Assigning Grades During an Earthquake - Shaken or Stirred?

Type of content
Discussion / Working Papers
Publisher's DOI/URI
Thesis discipline
Degree name
Publisher
University of Canterbury. Department of Economics and Finance
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Language
Date
2011
Authors
Hickson, S.
Agnew, S.
Abstract

In the event of an unanticipated disruption to normal life, universities tend to shift to an online environment in both delivery and assessment. Course instructors still need to assign grades despite not having the full set of planned assessments. This paper examines how grades are disrupted when an increased reliance is placed on online assessments.  We find substantial grade disruption and grade inflation as the weighting on online assessments rises relative to invigilated assessments. Grade inflation can be moderated by scaling to an historical distribution of grades; however such scaling can lead to substantial grade disruption where the quality of the cohort is different than the historical average. We also find evidence that time limited online assessments produce lower grade disruptions as weighting on the online component increases.

Description
Citation
Hickson, S., Agnew, S. (2011) Assigning Grades During an Earthquake - Shaken or Stirred?. Department of Economics and Finance. 35pp..
Keywords
economics education, principles of economics, online assessment, student grades, disruption to assessment, earthquake.
Ngā upoko tukutuku/Māori subject headings
ANZSRC fields of research
Fields of Research::39 - Education::3904 - Specialist studies in education::390402 - Education assessment and evaluation
Rights