B4. Marking
General principles
Marking student work can be as straightforward as adding up marks for correct or incorrect answers in a quiz. However, in many instances, marking involves the interpretation of criteria and the translation of abstract feedback into a numerical mark. Marking practices are a highly sensitive issue for students and therefore should be transparent, consistent and able to be explained, according to some or all of the following:
- the unit’s/Faculty’s general standards on marking, at appropriate levels
- the stated criteria in the subject outline
- marks assigned to other students for the same piece of work, including in situations where marking is done by teams
- special consideration issues, as agreed by the subject coordinator
- penalties for late submission, partially completed work, poor referencing or other issues, which have been notified to students in advance
Remember that the Code of Practice – Teaching and Assessment (refer 5.2.4) requires that a numerical mark be granted for every assessment task (except in pass/fail subjects) and that students may obtain their final examination marks on application to the Subject Coordinator.
Problems and specific issues
Unit and Faculty assessment committees provide oversight of the overall distribution of student results, and are an opportunity to identify and discuss apparently inconsistent marking practices. Nevertheless, there are many circumstances in which consistency can be hard to monitor.
In subjects with a small enrolment, for example, where the subject coordinator is likely to mark all student assignments, there is the potential for an individual marker’s interpretation of marking criteria to diverge from those of the rest of the unit or Faculty. In large subjects, or subjects distributed across campuses, care needs to be taken to ensure common interpretations of the marking criteria are used by the whole teaching team.
Consistency with other institutions (particularly in the case of Study Abroad and Exchange students) is not possible, but students who may be confused by differences in their results should nonetheless have confidence in the consistency of the internal processes used to determine their grades at this university.
Examples of Good Practice
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1. The key to developing a transparent and accountable marking system is for written grading criteria to be developed for each task, specifying as far as possible what standard of work will be judged as a Pass, Credit, Distinction and High Distinction - and for these to be communicated to everyone involved, including students (see criteria).
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2. Within subject teaching teams:
- A two stage process is strongly recommended to promote consistency:
- before marking commences - an initial team marking meeting to distribute and discuss grading criteria prior to marking, allowing plenty of time for tutors to ask questions.
- before release of results - a second team marking meeting to compare results across groups, paying particular attention to marks which are close to the borderline of a higher or lower band; and to discuss problematic students.
- Subject teaching teams may also engage in double-marking of a selection of already graded tasks, including work which has been judged as a Fail, either as a matter of course, or where grading deviations suggest some inconsistency.
- Where a subject is taught at multiple campuses, it can be helpful for staff occasionally to exchange marking batches, to minimise the potential for local bias.
- Consideration should be given to rotating the marking of assignments across a teaching team.
- Individual markers can check they are marking to the same standard as others in their unit by asking a colleague to look over a selection of graded tasks sampled from each band.
- Procedures need to be in place should a discrepancy in marking occur (e.g. >10% variation in marks).
- Heads of academic units can also initiate this process from time to time, to check that all staff are working to the same standards.
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