Prepared by the NCTE Task Force on Writing Assessment The following annotated bibliography on machine scoring and evaluation of essay-length writing is based on the 2012 published bibliography in the Journal of Writing Assessment 5 (compiled by Richard Haswell, Whitney Donnelly, Vicki Hester, Peggy O’Neill, and Ellen Schendel). The bibliography was compiled by reviewing recent scholarship on machine scoring…
Approved by the NCTE Executive Committee, April 2013 [A] computer could not measure accuracy, reasoning, adequacy of evidence, good sense, ethical stance, convincing argument, meaningful organization, clarity, and veracity in your essay. If this is true I don’t believe a computer would be able to measure my full capabilities and grade me fairly. — Akash, student…
On May 10th, CUCFA President Robert Meister sent the following open letter to Coursera founder Daphne Koller: Can Venture Capital Deliver on the Promise of the Public University? An Open Letter to Daphne Koller, Co-Founder and Co-President of Coursera and Professor of Computer Science at Stanford University Dear Professor Koller, Because I share your vision…
In an earlier post, “Please Sign Petitions Supporting the Voting Rights of College Students in Ohio and North Carolina” [https://academeblog.org/2013/05/11/please-sign-petitions-supporting-the-voting-rights-of-college-students-in-ohio-and-north-carolina/], I asked readers to sign a petition protesting against an attempt to discourage more than 32,000 out-of-state students attending Ohio universities from casting their ballots in Ohio. What follows is the testimony of Stuart McIntyre,…
Want to do something to show that faculty can come together? Contact colleagues at the City University of New York and ask them to vote “no confidence” in the Pathways curriculum initiative, the abrogation of shared governance foisted upon the system by a central administration with no interest in working with–and no respect for–the faculty.…
In a very recent post on guns on campus, I selectively surveyed the statistics on violent crime in the 2012 report on crimes reported on college campuses. I cited the statistics on sexual assaults but noted that those crimes have apparently been very under-reported, at least on some campuses. Female students on four campuses in…
The IRS scrutiny and delays aimed at Tea Party nonprofit groups has received enormous media and political attention. There’s nothing illegal, or scandalous, about these disturbing investigations of political groups. It’s been IRS policy and practice to do so for a long time, and more often targeted against liberal groups (and with much less justification).…
As our chapters and conferences confront major issues, we often create “toolkits” that include sample letters to other constituencies within our institutions (administrators, staff, and especially students), to groups that may be potential allies, to legislators, and to newspapers and other online media sites. But, beyond those salient issues, there is typically a multitude of…
May 14 marks the 43rd anniversary of the bloody massacre at Jackson State University. On this day in 1970, Mississippi cops fired a deadly barrage of over 450 bullets at unarmed black students in a women’s dormitory. Two were left dead and at least 12 wounded. The murdered Jackson students were Phillip Gibbs, the son…
Although guns may not be allowed on Montana campuses (See “Several Indications of Common Sense on Guns on Campus,” https://academeblog.org/2013/05/13/several-indications-of-common-sense-related-to-guns-on-campus/#more-3089), five state universities in Pennsylvania are now allowing guns to be carried on their campuses. The five universities are Edinboro University, Kutztown University, Millersville University, Shippensburg University, and Slippery Rock University. One wonders what statistics…