Context
Unit 2 is a Pass/Fail unit for which Year 1 BA Drawing students receive a short summative feedback with generic wording (Fig. 1). While the feedback tells students whether they have progressed to the next unit or not, it does not give any other indication of their individual performance.
Evaluation
Previously, we have added grading descriptors like ‘Excellent’ in the written feedback to give some indication of students’ levels and to introduce them to the assessment language. However, this was recently debated in our parity meeting on whether it made marking more labour-intensive for tutors and if it undermined the compassionate assessment rationale of Pass/Fail. Consequently, it was excluded this year but remains a topic worthy of further thought.
Additionally, students receive a 20-minute scheduled 1:1 tutorial with their personal tutor to discuss their submission and developing work. From past experience and research, we know that students do not always engage with written feedback for reasons including the anxiety of being graded (Ryan et al., 2017) and finding the assessment language opaque. They value verbal feedback because it allows for dialogue, elaboration, and debate on their submission in a safe environment, underpinned by trust, openness, and empathy (Carles, 2012).
Moving forwards
Having recently encountered Compassionate Pedagogy (CP), I am unsure where I stand with descriptors now. Personally, I have found it useful to give students some indication of their grade to aid the feedback discussion and support assessment literacy ahead of Unit 3 where they receive an actual grade. In feedback tutorials students ask, ‘but if you were grading, what would you give me?’ implying that Pass/Fail does not satisfy or recognise their achievements. Instead, they want locate themselves on the assessment totem pole (grade scale) to exactly measure their performance or progress. But could it be that the totem pole is the only assessment marker they have known? In response to their question, I say, ‘look at the grading descriptor used or listen to the descriptor I am using, that will give you an indication.’ So therein lies the conundrum: descriptors or no descriptors?
I will speak to our Year Leader about facilitating a reflective workshop with colleagues and students. Do we agree or disagree with CP’s rationale that Pass/Fail blocks ‘grade chasing behaviour’ (Belonging through assessment: Pipelines of compassion, 2023, p.17)? Should we continue to diverge from this rationale if students favour descriptors? How do we centre student and staff voices when/if they disagree with UAL’s Pass/Fail no detriment policy?
The questions above, and from the Compassionate Feedback resource (Fig. 2) will serve as prompts for discussion and practical activity. I would like to incorporate the grading descriptors as the feedback mechanism in some way to share their responses to some of the questions and to feedback on the workshop; enabling more experiential understanding of the grade scale.
For the most part, we concur with CP’s rationale including Kohn’s (2011) observations that grades ‘reduce students’ interest in whatever they are learning, create a preference for the easiest task, and tend reduce the quality of students’ thinking’. We discourage students from being overly conscious about grades in Units 1 and 2. Instead, we encourage focusing on the joys of experimentation and making, exploring new methodologies, and identifying interesting lines of enquiry. Ultimately, I hope this workshop allows students and staff (including me) to question and contribute to shaping our assessment and feedback processes in a rich and meaningful way.
Bibliography
Belonging through assessment: Pipelines of compassion.(2023). Available at: https://www.qaa.ac.uk/docs/qaa/members/belonging-through-assessment-pipelines-of-compassion-project-report.pdf?sfvrsn=681a981_10.
Carles, D. (2012). Trust and its role in facilitating dialogic feedback. Available at https://web.edu.hku.hk/f/staff/412/2013_Trust-and-its-role-in-facilitating-dialogic-feedback.pdf
Kohn, A. (2011). The Case against Grades. Available at https://www.alfiekohn.org/article/case-grades/
Ryan, T. and Henderson, M. (2017). Feeling feedback: students’ emotional responses to educator feedback. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 43(6), pp.880–892. doi:https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2017.1416456.
UAL Compassionate feedback form. Available https://belongingthroughassessment.myblog.arts.ac.uk/files/2022/12/Compassionate-feedback-prompts_Final_November-2022.pdf