Anonymous Grading Forum

[Panth8080]

I already knew that the grading of exams at my school was anonymous. However, a professor (who I don't have but got to know) surprised me when he told me that I was an "anonymous number" until grades are entered into the school's system. I was under the impression that going to office hours or doing well in cold-calls may have given students a slight bump if we were on the edge of the top 10%, 25%, etc. His quote - "sometimes I'll see a student who volunteered all the time and they are below the median, but there's nothing I can do because grades have already been submitted."
Was I totally naive, or is this standard policy? Thanks.

[cinephile]

I thought standard policy was blind grading save bumping down for students who skip all the time or aren't prepared.

[CreativityKing]

ITT a gunner's dreams are shattered.

[Bildungsroman]

Depends on the school. At my law school, at least as it has been explained to me, professors can give bumps by notifying the registrar of which students she would like to boost up. I don't think that the professor can see a student's grade before making this decision, though.

[sidhesadie]

That's what I understand as well, the professor can notify the registrar's office to bump/drop a student's grade. The registrar will then apply that to the given student's grade. The professor doesn't see the grades until it's all said and done. So it wouldn't matter if you were 'on the border' of one grade to another, the prof would have no way to know that part.

I've also been told by multiple professors that in reality, this almost *never* happens, and is almost always only used for a drop (not a bump) and almost always in really egregious cases. They are required to have anonymous grading and if they let professors bump/drop everyone, it wouldn't really be anonymous, and that could cause problems. So they *can* do it, but it's exceedingly unusual. Of course, take that with the grain of salt you should, as it's purely anecdotal.

[Gorki]

Depends on the school. At my law school, at least as it has been explained to me, professors can give bumps by notifying the registrar of which students she would like to boost up. I don't think that the professor can see a student's grade before making this decision, though.

This essentially... Though a professor I spoke with said they almost never do this unless a student has gone above and beyond expectations for participation w/o going full blown gunner... In that class, the professor gave a single bump for one student in our section.