It is the purpose of this study to determine if there is any significant difference in teacher ratings of boys and girls of equal achievement. If such differences are found to exist, an attempt will be made to explain the causes for such differences.

Kong, Ying Yuk. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2013. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 287-304). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts also in Chinese.

In the assessment, each student was marked by two raters, assigned at random to the student from a pool of 200 raters. These raters had undergone a series of instructional programs and training prior to the job. Each of the two raters gave seven scores to the script. As there was no minimum number of words as required in the writing assessment, a general belief would be generated that if there was insufficient content (as evidenced by a low score in "content") and poor organization (low score in "organization"), then the student would have written so few words that the chance of making mistakes in "vocabulary" (the 6th score) and in "punctuation" (the 7 th score) would be relatively small. In order to rectify the deficiency in marking, this study used three different methods to apply weights on the "vocabulary" score and on the "punctuation" score. For each method, the GENOVA program was used to calculate the reliability of the assessments. After due comparison, it was found that each of the methods used was able to raise the reliabilities of the assessments under investigation, and the most recommended method was to use students' scores in "content and in structure" as weights. / In writing assessment, there are quite a number of factors influencing the marking stability and the reliability of the assessment such as the attitude towards marking and consistency of markers, the physical environment, the design of the items, and marking rubrics. Even the methods to train markers have effects on the reliability of the assessment. Generalizability Theory was used in this research to analyze the Chinese writing assessment of the Territory-wide System Assessment (TSA) so as to improve the reliability of the assessment. / On the one hand, the study has examined the present mode of marking of the writing assessment in the TSA. This gives opportunity for improving the item-setting and the script-marking procedures of the assessment with a view to raising its reliability and giving valuable feedbacks to teaching and learning. On the other hand, the favourable results of applying weights to sub-scores will serve to provide a good example on improving marking rubrics in large-scale standardized tests of writing assessment in Chinese Language. vi / This study was a post-mortem analysis of the raw scores from a sample of 6,000 students who participated in TSA 2006. As there were three sub-papers, the sample consisted of 2,000 students from each sub-paper. Brennan's GENOVA program (1983) was used to calculate the reliabilities of the assessments. / TSA is a standardized test administered centrally by the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority every year. The target groups are students from Primary 3, Primary 6 and Secondary 3. TSA focuses on assessing students' basic competency on the three core subjects, Chinese Language, English Language and Mathematics. In contrast to the traditional Chinese writing assessment, there was no requirement on the minimum number of words produced by the student. An analytical approach was adopted to assess students' writing tasks. As a result of this measure, students who did well in some particular marking criteria would end up with a good overall performance. / 林玲芝. / Adviser: Kit Tai Hau. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 73-02, Section: A, page: . / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 84-98). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [201-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / Lin Lingzhi.

Two hundred questionnaires were sent to high school speech teachers in Texas to determine their attitudes toward peer evaluation, a method of critiquing speech class activities. Results indicated that these teachers are familiar with and use peer evaluation and that they do favor it as an evaluation technique. Women used peer evaluation more than men, and teachers with more experience used peer evaluation more than those less experienced. Peer evaluation was used most for speeches and oral interpretation and least for parliamentary procedure. Peer evaluation helps students learn the criteria upon which an oral presentation is evaluated, keeps the students busy, and helps the students become better listeners. Its values outweigh its drawbacks.

Thesis. 1976. M.S.--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Alfred P. Sloan School of Management. / Microfiche copy available in Archives and Dewey. / M.S.

A college degree is not a homogenous investment across fields of study (Arcidiacono, 2004; Zhang & Thomas, 2005). Even after accounting for selection, STEM degrees pay substantially more than other fields (Altonji et al., 2012) and earnings disparities across majors have increased substantially over time (Altonji et al., 2014). Even though STEM degrees yield greater labor market returns, the number of STEM graduates and professionals remains low and the disparities in STEM attrition are alarming. As a result, STEM education has been elevated as a national priority in the U.S. and considered to be in high demand in the global economy. Yet, there is a lack of consensus on how to boost STEM graduation. My dissertation is motivated by the need to improve the number and composition of STEM graduates and to evaluate policies that can mitigate STEM attrition. In my dissertation I focus on the effect of college grades and grading policies on STEM graduation. College grades are important determinants of course and major choices and research suggests that grades have differing effects for STEM minorities and non-minorities. Moreover, disparities in grades between STEM (low-grading departments) and non-STEM (high-grading departments) due to grade inflation and compression of grades near the top affect sorting into majors, making grades less informative and distorting major choices (Bar et al. 2012). In my first essay, I examine the possible differential effect of college grades on STEM attrition gap by gender and race. Non-grade explanations such as pre-college factors, instructor gender and race and peer effects are also examined as potential determinants of STEM attrition gaps. However, I focus on grades because there is evidence that grades affect sorting into majors, and grades may have differing effects for minorities and non-minorities. This review uncovers evidence supporting the importance of institutional grading policies to shape student’s major and course choices. Despite the fact that institutional grading policies have been studied at some extent, none of these studies have addressed the differential effect of these policies on those who might be more sensitive to grades (i.e., women and racial minorities). In the second essay, I explore what factors explain the gender and race disparities in STEM attrition. This study utilize Florida’s Education Data Warehouse to conduct a reweighted Oaxaca decomposition of racial and gender differences in STEM attrition, with a particular focus on how STEM- intending students respond to college grades in introductory courses. The decomposition results show that women mainly leave STEM by switching into non-STEM fields, particularly due to non-STEM college factors such as grades and credits attempted in lower-division courses. In contrast, racial minorities mainly leave STEM by dropping out of college towards graduation, and they differentially leave STEM due to their lower high school preparation in STEM and consequently lower grades in lower-division STEM courses during their first two years of enrollment. In the third essay (which is also my job market paper) I examine the effect of changing the grading scale from whole-letter grades to plus/minus grades on STEM graduation/major choice. In this study, I examine the effect of changing the grading scale from whole-letter grades to plus/minus grades on STEM graduation/major choice. I use administrative data from the Florida Department of Education that combines students’ pre-college characteristics with students’ enrollment and transcript records. I rely on a difference in differences framework that compares STEM graduation/major choice rates during the early 2000s versus the late 1990s for students whose grading differentials between STEM and non-STEM courses were reduced versus students whose grades were not differentially affected. I find significant effects of changing the grading scale on reducing grading differentials and improving STEM graduation/major choice. These results represent the first direct, quasi-experimental evidence regarding the effect of changing the grading scale.

This study sought to determine the ways in which Texas public school districts differ in their calculation of Grade Point Average/Rank in Class (GPA/RIC), how district size affects weighting practices, and the effect of non-uniform calculation of GPA/RIC on admissions to college. Descriptive and non-parametric analysis techniques were used.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Toronto, 2005.

This thesis examines tutor feedback on student essays to ascertain the extent to which these responses assist in teaching the academic and specific disciplinary conventions and to determine what is effective feedback and what is not. The investigation constituted an evaluation of a small sample of essays and the framework for this evaluation was developed from a study of current theories of literacy and language teaching. It was further informed by data gathered from interviews with students and tutors and questionnaires completed by them. This was done in order to establish how students interpret and react to feedback and to demonstrate the level of understanding between tutors and students in this mode of communication. The conclusion was that tutor feedback can provide a valuable method for teaching the discourse of the discipline. However, results of the study revealed that communication often breaks down because tutors and students do not share a common language for talking about academic discourse and because students may not have understood the requirements of the task. In addition, the study found that responses to a small group of essays in the lowest mark category and written by second language students, were very inadequate. As the researcher, I concluded that graduate tutors were not well equipped for the task of dealing with these weaker essays. I have made suggestions for future research in this area and I believe that the data from this case study will provide valuable ideas for training tutors for responding to student essays.

Education reform in Namibia brought about changes to mathematics education since independence. This has put pressure on the government to provide both resources and qualified mathematics teachers to help drive the reform process in all teaching and learning activities. This included availing reliable and valid national examination results which is a measure of whether the newly introduced programmes are working or not. For the Ministry of Education this meant training more mathematics teachers and ensuring that competent and reliable teachers are appointed for marking national examination every year. The teachers' training process however, has not been going as fast as it was expected and year after year the Directorate of National Examinations and Assessment experienced problems in obtaining competent teachers for the marking of national examination. The purpose of the study was to understand the differences in marking performances of the JSC mathematics national examination markers. Particularly the study was to create a clear and detailed understanding of different factors that could possibly affect the marking performance of different markers. In addition, the study was to investigate the effect the mathematical content knowledge of the markers has on their marking performance. It was evident from the findings that their mathematical content knowledge had influenced their marking performance. Moreover the research findings also gave a strong indication that there are other factors that were influencing the markers marking performance. These were the markers' knowledge of the assessment and marking process, the markers' marking experience, the markers' socioeconomic background. The difference in their moderators' input has emerged as the other factors that have influenced their performance in marking and consequently contributed to the differences in their marking performances.