This comes from the statistician in me, not the instructor: I love doing final grades. I love setting the curve, computing the median, poring over the final letter grades, and correlating those grades with my subjective opinions of each student formed over the quarter. I love it when a completely objective scale gives the hard-working students As and Bs, and the slackers Ds and Fs. I feel like a karma machine.
Sometimes, however, a frustrating thing will happen: a complete slacker will earn a respectable grade. (The reverse, a hard-working student who earns a less-than-respectable grade is even more frustrating, but very rarely happens.) Usually this occurs because I am generous with extra credit. I put extra-credit questions on exams, I give extra-credit quizzes -- pretty much anything I can think of that will help a hard-working student get a better grade. I like to believe that my extra credit, while generous, is nonetheless pedagogically relevant: even though I might ask on a pop quiz what day of the week it is (an exaggeration of course), I'm doing it to reward and encourage attendance.
So here is a question for discussion: should extra credit be applied to raise a failing to a passing grade, or should extra credit be applied only to raise a passing grade to a higher grade? Talk amongst yourselves.
Friday, June 08, 2007
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case by case basis. If the student worked hard through the term and went to class, took advantage of office hours etc, then absolutely.
If not, tough shit. Its annoying and frustrating to the hardworking students.
Hmmm. I'm envisioning text for a future syllabus. Something like:
Extra credit is intended to raise the grades of students who demonstrate that they are doing acceptable work in the core areas of the course. (viz., How can you have any puddin' if ye don't eat yer meat?) Extra credit is not intended to pad the grades of students who do not attend to their basic responsibilities in this course. Therefore, extra credit will only be applied to passing grades. It will not be possible to raise a failing grade to a passing grade with extra credit points.
Luis, you read my mind.
I don't understand why extra credit exists in the first place, so I'm probably not of much help. I've never heard of it being used in the UK (sounds as if it just creates more work).
Too add on to my last comment....
In my experience with professors and extra credit, the extra credit was applied without the students knowing. For example a professor I had during my undergrad used to give extra points to students who would challange her points in class in an intelligent manner.
This same professor did something like extra credit. Her classes were all taught the same. Two tests and a paper. The paper was worth the most. However how she'd help students out was she would tell everyone on the first class that if they wanted to pass drafts in to her she would informally correct them and comment on them. I've gone so far as to pass in 3 drafts before the final. I ended up with the highest grade in the class on that paper. But it was a way to give extra credit to students who were willing to work. Chances are the failing student isn't going to bother. Therefore it only rewards the students who have worked for it.
The purpose of extra credit, as I use it, is to allow a student to recover from a stupid mistake when they are within inches of a better grade. For instance, if a student is just above a grade boundary and blows one quiz, they could well drop below the grade boundary. I can't just say "OK, up you go!" I have to have some basis for slipping them back up. If they have completed some extra credit assignments satisfactorily, then I have some basis to judge whether the quiz was an anomaly or not. But I set things up so that the extra credit can never amount to more than one quiz grade, so a student can't just ignore the parts of the class they find dull and create their own assignments instead.
Incidentally, if a student was already below a grade break (that is, the bad quiz wasn't entirely to blame) and the extra credit doesn't pop them up to the next level, too bad. I read that as evidence that poor performance is not anamolous.
In my experience, students who work for a grade, get a grade that doesn't need help. But I don't teach in a quantitative field, in which one could argue that understanding concepts and making the math work are separable skills. I'm not sure I believe that, but I've certainly heard it said.
Well, I'll bite and probably
get killed...
I don't believe in extra credit.
I don't believe in coerced attendance.
Having said that, it would be pretty difficult not to get hurt in my classes by skipping too many of them. I talk about the things in class that I think are important and they end up on (scheduled) exams.
In lower level courses where pounding information into people is necessary, there are scheduled weekly quizzes. Some of them can be dropped so that people are not unduly penalized for a "mistake." People who do badly on quizzes are hauled in for a little chat.
This method has produced reasonably good results over the years. Now unlike many of my colleagues out there in the aether, I have been pretty fortunate over the years in dealing with pretty motivated students and also teach science. This method is no doubt inappropriate for some other circumstances.
Ciao,
Bonzo
I'm a student and feel that extra credit should at least be meaningful and take some time.
Many of my professors give extra credit for participating in experiments (as tracked by Experimetrix) or for attending outside lectures (need to write a synopsis on it) or for bringing relevant articles to their attention. They almost never give more than one point for each thing so you could raise your grade from a c+ to a b- with one item.
Yeah, I was going to say what Luis Felipe did. If you didn't say it on your syllabus this year, then I think you have to pass the student. But if you want to spell it out in the future, then the student fails.
Angry Professor, in corporate America, we have similar conundra on our annual performance evaluations. Does the person who really pulled off a miracle and made a sh_t project go in with only 10 defects get a worse score than the slacker who pulled a plum assignment and put in the easy-as-pie project with 3 defects?
Of course, all the fun of life is in those grey areas.
I have to say, neither of Iralyn's examples are what I would call extra credit, as a professor.
I think I *would* let extra credit make the difference between passing and not passing. I mean, that's from an F to a D or D-minus, right? I'm okay with the idea that effort can make the difference there--that's still a bad grade.
Thanks for spurring a post on extra credit.
In any given course, any extra credit that I make available consists of problems that are tons more difficult than the regular work that I expect my students to do.
Nowadays, I rarely get requests for extra credit.
I'm with Luis Felipe (and the others thinking in the same vein). My students, particularly those in required courses, are constantly asking whether they can dump the regular course and do *only* fun extra credit projects. Like: watch the movie *instead* of reading the novel. Ergo: extra credit is for those who want an extra challenge! And it can incidentally allow people to make up for a silly mistake ... or a life issue that comes up! But not, and I repeat n.o.t., replace the basic course material!
Personally, I despise all the statistical BS, and am perfectly willing to have the entire class get A's. That's the reason they get the list of the goals and objectives that I write my lectures from a week before the exam. It has never happened, but I live in hope. I've used extracredit twice, to reward students who came to an outside lecture I gave, and to reward those who showed up for class on a university holiday.
Most of my professors despise extra credit and refuse to give it, but most of them also manage an "out" for anomalously poor performance: dropping the lowest quiz grade(s), assigning 12 labs and only grading 10 for each student, accepting some small number of late assignments from each student, etc. This seems far more fair than the extra credit silliness.
Fair is fair, AP. The "slacker" should get the higher grade if that's what the extra credit entails. FU for having the nerve to complain after you've designed an extra credit system that has allowed a slacker to play you to their advantage. You've been pwned, deal with it.
Professors who play attendance games with bullshit quizes are usually a waste of time. Just because you work hard to prepare your lecutures and are good at teaching doesn't mean that all students should be in class to gaze at you with rapt attention each class day. Sometimes students don't need to bother to come to class in order to make high grades. I remember a couple of classes where I simply stopped going unless it was an exam day because I could show up to the exam and make an A with no prep work whatsoever. Thank god those profs didn't feel a need to hold students hostage in a class that clrealy wasn't going to teach me anything I didn't already know. Let's face it, intro to stats is pretty easy math. Hardly the kind of thing you can't master alone with a decent textbook.
And I'm not the only one. A good friend who was a physics major refused to go to a lower level class after the first day because it was a waste his time. The professor actually called him to his office to ask why he wasn't showing up in since he was a major. His response was that it was a waste of time and he'd be happy to take the final immediately. The prof called him on it and after getting a 100% exam back told him he didn't need to bother to come in, he'd have an A for the semeseter.
But back to my first rant. If you're going to give away extra credit, suck it up and be fair to those who work it to their advantage -- even if you think they are slacking. Otherwise, cut that BS out and don't offer it at all.
Shame on you AP! You deserve your bleeding ass for trying to shaft the slacker who successfully played you.
Well, Anonymous, a passing grade in a course is a guarantee to other faculty, and to employers, that the student has mastered the material sufficiently to be able to manage the following course, or to apply the material taught in this course in a practical setting. It is unfair to everyone concerned not to give a passing grade this meaning.
In intro courses, there are always some students who have been placed there by unknowing advisors, and who already know the material. That is what credit exams are for - so they can get credit if they need it, and move up, out, and beyond my boring old course. I can give you credit for knowing material, but not for doing work you do not do, if the course is project based. That would be unfair to the very type of student you are trying to defend here.
One class - one grading system - period. You seem to want credit for
knowing material given to those who do not, and credit for doing work given to those who do not. But courses are designed for those who do not know the material ahead of time and want to acquire knowledge of the material. The lectures, projects, exams, and so on, are designed to that end. Dropping lowest quiz grades and giving small extra credit options, are lagniappe to reduce tension and add interest - not to twist the primary purpose.
Being so bright and all, I am sure you are aware of these things. Caring so deeply about failing students, I am sure you would not want to place them in a position to fail at higher levels, where consequences would be more serious.
P.S. "I might ask on a pop quiz what day of the week it is (an exaggeration of course), I'm doing it to reward and encourage attendance."
I do this a lot in intro courses. It gets them there, and they then relax, have fun, and learn something.
Also: if people aren't in class, I do not find out what they really know or not and how well they know it, or what their interests are ...
so the course cannot get tailored to the population as much. And: if I haven't seen the quality of your participation, I cannot say nearly as much in a letter of recommendation.
Also, anonymous? Your argument would be much stronger if it didn't have quite so many typos, spelling errors, and grammar problems.
I second Liz's statements!
One of the stupidest things I have seen a prof. do was changing the grading rubric AFTER the drop-add period....which in my eyes is unfair to the students.
A syllabus/grading rubric outlined therein is essentially a contract between student and professor. If you stick with the class after the drop/add period ends you are agreeing to the terms set forth by the instructor in the syllabus.
So you should not change your grading at this point in time. Even if the slackers deserve a failing grade it would be unethical for you to alter the grading system expressly for this purpose.
Extra credit is subjective and slippery by nature. If you don't outline HOW extra credit is applied to grades in your syllabus then you are at liberty to decide how to apply it in each individual case. They can't challenge the application. Yes, this is a bit shady... but extra credit isn't mandatory. It's a gray area without clear guidelines. Also, you could say that extra credit is not valid unless all other assignments are completed... thus making it truly "extra" and not "exchange credit".
Anon., I could have skipped lectures like you did, but I save absences for the times when a migraine inconveniently coincides with Italian papers. Also, my college education (undergraduate) costs upwards of $40,000 per year. Each class costs me around $80 per class period. I lose both money and information if I skip. If the prof. can't hold my attention, I'll still show up in case something important is mentioned. So I multi-task... I do homework in the boring, non-informative lectures. Maybe the prof. will eventually realize that my Italian homework is more interesting than their ranting about the Republican party and consequently improve their lectures.
I hope I was able to contribute something slightly relevant to this discussion.
Ingrid
(recent survivor of freshman year of college)
For a blog that likes to whine about grade inflation in posts and comments there are a lot of you who seem to love giving grade inflating extra credit. Just as many of you are fans of dropping one or two harmful grades -- hardly fair to the exceptional student who always performs at a high level.
Run you class the way you see fit. But when you run it like a public high school and the students work your system to their advantage, don't act like Paris Hilton screaming for her mommy. Better yet, go teach high school so you can prepare those slackers for "real" college life. Go ahead, be noble!
Those of you on the academic reservation do not live in the real world where nobody cares what grades your students get. Grades are much like SAT scores -- highly relative and useful only in as much as you believe in the system and biases they represent. The great lie about grades is that they matter; they don't mean shit.
Curve blower-
As someone who has worked in industry - ten years - as well as on the academic reservation...
"The great lie about grades is that they matter; they don't mean shit."
You are full of it.
When you initially come into a system, grades, SATs etc. are about all they know about you. If you have done a poor job in these areas you won't even get an interview. Your comments do students a disservice.
Your remind me of a corporate scientist at the Mining who once claimed that performance there was inversely related to academic achievement.
Wake up and smell the coffee.
Bonzo
Check out this graph (oooh... graphs!) that is related to the last couple of comments.
http://indexed.blogspot.com/2007/05/look-new-coffee-maker.html
So far, in my short time teaching, I've usually handled extra credit by waiting until the first exam or two are in, and then going from there. If the class as a whole does well, I don't offer it. If they're not doing so hot, I will. It rarely improves grades by more than a half-grade, and I try to make it pedagogically relevant (or at least reward observant students).
I've had a couple of people who'd otherwise fail squeak by with a low D (hardly GPA-padding), and they generally seem more appreciative - they're usually the ones who come to office hours and want to work for it. On the other hand, I've had students sitting in the high-B range whine and bitch that I'm not offering enough extra credit to get them up to an A. As far as I'm concerned, they can pound sand.
I try to make it clear that any extra credit is at my discretion and they aren't entitled to it. It's a privilege, not a right. And so far the results seem to be good pedagogically and karmically.
I also love it when people from "the real world" (so I take it you're leaving out consultancy?) deign to weigh in on the legitimacy of academia. Knowing what I do about some of the assessment tools used in the "real world", I'd love to offer them my services to design better ones. At a ridiculously inflated rate, of course.
"I feel like a karma machine."
ahem.
"I also love it when people from "the real world" (so I take it you're leaving out consultancy?) deign to weigh in on the legitimacy of academia. Knowing what I do about some of the assessment tools used in the "real world", I'd love to offer them my services to design better ones. At a ridiculously inflated rate, of course."
Excellent point, Ian.
I give an extra credit assignment worth 5 points on the final (the final is worth 20% of the course grade). I give all the details about this extra credit assignment on my syllabus. It entails reading several short articles about a relevant subject that we don't get to spend a lot of time on in class, but that students are generally interested in, and then writing a one page paper answering a couple of broad questions about the readings.
I like doing this because (1) the students who complete the assignment actually learn something of value from it; (2) out of the 600 or so students I taught over the last 2 semesters, I only had to read about 30 extra credit papers (low cost for me); (3) it helped raise the letter grade of about 3 of those 30 students (most of the others were A students to begin with or too far away for the extra credit to matter for their grade); and (4) it cut complaints from all the other marginal students: whenever one of them complained about their 59 = F average all I had to say was "if only you had done the extra credit you would have gotten a higher grade" and they knew I had them over the proverbial barrel. I love my extra credit!!
JEH
Just a note on requiring attendance:I moved from a university with smallish classes where attendance was usually required (e.g. no more than 3 classes missed)to a university with big lectures & tutorials which *doesn't allow* faculty to require attendance. I love not have to take roll, and I also love to have my lectures full of students who have chosen to be there, even if it means that 20% of the class might be absent. There is no acting out, no reading the paper during class, no sleeping. There are one or two students who can do well without coming to class, but most students who don't attend are slackers who fail. I prefer giving them the choice: attend and do well (usually), or cut class and do poorly.
I've been known to give small amounts of extra credit for things I can't require students to do (attend a meeting or volunteer at an event), but it's a pretty rare thing. I've been known to curve some grades at the very end (though not recently), and my cut-off there is different. A lot of the classes I teach, students need a C or better to take the next class in the sequence, and that is the place where I never raise grades. If you're a C or above you might get curved up a little; if you're failing you might get curved up to a D, but D's never move up to C's, because sending students on to a class they're probably not ready for is always a bad idea.
The departmental syllabus which we lowly peons are required to use mandates a certain amount of extra credit for 'quizzes'. With that in place, I feel that a curve has already been given. I also agree on what lsquared said -- I absolutely won't curve a D to a C, because frankly in my opinion the bottom of the C range students are ill-prepared for the next class anyway, but pass due to departmental exams which are incredibly predictable from semester to semester making a large portion of the grade.
This is a hard one. I do agree that "extra credit" should not be a way for someone to pass a course- you should be able to pass on just the "regular" course requirements.
I had a similar situation TAing. We gave participation/attendance marks for tutorials. You always got one free attendance mark if you missed a class (though we certainly didn't tell any of the students this), and another one if you told me in advance you wouldn't be there.
This meant that people who only showed up for one or two tutorials, would still get marked like the came to nearly half of them if they happened to email me in advance once. I tried to convince the prof that there should be a cut-off for these "free" points, but no luck.
I agree with doing the final grades. I really like to nail the kids that didn't do anything at semester. And it is fun to see if some students that really tried hard can pull out an A in the end.
I usually give out some extra credit during the semester, but I absolutely do not give out extra extra credit at the end of the semester for those people with really bad grades. That is just not fair to everyone else who tried for the whole semester.
The way that I make sure that people get the grade that they deserve is that I tell them that there is no curve in the class, and then I can then set a curve and make sure the people that deserve a grade gets it. (I only help people with the curve, not hurt them... although I would love to just give some people F's...)
Dear blogger,
Crawlspace (aka Jesse) couldn't or wouldn't be bothered to tag you for a Meme. I shall.
Gill Smoke
http://catoshead.wordpress.com
I no longer give extra credit. The various papers, homework, peer review assignments, and final portfolio should be enough. If a student blows it, too bad.
Hmmm... I feel rather guilty for saying this, but here goes.
I carry a very high GPA overall, and especially high in my department; however, I am inherantly lazy. I think all students are (especially this close to impending graduation).
When a class does not require attendance, I usually do not go. Especially when said professor puts every word from his powerpoint lectures on webCT.
Regardless, we're not discussing attendance. On to the extra credit debate.
As I said before, I'm lazy. And a procrastinator. I took a gen ed class last semester which (not only) did not require attendance, but offered as much extra credit as you wanted- you simply had to watch a show on some aspect of world history and summarize in a brief paragraph.
I never went to class. I didn't study for the tests. I just watched the history channel a few nights a week and wrote some meandering essays on said subject.
Bottom line: I still don't know a damn thing about world history.
I'm not a fan of extra credit, even though I do take advantage of it. It simply enables my laziness.
<3
Jenn
What's the difference between a barely passing grade and a slightly failing grade? I mean, what's the real difference?
You're the statitician - you would know better than I.
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