat surprised you're not aware of the differences.

Lesson: Just because you put them in the same paragraph doesn't mean things are related.

• Pretend "Thought Experiments:" Just because you chose to force-fit your broken-backed maunderings into a phony interrogative format where you use a lot of question marks, that doesn't successfully disguise the fact that you have twaddle to peddle. Slicing and dicing the rhetorical forms you've employed (putatively for my benefit) in queeping out your content-free drivel doesn't really add any value -- or any credibility, for that matter, in that it just reinforces the evaluation (there's that word again) that you're just hissing like an unattended tea kettle. In any TV courtroom on the airwaves you'd be slapped down for leading the witness -- except that no one could pin down where you were leading the witness to, since there's no destination apparent.

Lesson: You're not fooling anyone except yourself if you think deliberate obfuscation makes you appear smarter. It's the direct opposite.

• I will acknowledge that perhaps your posts don't meet the exacting standards I applied to them with the term "pifflicious pronouncements." Perhaps a simple "bullshit" would have been more appropriate. I can only confess to temporarily being under the influence of your logorrhoeaic emanations and so having gone briefly off the rails myself.

Lesson: Don't ever change. You're way too entertaining. Corollary: Don't expect too much from life until you get the large stick out of your ass.

[Boojatta]

20. You have inspired me.

I cannot explain how you did it. I begin with a response to your most recent message. After that, I will post some *** symbols and the composition that you inspired.

You say that you

can only confess to temporarily being under

my influence.

You make it clear that you consider the influence to be bad, but you say:

Don't ever change.

Aren't you concerned about again being influenced in a bad way?

You refer to the style that I used:

Lesson: You're not fooling anyone except yourself if you think deliberate obfuscation makes you appear smarter. It's the direct opposite.

You also refer to the content:

In any TV courtroom on the airwaves you'd be slapped down for leading the witness -- except that no one could pin down where you were leading the witness to, since there's no destination apparent.

Are you suggesting that you are hungry for additional content or are you suggesting that the content remains a mystery to you? It's difficult to see how it could be a mystery to you if you understand it well enough to have evaluated it as follows...

you have twaddle to peddle

Give yourself credit for inspiring me to use a style below that is different from that in the Original Post of this thread. Here it is, the promised composition:

*** *** *** ***

Understanding Standards

(An attempt to understand what standards are, where they come from, and why they are important.)

There are no standards unless each submitted assignment is given an official evaluation.

The essence of standards isn't that there be at least one evaluation that is supported by true assumptions and valid step-by-step reasoning. The essence of standards is that everyone has access to information that identifies one particular evaluation as "official."

What does it mean to say that an evaluation is "official"?

It's a matter of who wrote the evaluation. It must be someone who was officially appointed. The essence of standards is that some person was appointed by bureaucrats who were themselves appointed by politicians.

However, it is unacceptable to speak of a politician as being the right person for the job. That's purely a matter of personal opinion of this or that individual voter.

Thus, we have a power hierarchy. It's irrelevant who is at or near the top of the hierarchy. All that matters is that some process was used to transfer authority from the top down. A person near the bottom of the hierarchy can be relied upon. The process that was used to select that person is completely irrelevant.

It is not even acceptable for an instructor at a publicly funded educational institution to speak of someone above the bureaucratic level and at the political level of a power hierarchy as being "the right person for the job." To utter such words would be to violate the official standards of objectivity.

[MrModerate]

21. OK, I take it back. Go ahead and change. This game is only fun for a few rounds.

In that comment I was referring to the entertainment value I derived from framing a response to such gasbaggery. Unfortunately I'm finding that the pleasure palls quickly.

I'm also convinced that you are driven to inflate such gasbags by a roughly similar impulse to the one that causes me to poke holes in them. You apparently consider yourself some sort of crypto-humorist who marshals these fumble-footed platoons of illogical, unsupported, or just plain false statements ("The essence of standards is that some person was appointed by bureaucrats . . .") to 1) demonstrate your mock erudition and 2) drive sane people mad.

Piffle turns out to be pretty thin soup. I think I'll save my energy for toilet jokes.

[Boojatta]

22. "similar impulse to the one that causes me to poke holes in them"

I'm guessing that you meant "find holes" rather than "poke holes." If I were doing your writing, then I would prefer to write "find potential holes." I don't think that it's either necessary or helpful for me to presume that any given search for error has already been successfully concluded.

[MrModerate]

23. If 4 out of 5 people suffer from diarrhea . . .

Does that mean that 1 in 5 *enjoy* it?

[Boojatta]

24. No, it doesn't imply that 1 in 5 enjoy it.

What's the lesson? I have thought about it, but haven't guessed what train of thought might have prompted you to ask that question.

[MrModerate]

25. It was the train where I was going to concentrate on toilet jokes rather than . . .

continue trying to trigger a response from you that indicated you heard anything outside the noises in your own head.

So . . .

Why is pea soup more special than mashed potatoes?

Because anyone can mash potatoes.

Choo-Choo!

[Boojatta]

26. "I was going to concentrate on toilet jokes"

Please start your own thread for that.

[MrModerate]

27. Why should I? Based on the content of your posts . . .

Not to mention the rigor of your logic, the two themes are effectively identical.

[Boojatta]

28. You could have simply asserted that the two themes

are "effectively identical" and left it at that. What was your motive for posting anything else in this thread?

You had things to say earlier that were much more interesting. As I said before, you inspired me. Thanks again for that.

[MrModerate]

29. I'm surprised I've let myself continue this subthread, so I'll give you a serious answer.

Your initial post really rubbed my fur the wrong way, as did most of your subsequent posts.

Here's why: I have an aversion to what I consider hifalutin nonsense, especially in an educational context. I find both your rhetoric and the ideas behind it to be specious, presumptive, and apparently based on some unknown doctrine that I neither grasp nor (I suspect) accept.

Additionally, I'm convinced that you're making this stuff up either to be deliberately provocative, or because you've adopted a "baffle 'em with bullshit" modus operandi to mask a lack of anything worthwhile to say.

Perhaps I'm entirely wrong and your cant is regarded as the height of humor in some circle or the other. In my circles I'm considered both funny and pithy and I suppose the same could be true for you.

No matter.

Either you're a complete phony or we come from different planets. I think I'll leave it at that.

[LWolf]

6. What would be the point?

Who is better qualified to assess, score, or grade an assignment than the professional who created it?

I'm not sure what textbooks have to do with it. Textbooks don't grade assignments.

We are currently in the process of creating an online grade book that will allow student and parents access, only to the individual students record. A grade book that will include mouse-over pop-ups of assignment description, directions, and requirements, along with the rubric used to score the assignment.

And with the future possibility of exemplars to be included.

That will give families plenty of feedback about why Johnny didn't get a higher score, as long as Johnny doesn't trash his returned assignment before he gets home.

[Boojatta]

8. "Who is better qualified to assess, score, or grade an assignment...

...than the professional who created it?"

Either there's a concept of correctly assessing, scoring, or grading an assignment or there is no such concept. If there is such a concept, then some particular assessment, score or grade is correct, regardless of who does the assessing, scoring, or grading. If there is no such concept, then there is no basis for anybody to be considered qualified to do the thing correctly because it is meaningless to talk about it as being done correctly.

I'm not sure what textbooks have to do with it. Textbooks don't grade assignments.

I'm not sure why you were expecting to be sure about "what textbooks have to do with it." Can you give one example of an argument that supports and later relies upon a claim of the form "A and B have something to do with each other"? I cannot think of even one example of such an argument.

On the other hand, I wouldn't characterize the Original Post as an argument. I would characterize it as a description of a train of thought along with a formulation of a question that is provoked by the train of thought.

[LWolf]

11. You brought up text books in your OP.

As for their being one "correct" score regardless of who scores it, that would depend on all of those scorers:

1. Understanding the objective, and
2. Understanding the scoring rubrics, and how to use them.

I don't know why you would assume that anyone who happened to stop in and read a student's paper would meet those 2 criteria.

[Boojatta]

12. "I don't know why you would assume that..."

I believe that it's important for evaluators to know the constraints under which students were operating.

(In some cases, one might speak of "extra help" rather than "constraints." For example, instructors who create a test can give very specific hints about what kinds of questions will appear on a test, and the test itself doesn't necessarily reveal that such hints were provided, so a historical record consisting of an old test and past scores can be incomplete in a misleading way.)

For the sake of completeness, it is valuable to specify that the assignment information that was provided to students would be posted online along with the completed assignments submitted by students. I don't see any basis for claiming that the Original Post implies otherwise.

However, given the way that the Original Post has been received, I suspect that such completeness in the Original Post wouldn't have been helpful, but would have simply distracted people (or provided them with a pretext to distract themselves) from the main question that the Original Post was designed to pose.

[eppur_se_muova]

7. Well, it might force a reevaluation of the concept of ...

student evaluations of teachers, once the foot is on the other shoe.

No student is ever too ill-informed or thoughtless for his opinions on his teachers to be treated with equal validity as anyone's, and filed in the teacher's permanent record.