Learning Abroad Grading Techniques: Good or Bad?

As I was skimming through articles on The Panther Online, an article titled "Learning Abroad" really sparked my interest. Actually, it struck me as being utterly stupid. Why on Earth would you want to lose your identity in the classroom? Who wants to just be a number and not an individual? The suggestion that we at Chapman should adopt the British system of grading is ridiculous and short-sighted.

Even though class sizes at Chapman are small, the professor/student relationship would be greatly affected if everyone’s work only had a student number on it. The professors wouldn’t know what kind of person each student was, and they would not get to know the students’ personalities through their work. To me, having a working relationship with professor is crucial, so the idea of taking that away for “unbiased grading” is the worst suggestion for schooling that I’ve ever heard. Nobody likes it when teachers have favorites (except for those lucky favorites), but isn’t dealing with such things part of life? Competition is part of both academics and the workplace in the United States, and personalities are part of that competition. Therefore, the skills needed to succeed in our world should be developed through school, before people join the job market, instead of pretending that we live in some utopia where the world is always fair. To think otherwise is just silly. I believe that students usually get the grades that they deserve, so it’s not worth losing your identity for this “fairness.” If part of the grade sometimes has to do with the professor’s evaluation of personal merit, then so be it.

When a student thinks that a teacher is not grading fairly, it’s also likely that the student is doing poorly in class. What a coincidence! Maybe those students should just do the work and put more effort into it, and then they will get a better grade. I hate it when people are lazy and try to take the easy road, when others actually work hard and then get blamed for being liked by the teachers. Maybe the teachers simply prefer students who show more interest in a subject and ask questions in order to better themselves as students.

Obviously, I understand why people might think that it would be fairer for school work to be graded anonymously, but the resulting loss to the professor/student relationship is more important in the long run. Our system does not need fixing. Most professors are capable of unbiased grading, and I feel that getting to know the students is an important part of being a good professor. Yes, we are only human, but our system works and turns out successful graduates. You can’t remove the “human” factor from our society; if that’s what people want, they should study in Britain. They are free to leave.