Re: AltInst: Regressions for Student Evaluations/Grades

A paper proposing a student grading scheme along these general lines
is available at http://ftp.isds.duke.edu/WorkingPapers/96-20.ps:

  Valen E. Johnson. An Alternative to Traditional GPA for Evaluating
    Student Performance.

It has since been published in Statistical Science (1997).

The general lack of attention to these matters (and to improving
teaching evaluations) does say something about something, I think.
Since grades are obviously important (though maybe they shouldn't be),
one has to wonder from this inattention whether their social role is
not to reflect actual skills, but to reflect something else. (The
persistence to stick out four years at a university? Ability to
learn how to exist in a beaurocratic system?)

   Radford Neal

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Received on Thu May 3 20:28:16 2001