Video Transcript: Empowering Students Through Specs Grading

Sally Hang, Psychology Department

I'd have to say a lot of my background kind of inspired me to go towards this route. As a first-generation college student, figuring out college, figuring out academia, in and of itself, is a learning journey. Right? And so you come into this system, the traditional system, and there's a lot of things that are hidden in my experience or assumed. And if you don't have the mentors there you may not understand what is necessary to propel yourself to the next level.

And so, yes, more research is needed but I think specs grading is a method or a mechanism that we can utilize to gives students that template. To be like, here's what you need to do, this is the guideline. And it kind of just unveils, right, what needs to be done to get to the end.

On the very first day I let them know, right out of the gate, that, number one, excellence is expected out of all students. But I understand that every student is on a different journey and so they have choices to make and I acknowledge that. And furthermore, it really gives them the choice to understand that, one, failure is a necessary part of success. I understand that. Right? And so, it's not its opposite. It's necessary. So making these mistakes -- it's important for them to be able to have the opportunity to reflect on it, to be able to improve upon on those mistakes or learn from them.

Students actually say it pushes them to dive deeper -- right -- into their critical thinking process. In my particular course there are a couple of assignments that build on top of each other and it really asks them to observe their behavioral, their behaviors, and make modifications. And so, some students have mentioned that with this particular grading scale they're able to dive deeper into their thoughts and be able to analyze where the changes can be made.

I really enjoy it. One of the biggest things is not having to decide: should I take a half a point? should I take one point? two points? To just really let them take the driver's seat. Let them just take the wheel and see what they want to produce -- the type of quality of work that they want to produce. And I've gotten some feedback from students on what they really enjoy about this process is they know exactly what to produce and how much of it to obtain the grade that they desire from the course.

So that particular rubric: EMRF. E stands for excellent, so meeting or exceeding the objectives or expectations. M stands for meeting expectations and so it's substantial and it shows me that they understand the concept and no more teaching is required for that particular assignment. R is for revision, and they have the choice to revise or not and an F would be fragmentary. I'm showing that maybe they just didn't submit an assignment at all, letting them know that it's missing and they can still resubmit.

Yes, so it is a little different, of course, compared to the traditional grading system. And I do have, and I do provide, a couple of assignment examples for them to understand which assignment would constitute receiving an E as opposed to an M. And so it very clearly lays out the length and the depth of the assignment you submitted and what you can expect your grade to be.