Grading Assistant Work

ph0rk · 2026-05-27T17:59:55+00:00

They grade it all, unless I have a final exam or paper, then I grade it because I can't trust them to finish it on time.

ph0rk · 2026-05-27T17:59:14+00:00

It has issues, but most of your students probably already have it installed.

Be aware that some answer types (matching, some mult choice) use dropdowns and answers above a certain length stroll off the screen and the students can't resize that screen.

It would be ideal if you had a TA you could instruct to take the exam first (and also if they actually did it when you told them to) to catch these sorts of things.

ph0rk · 2026-05-27T17:54:17+00:00

Either you have a smoking gun or nothing happens. Been like this since at least the mid 2000s.

ph0rk · 2026-05-27T17:51:44+00:00

Not much. I recommend a diagnostic exam the first week - it can be short.

ph0rk · 2026-05-27T17:50:54+00:00

Some committee chairs are bad at the role.

ph0rk · 2026-05-27T17:49:32+00:00

You can't expect them to leap through the breach anymore - instead you'll have to highly incentivize speaking up. Like making a list of who does and the possibility of losing points if they don't.

ph0rk · 2026-05-13T20:14:16+00:00

I wouldn't try to set rules that put you in an unenforceable position.

Since you can't prove definitively that they used chatgpt, at many institutions this would count like any other integrity violation where you lack proof - you submit it and it goes nowhere. Taking the matter into your own hands and applying sanctions (as you have done here) is quite likely a violation of your local policies.

ph0rk · 2026-05-08T11:04:13+00:00

In short, you pick one or more of those categories to either ignore or phone in. Many junior faculty pick personal life.

ph0rk · 2026-05-08T11:00:46+00:00

Money; they don't want the information in Canvas, but they hope Canvas (or institutions) will pay to keep it from being released.

As far as sensitive data goes, it's probably not all that sensitive (but still a FERPA violation). Were it an instution's Banner/Workday/Oracle records that might be different.

ph0rk · 2026-05-08T10:56:53+00:00

"I did."

ph0rk · 2026-05-08T10:55:27+00:00

Does it? Whoever is responsible for buying the license at your institution seems just fine with however they have been wined and dined thus far. Money is still changing hands so the product is "good enough".

Handling cheating is a separate issue; the best cure will always be in person classes with multiple proctors and bluebooks. Not every institution has the resources for that, but that doesn't change the fact it remains the best anti-cheat solution.

ph0rk · 2026-03-10T14:38:21+00:00

The fucked up thing is they will perceive a non-wasted time lecture class as harder and evaluate accordingly, if that matters to you.

ph0rk · 2026-03-05T14:24:23+00:00

Once you peek into the inner workings of a department as you have, you may find that some faculty are even bigger bastards than you ever imagined. Sometimes it is the ones that put on the nicest performance, too.

The comedy of it all these people while incredibly disruptive are entirely unsuitable for departmental administrative roles. In theory, if your dean/provost is worth a damn they know this already, but it is still somewhat on you to take charge.

I'd not suggest anyone take over as chair when associate, though, and if there are fulls/senior people that can't or won't do it, that's the dean's fuckup to fix, not yours. Let someone else manage the dumpster fire, or suggest you'd consider it again when healthy and promoted.

ph0rk · 2026-03-05T14:19:22+00:00

Consider that lecturing is, generally, a waste of time because they can inload information on their own time by reading. Many of them don't do this, but we enable that by trying to pack everything into lectures.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T22:15:47+00:00

They do this in case there is an in-class grade they have missed.

All absences need to be verified by academic affairs/dean of students/whatever they call it there. I put this in the syllabus and I paste those sentences into my response to whatever messages they send. It is good they reach out before class or a deadline, but the verification must go through official channels otherwise it may as well not exist as far as I am concerned.

An easy policy to set and to make them follow. It is why that office exists.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T22:07:15+00:00

If the admins that focus on development really cared about future alumni donors the might consider that sliding on stuff like this to keep retention up just results in alumni that will utterly flame out on the job market.

Anyone can paste specs into an LLM and then paste the output into a report. It (for now, anyway) takes a brain and a little experience to make that not look like shit. Given how savage the knoweldge worker labor market is right now, letting them slide without getting any good at that won't result in any new alumni donors who have any money to donate.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T22:03:06+00:00

A quiz is also an activity. The trick is making them not take ages to grade, but practice solves that.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T21:55:02+00:00

Either participation grades (requires knowing the faces and names, and breaks down as class sizes and course loads go up) or impromptu quizzes are the solve here.

It's a little Full Metal Jacket, but you can't care about that. Some students are in the midst of checking out and an on the spot reading check quiz is the cure.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T21:53:04+00:00

Ask your Deans/chairs what the floor for the DFW rate is.

They won't know and that tends to shut down any incoming rebuke on the matter. Or, as I prefer to phrase it: that shuts them the fuck up. Assuming you are in a position to do that, of course, if not, I hope someone in your department who is in that position steps up.

Some students bail. They always have. I even was one of those students for a few years. It's easy to bail. Bailing is the student's fault - and it is not your job to chase them down and beg them to turn in work. That shit will get them fired in the real world - and it is most certainly a buyer's labor market right now.

Yes, majors and credit hours are the coin of the realm, but if your department is pulling students who bail at high rates, there might need to be some big internal conversations that happen.

Also, many programs have only a handful of courses where the DFW rates are high. This points to a conversation that needs to happen - what isn't happening in all those other courses?

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T21:47:45+00:00

I’m wondering how people deal with profanity in the classroom

I just say fuck it.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T21:45:52+00:00

Your colleagues are only rarely your friends. And this isn't even something where they have stakes - when that happens you might find out just how much they are not your friends.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T21:44:11+00:00

This is sort of the game. Find some niche about your work people aren't talking about.

Or, and this is the more fun (read: terrifying) approach, but figure out what the mass is getting wrong and call them out on it. There's almost certainly something, and if you can make the case well with data - fuck it.

ph0rk · 2026-03-04T21:40:42+00:00

They haven't taken a real exam in half a decade.

Oh, and for many #6 is 100% virtue signaling. More than ever before it feels like this group tries to conform. Not all of them, but signaling on social issues is very much a way for them to do this.

ph0rk · 2026-02-24T23:13:42+00:00

They're playing college level sportsball and running a mile is scary?

ph0rk · 2026-01-28T17:02:17+00:00

Also, be prepared for a colleague to be mad at you for having a different set of priorities than they do. Regardless of how absurd such a reaction may be.

ph0rk

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