teachers playing around with raw marks? (1 Viewer)

[fleepbasding]

I have a question for anyone but espescially for the more expert. I have trawled through the exhaustively discussed threads on the moderation procedure blah blah blah (and by the way, it was very helpful- honestly, atleast 3/4 of the students at my school wouldn't know how it works). If this question has been discussed then I apologize, and could someone direct me to the correct thread.

I am aware that teachers sometimes for some of my subjects, decide at the end of the year that they will "tweak" some of the students raw internal marks (that they send to the board) in an attempt to make their internal marks better matched to their externals. like "hey that kid was a lazy turd and only got 75 but he/she is really bright and will probably get 95 for their externals, so we should just drag their internal up a bit". I know that if the teacher gives the whole class an extra ten points this would make no difference, but what about when they only give some people the extra marks because they haven't done well in internal but will do well in external. I'm quite sure this happens atleast a little and my question is: are our teachers really allowed to do this? It seems unfair.

Another related question: Should our raw internal mark be the sum of all our wieghted internal assesments?- this is what I would've thought.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Cab31]

I am not 100% sure, but basically whatever they do to school internal marks wont matter because they will get alligned later according to how well your school goes in the exam. You really have a problem if they fiddle around with the ranks (which i have heard they do at some schools to try and get an overall higher percentage of students going well). So unless this hypothetical student that gets 75 leaps over 10 other kids when they 'fiddle with his mark' and adjust it to 95, it wont make a difference.
By the way, if i am completely wrong, i apologize.

 

[Sarah168]

internal assessment dont matter in terms of the actualy raw numbers themselves. However, internal RANKINGS (which obviously are determined byt the intenral raw marks) DO matter. They form you final assessment mark, so it only has negative effects in the cae you describe if it alters the rankings of the class in a way that is not fair and not in line with the assessment marks that students receive during the year.
The obvious answer is yes, i suppose, because adding and fiddling with internal raw marks affects the ranking for everybody.

Regarding the Q of whether teachers are allowed to do this: obviously not and discrepencies DO occur and often we can't do much about it unless you have solid proof. I dont know...perhaps there is a way but I dont know about it. If you are suspicious of your final ranking (having calculated your raw internal mk according to weghting and all), you could ask for checking or whatever but this varies from school to school.

The raw internal mark is the sum of the weighted marks throughout the year, yes.

 

[Cab31]

Yeah thats why they HAVE to give you your rank at the end of the year because it is a major factor in determining the actual mark you will end up with.
If there is something suss about your rank, then contact the head of faculty or principle.

 

[Lazarus]

I know that if the teacher gives the whole class an extra ten points this would make no difference, but what about when they only give some people the extra marks because they haven't done well in internal but will do well in external. I'm quite sure this happens atleast a little and my question is: are our teachers really allowed to do this? It seems unfair.

The marks submitted by the school to the Board are meant to accurately reflect the relative differences between students. Some teachers might tweak a few marks in order to better achieve this goal.

Strictly speaking, they are not allowed to do this unless mention of it was made in the assessment program that was provided to students by the school.

The rank order of students is usually not changed via tweaking.

Another related question: Should our raw internal mark be the sum of all our wieghted internal assesments?- this is what I would've thought.

The procedures used by the school for determining the final assessment mark must conform with its stated assessment program, and the weightings used for the various assessment tasks must be consistent with those specified in the assessment program.

If the school doesn't calculate your final assessment mark according to the weighted sum of individual assessment tasks, they have to tell you how they're doing it.

 

[line_backer]

internal assessment dont matter in terms of the actualy raw numbers themselves. However, internal RANKINGS (which obviously are determined byt the intenral raw marks) DO matter. They form you final assessment mark, so it only has negative effects in the cae you describe if it alters the rankings of the class in a way that is not fair and not in line with the assessment marks that students receive during the year.

Wrong. The rankings do matter, but gap in marks matters too. E.g. If you come third in a class of twenty and the top two marks were 50 higher than yours it would hurt your moderted mark as opposed coming third by 1 or 2 marks.

 

[candy2000]

In my opinion (note: do NOT take this as factual), teachers also "tweak" results when marking your internal assessments anyway, e.g. if they believe you are a 'good' student and you don't perform as highly as they would have expected you to, they can be inclined to give you a better mark on an individual assessment task in the belief that you will do better next time. From my experience, I believe that this happens.

This is why it is important to try your best consistently thoughout high school (or at least in year 11) so that if your teachers are biased in this way, they will at least think more carefully about the mark they give you and not just assume you're a bludger who doesn't care if one of your assessments isn't really up to scratch.

It isn't very ethical, and it probably wouldn't help anyone in the long term anyway, but yeah.

 

[Sarah168]

Wrong. The rankings do matter, but gap in marks matters too. E.g. If you come third in a class of twenty and the top two marks were 50 higher than yours it would hurt your moderted mark as opposed coming third by 1 or 2 marks.

whoops, yeah im aware of that but didnt think it was important enough to mention...whoops. Apologies if i misled anyone lol

 

[wrong_turn]

In my opinion (note: do NOT take this as factual), teachers also "tweak" results when marking your internal assessments anyway, e.g. if they believe you are a 'good' student and you don't perform as highly as they would have expected you to, they can be inclined to give you a better mark on an individual assessment task in the belief that you will do better next time. From my experience, I believe that this happens.

This is why it is important to try your best consistently thoughout high school (or at least in year 11) so that if your teachers are biased in this way, they will at least think more carefully about the mark they give you and not just assume you're a bludger who doesn't care if one of your assessments isn't really up to scratch.

It isn't very ethical, and it probably wouldn't help anyone in the long term anyway, but yeah.

i don't think this would happen in maths. the marks shouldn't be tweaked since it will stuff up the whole cohert.

 

[ur_inner_child]

Can I ask also, why in my situation I got a low assessment mark?

I received 91 as my exam mark in visual arts

an assessment mark of 83.

perfect attendance, straight A's except for one assessment which weighed heavily, where my teacher lost faith in my art work and predicted it would go no higher than an 70. He gave me a 71 which dragged my ranking down from 5th to 9th I think. Which I thought wasn't too much of a difference.

Is the slippage of "losing faith in me" 71 mark in one of my school assessments the reason why I was dragged from 91 to an 87 in the end?

I know Lazarus that you're reading.

 

[fleepbasding]

Thanks everyone for your input. It has been very useful to hear some feedback on this because it has really been on my mind. "Candy 2000" I agree with everything you've said- I've observed that as well and I swear I'm not paranoid. And the bit about pampering teachers, I have also seen that in my friends- people will say to the teacher after handing in an essay that its "a night-before-job" and they end up doing crap, and I read their essay and its actully pretty decent. Since year 11 I've been trying to exude an air of studiousness.

Thanks Lazarus and others, you've cleared up a lot of things. When I go back to school I think I'll just approach all my teachers in an open honest way and discuss this with them- because frankly I don't think many schools are open.

Thanks people.

 

[Lazarus]

Can I ask also, why in my situation I got a low assessment mark?

I received 91 as my exam mark in visual arts

an assessment mark of 83.

perfect attendance, straight A's except for one assessment which weighed heavily, where my teacher lost faith in my art work and predicted it would go no higher than an 70. He gave me a 71 which dragged my ranking down from 5th to 9th I think. Which I thought wasn't too much of a difference.

Is the slippage of "losing faith in me" 71 mark in one of my school assessments the reason why I was dragged from 91 to an 87 in the end?

I know Lazarus that you're reading.

Ergh, it is always really difficult to answer these questions.

Your assessment mark of 83 was justified by the exam marks received collectively by the students in your class and by your teacher's reckoning of your relative position amongst those students.

Had your ranking been higher, you most likely would have received a higher moderated assessment mark.

It's impossible for me to tell whether your "low" mark can be 'blamed' on that one assessment.

 

[Scanorama]

In my opinion (note: do NOT take this as factual), teachers also "tweak" results when marking your internal assessments anyway, e.g. if they believe you are a 'good' student and you don't perform as highly as they would have expected you to, they can be inclined to give you a better mark on an individual assessment task in the belief that you will do better next time. From my experience, I believe that this happens.

This is why it is important to try your best consistently thoughout high school (or at least in year 11) so that if your teachers are biased in this way, they will at least think more carefully about the mark they give you and not just assume you're a bludger who doesn't care if one of your assessments isn't really up to scratch.

It isn't very ethical, and it probably wouldn't help anyone in the long term anyway, but yeah.

I believe it happens all the time, depending on the subjects though. English, history are obviously easier to occur. The marking criteria for English is just a matter of interpretation, it doesnt say how exactly you will gain the marks, and it is very argumentative especially when you are on the boundary between 2 bands.

But Maths, Science subjects are harder of this to occur. The marking guldlines are pretty much dead set, if you write certain things, you gain the marks, if you don't, then you gain nothing.

 

[wrong_turn]

the marking rubric, this is meant to be the band performances, or like a guideline of marks of what we needed to gain certain marks; ya?

 

[fleepbasding]

wrong turn, You posted and then this thread died. Just an observation.

 

[^CoSMic DoRiS^^]

In my opinion (note: do NOT take this as factual), teachers also "tweak" results when marking your internal assessments anyway, e.g. if they believe you are a 'good' student and you don't perform as highly as they would have expected you to, they can be inclined to give you a better mark on an individual assessment task in the belief that you will do better next time. From my experience, I believe that this happens.

This is why it is important to try your best consistently thoughout high school (or at least in year 11) so that if your teachers are biased in this way, they will at least think more carefully about the mark they give you and not just assume you're a bludger who doesn't care if one of your assessments isn't really up to scratch.

It isn't very ethical, and it probably wouldn't help anyone in the long term anyway, but yeah.

hey yeah ive noticed that happening too...like in geography last year the teacher hated me and i never got full marks for anything no matter how much effort i put in, but in english i always did well, and even if i went bad i did well, because the teachers liked me. hehe...

 

[rantman]

this is untrue, teachers dont play around with marks, why would they do it for??

 

[fleepbasding]

this is untrue, teachers dont play around with marks, why would they do it for??

a) how do you know that it's untrue? I have knowlege that alterations, albiet minor, are made for atleast one of my subjects at school.

b) They might do it to try and make their students internal assesment marks more closely reflect there exam marks so they don't get anyone making accusations of "underassessing" certain students. I think I outlined the reasons in my first post, but if you use your imagination I'm sure you can think of many more. They might just have a poor understanding of the alignment process (many teachers).

EDIT: And I'm talking about alterations at the end of the HSC to your overall rawmark- not to individual assesment tasks.

 

[Meldrum]

I believe it happens all the time, depending on the subjects though. English, history are obviously easier to occur. The marking criteria for English is just a matter of interpretation, it doesnt say how exactly you will gain the marks, and it is very argumentative especially when you are on the boundary between 2 bands.

But Maths, Science subjects are harder of this to occur. The marking guldlines are pretty much dead set, if you write certain things, you gain the marks, if you don't, then you gain nothing.

GO THE GOUGH.

 

[ur_inner_child]

3 or 4 students were tied equal first in visual arts at my school by the end of the year.

the teachers DID play with the students marks by re-marking the assessments and changed the marks by 0.5 of a mark so they can seperate them into different ranks, and people who were say, equal 5th were left untouched.

if that's not playing around with marks/ranks then i don't know what is.