TEACHER IN IB PROGRAMME INVENTING GRADES
This writeup is a long time in coming. Almost all of the
participants have long ago moved on to pursue other ends, and shall
remain anonymous for their protection.
The events chronicled below take place at an IB Diploma Program school in the United States.
At this school, the IB History of
the Americas instructor was a busy man. Far too busy to actually
grade every paper and assignment that crossed his desk. Instead, he
graded a few assignments early in the year, and established a
“default” grade for each student. For the rest of the year, each
submission from a student would be given that default grade.
Now, eventually, the bright, young IB students noticed that their grades were
remarkably consistent. No matter how much care and attention they
paid to their assignments, no improvement ever manifested itself.
No matter how sick, tired or distracted a pupil was, his or her
grade showed no decline. Written comments consisted of the
teacher’s two favorite words: “superficial” and “vague.”
Soon the students began to test the limits. One (actually very
bright) student turned in a paper about fuzzy bunnies. Another
wrote in crude Spanish. Once, a “B” student traded papers with a
“C” student. No amount of ridiculousness seemed to have any effect
on the resulting grades, nor did they draw any comments (other than
remarks as to their superficiality and vagueness).
Subjectivity in grading essays could be understood, but the
unshakable consistency in grading did not stop there. On a
short-answer exam, one student missed 13 questions and earned a
“B.” Another missed the same number and received a “D.” Your
narrator missed nine, and got a “C” — the same score as on every
other assignment in that class.
By the end of the year, as exams approached, History of the
Americas had become a joke. The punch line, however, was yet to
come.
A nosy individual, examining some of the History teacher’s
papers, found a typed list of names and grades. The list contained
the names of every student, organized by the grade that he or she
would receive. It quickly became evident that this was it — the
master list, used to assign grades for every History assignment,
regardless of content or quality. Once the word got out, a second
conspiratorially-minded individual logged onto the History
teacher’s computer and printed a few copies.
Once the teacher had been exposed, the faculty retaliated. The
student who printed the file was suspended for five days. Only when
members the student body protested and threatened to boycott the
IB exams was the suspension
overturned.
The teacher in question had, by this time, decided to seek
employment elsewhere.