Day 2-109 -- Incessant Need to Rank Others

Another day of grading. I do understand that this is a part of my job; it is just so tedious. Eat, sleep, grade. Repeat. Sorry if this sounds whiny. There are times when I feel like I'm losing focus -- being tired doesn't help there. I do like teaching in the classroom; I just have some philosophical differences with the global need to rank people by numbers. Is there really a difference between a 78 and and 81?  a 53 or a 48? Yet one might get someone a scholarship while another fails the course. Ranking numbers without noting significant differences seems so outside the academic realm. I do not have an alternate method to assess learning without assigning it a number. Even if I could convince people locally to do so, any graduates from here would be crippled when applying for grad school, scholarships, or jobs.

Why do humans need to rank each other? When feeling low, I often hear people saying that there are others worse off so we should just accept our lot -- an odd way of comparing ourselves to others. Emotional well-being is jeopardized by such comparisons. Modern marketing uses such insecurities to sell products that purport to raise us in the social echelons. I see students and instructors noting that person A received a higher grade than person B and assume that these are distinctly different grades. In many cases they aren't. Perhaps it is the lack of scientific evidence behind the grade system that really irks me. I've been told that logical thinkers will be distressed by the way the 'world' thinks. <smile>.  But, I work in the midst of academics and scientists -- so why can't we develop a better method of assessing student performance and learning?

Some of my feelings from today reminded me of lyrics from an upbeat song. The ability to choose to stand outside the spotlight would be great at this time of year -- yet it all seems to rest on the shoulders of instructors. Listening to this song does make me smile, though. Enjoy!

Super Trouper -- ABBA