Do teachers have to have a certain amount of different grades?

Discussion in 'SHH Community Forum' started by Gamma Ray, May 9, 2006.

  1. Gamma Ray Registered

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    Obviously a teacher can't fail their whole class, but is there a certain quota of As and Bs that must be met? Any teachers on board? College in particular...
     
  2. Darren Daring Registered

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    If they Bell curve it, yeah.
     
  3. Odin's Lapdog Registered

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    i guess it depends if they are taking care of a specific set or a intelectually mixed group.
     
  4. Mr Sparkle Registered

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    yes they can, and I college a bunch of teachers routinely failed entire classes.
    you cannot give a failing student a passing grade because 70% of the studendts are morons or fail to do the work.
     
  5. Immortalfire In the pale moonlight

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    Wanna bet?
     
  6. Daisy Gone

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    In most cases, no, there is no quotas. A teacher could give all As or all Fs. I would say, however, that if either of those occurred, it would be an indication of a poor teacher.
     
  7. PLAS Registered

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    be wary of a teacher whose class is either mostly low grades or really, really high grades

    a teacher evaluates students based on their performance and aquired knowledge from the course

    there are ideal scenarios when it comes to overall grade tally, but that's about it
     
  8. dpm07 Hiking Hero

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    When I was hired to serve as a part-time instructor for a university, the first thing I was told in the hiring process is that they did NOT want to see all A's. They stated that I should set the course up to be difficult, but fair, and to challenge the students to aspire toward a higher standard.

    I have failed students in the past, but it was less the fact that I failed them, than I gave them enough rope to hang themselves. No instructor likes to fail students, but they need to set standards, or every semester students will walk in, and think they can just do whatever they want and not be accountable for their actions.

    Generally overall, I have seen many instructors actually be too easy on grades and let students get away with things at the university level. Students in the US don't realize how easy they have it compared to the educational standards of many other countries.

    Personally, I think that the US should set the bar higher collectively at the secondary level of education so that when students reach the university level, there will be a higher average.
     
  9. Daisy Gone

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    Sadly, I think that school is in the minority. :(

    I taught at an Ivy Leauge U, and the 'helpful advice' we got was that the parents of our students were paying our salaries and that parents liked to see their children get As... and we should be mindful of that when we were structuring our courses and grading scales.
     
  10. Childlike Wild Registered

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    I'm not sure which Ivy that was, but I have heard that "the hardest part of Harvard is getting in."

    My professors (not at Harvard) have ranged in their grading. One guy had graphs and explained at length about the numbers of students at certain grades and how that matched up to what was expected/average. Occasionally if the class did too poorly, he'd raise grades so that there were enough A's and B's. He apparently cared about the opinions of his bosses... some don't have that concern.
     
  11. Daisy Gone

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    Yup, that's pretty much the case with all the 'big' schools. But it's not just them, grade inflation is a serious problem in most American universities.
     
  12. Calvin Muchas smooches

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    I once had a math professor who had failed his entire class the semester before, and it hadn't been the first time either.
     
  13. jaguarr Be Your Own Hero

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    Man, I wish that had been a problem where I went to college. Because it was a smaller school, the Professors seemed to have the attitude that they needed to make people work extra hard for their grades, particularly when you got into the Senior level courses.

    jag
     
  14. Childlike Wild Registered

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    I think U. Alberta hangs around the 30,000 student range, so it's definitely in that "big" category. Canadian universities seem to suffer from the same problem. (In my limited experience with Canaidan universities, anyway. And I should note that while I think education is important, Alberta should wait until I leave to cease grade inflation. ...And finally, that it varies by department. The History department seemed more concerned with raising grades than my current department... which is English and Film Studies.)
     
  15. Erundur Registered

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    Some of my teachers at my Uni do that I ****ing hate it :mad: I dropped out of two classes that did that in the fall semester just so I would not have to deal with that kind of BS. :mad::o
     
  16. ScottyBBadd The Texas Outlaw

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    I am not sure, but it does help if you have something to hold over the teacher in question.
     

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