The Measure of a Student

I finished reading Cathy Davidson’s latest book, The New Education, subtitled: How to revolutionize the university to prepare students for a world in flux. It is the latest in a series of many articles, books, and presentations, made by pundits bemoaning the state of higher education. Having read much in this area already, I did not learn anything new here, but Davidson’s book collects the main threads of the web and delivers them with a clear narrative. Like many other popular pieces, the points being made are illustrated by personal stories of individuals, some data analysis, and a splash of history for narrative arc.

In today’s post, I will concentrate on Chapter 7 (“The Measure of a Student”) because it’s something I’ve been thinking hard about this past month. In particular, I’m motivated (again) to de-emphasize grades and exams, and to find alternative assignments and assessments in my introductory general chemistry courses. My hope is to find that happy medium between depth-rigor of knowledge (students must know the basics!) and creative application of that knowledge (students acquire relevant skills that will serve them both present and future).

“The Measure of a Student” is about assignments and assessments. Davidson’s anecdotal human interest story is an adjunct math professor at UC-Berkeley, who seems to be a fantastic teacher, who loses his job ostensibly because of his unconventional approach. The professor is quoted: “What does it mean to adhere to department norms if one has the highest student evaluation scores in the department, students performing statistically better in subsequent courses, and faculty universally reporting ‘extraordinary skills at lecturing, presentation, and engaging students’?... In a nutshell: stop making us look bad. If you don’t, we’ll fire you.” (His students also apparently “scored just as high or higher” on standardized departmental final exams.

The splash of history will be familiar to those who have looked into the history of grades. Mount Holyoke College is credited as the first institution to systematically create and implement a letter-grade system. Originally A, B, C, D and E, with A being the top grade (similar to classifying egg-size back then, get your “Grade A” eggs!), there was a controversy over the E grade. Apparently there was a fear that students would attempt to misrepresent E to future employers as “Excellent”, or in Hogwarts parlance “Exceeds Expectations”. (I suppose it could also be “Egghead”.) The E was changed to the dreaded F, derived from “the old Anglo-Norman failer, meaning nullification, nonoccurrence, or failure.” Use of the F spread to other institutions, but in addition, an agriculture professor at the University of Illinois introduced grades to the meatpacking industry.

Meatpackers, skeptical that a single letter grade could represent “something as complex as the quality of sirloin or chuck… insisted that, along with the grade, the written comments of the meat inspector to be tied to each and every piece of meat.” We no longer seem to have that metadata, and the USDA now uses words rather than letters. Prime. Choice. Select. No one is going to buy B grade meat, or anything lower, at least in today’s society. It’s no wonder that for many of our students today, getting a B is a tragedy. Anything less than A seems like a failure. I hope we don’t go the route of the Australian guide to kobe beef – slicing up the A’s into finer categories.

It’s not easy to buck the trend. Except for trend-buckers such as Hampshire or Reed College, most of us and our institutions caught in a vast system, made more acute by technology. At the end of the book, Davidson has a section addressed to students: Ten Tips for Getting the Most out of Your College Experience. #10 reads: When it’s time to submit an actual, professional resume, remember your first reader might be an algorithm. Sadly, this is likely to be increasingly true. I do like some of Davidson’s other tips including #2 Mitigate risk while taking risk. My favorite (and clearly I’m biased) is #3 Find a great prof and take advantage of all they can offer. In particular: “Great profs don’t just lecture well – they challenge you to think in new ways about new things. They don’t give answers; they ask deep questions. Visit their office hours…”

Davidson, like many others before her, argues strongly against standardized exams, with standardized questions, and standardized answers. She also argues that these do not lead to future palpable impact, and that we should be preparing our students differently. Exams are proxies for what the student “knows”, but is that enough? And are they even good proxies? (I suppose it depends on how the exam is written and how you prepare the student up to that point.) As I look to revamping my introductory chemistry courses, this time around, I’ve decided to strongly take student input into account. I’ve invited a couple of former students who were in my general chemistry course last year and my research methods course last semester (where we had a creativity thread!) to help me redesign assessments and assignments that are more open-ended and creative, without sacrificing the things the students must learn the ‘old-school’ way. I’m trying to refrain from imposing my ideas early on and allow wild ideas to flow back and forth in our group discussions. I’m already excited for next semester! In the meantime, I need to maintain my focus on trying to be an excellent teacher in my classes this semester. We’ve only just started, and setting the right tone and environment is crucial.