Slashdot Mirror
Computer Program Makes Essay Grading Easier
phresno writes "c|Net is running a short article on Prof. Bent at the Columbia, Mo., University. The Prof. has developed a computer program which he now uses to grade his sociology students' essays. He claims the program can discern content, and argument flow within sentence and paragraph structure, and has saved him over two hundred hours of reading per semester. How long before he's replaced entirely by his own program to cut down on staff costs?"
I'm not so sure I like the idea of a computer grading my work.. I spent hours making it, but the guy doesn't even give it the time of day....
Angst
"The program analyzes sentence and paragraph structure and can ascertain the flow of arguments and ideas."
So it measures structure and argument.
How's it going to measure creativity of thought? Are we going to just pump out logic machines from colleges?
The only way that a computer program can possibly analyze a paper fully as a paper is if it read it as a human. heuristic algorithms, however sophisticated, just aren't enough for things of this sort of importance--after all, the profs are paid to grade (well, them or the grad students). It doesn't seem like it would be too difficult to just throw in keywords and make sure that you use proper syntax in order to fool this thing, albeit the prof says keywords alone aren't enough. I find the claim that his program can "analyze argument flow" quite dubious. I'll stick to getting my several grands' worth out of my courses, thank you very much.
If you'd read the fucking article, you'd have known that the students get instact feedback on their scores, so it effectively is a filter for better papers.
God, imagine what test prep courses like Princeton Review are going to do. Essay writing for the SAT will turn into a new branch of science. They'll teach you exactly what your ratio of compound sentences, to complex sentences, to clauses, to action verbs, etc. should be.
Qualrus doesn't operate using a set grading criteria, but trains based on the users' grading markups. Therefore, you'd need the teacher's copy (complete with its "learned" patterns) to fool the system. Actually Ed Brent encourages the students to use Qualrus to write rough drafts, as it gives instant feedback - arguably a better learning technique from a usability standpoint (faster feedback == more retention).
What does this say about the field of Sociology? :P
Why not give the program to the English department and use it for teaching?
Would be great for high-school students. Have students write an essay or paper and analyze it right in front of them. Then the program highlights their errors (or what the program perceives as an error). Even better, complaining students would help fix bugs in the software because they know their intent - they could send off a highlighted error-ridden version to the developers with an explanation of why they think they are right.
Better yet, give it to everyone! It's not like you can cheat, you still have to rewrite and resubmit your papers. Shit, I say build it into text boxes on slashdot and wikipedia to start!
please do not hold this post to the standard of the Qualrus (real page of the software)
Get your Unix fortune now!
According to ETS, the e-rater agrees with the human grader 98% of the time.
My userid is prime!
From TFA, which apparently no one has read yet:
"The final papers, which he does read, are usually much better as a result of Qualrus, too."
There you go! For the reading and comprehension impaired, here's a summary of what's actually happening, which even the reporter didn't get:
1. Students write a draft of their essay, which they then upload via a Web form to this program
2. The program gives them a score on various parts of their essay, giving them valuable feedback on what needs to be improved.
3. Students improve the pieces of their essay that the program suggests.
4. Students submit the final draft to the professor, who reads and grades each one by hand. Due to steps 1-3, the quality of the final draft is much higher.
This sounds like a great thing to me. Wish I had something similar for my students. I don't have the time to read through dozens of drafts for every student. Too bad I'm not in sociology.
I go to the University of Missouri. I wouldn't want to be in his class either. Hmm, I don't have enough of the keywords in my paper? How about you actually read the paper you made me write?
a culty/Edward_Brent.html
http://sociology.missouri.edu/Faculty_and_Staff/F
So since the professor's time is worth about $36.00/hour and he spends 200 less hours on reading papers...
200 hours * $32.00 = $7200
He teaches about 84 students...
$7200 / 84 = $85.71 refund for each student. It's party time!
Authority questions you. Return the favor.
I have lots of programs that save me hours of "doing my fucking job". They're called scripts, and it's called efficiency.
If I can write a program to automate a menial task so I don't have to do it, then by all means, I should do it. If grading undergrad papers is a menial task that can be automated, then it should be automated.
I mean, just because a freshman writes a bad paper doesn't mean a professor has to actually read it.
paintball
I really, really, really wish someone told me this. I lost a letter grade in a class because I had a differing point of view from the professor. I wrote a kick ass term paper, I spent countless hours in the library doing research, I had other people proof read my paper. It was one of the best papers I wrote. But it was the exact opposite of what the professor believed.
We expect our teachers will grade us on our work. But every now and then we get a professor who probably spends too much time writing letters to the editorial section of the new york times.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."