As the midterm season mercifully draws to a close and students enjoy the pre-finals lull, another group of people must spring into action - the graders.
University professors and teaching assistants have numerous choices to make when grading, not the least of which is when, if ever, to use a curve.
Associate Psychology Prof. Angeline Lillard said she generally tries to avoid using curves, but does so under certain circumstances.
"The T.A.'s grades need to be curved," Lillard said.
Lillard added that she thinks it would be unfair for students in the same class but with different teaching assistants to have varying standards of difficulty in grading.
Lillard also said she thought curves were sometimes needed to adjust for poorly made exams.
"The only other time I curve is if the exam is too hard," she said. "If you make up your exams well, you don't have to curve."
Mathematics Department Chair James Howland also said he prefers not to curve.
Howland said though the Math Department does not have a department-wide grading policy, his personal preference was for a "fixed scale" where students who receive certain percentages are guaranteed at least to get the grade associated with that percentage.
For example, under this system, an 80 percent might translate to a 'B' or a 90 percent might translate to an 'A'.
Howland said the advantage of such a system was that it let students know ahead of time what they needed to do to get certain grades.
"Then they have something to shoot for," Howland said.
Like Lillard, Howland said he would sometimes curve grades upward if he thought students deserved higher grades than their percentages dictated.
Other University professors do not see the need to curve under any circumstances.
English Department Chair Michael Levenson said though his department did not have a set grading policy, he did not know of any English professor who uses curves.
"I think curves are not suited to English," Levenson said.
Instead, Levenson said English professors often discuss how they determine grades in order to have a shared standard.
"We feel that we can and should employ an absolute standard," Levenson said.
At the heart of this view is the idea that students' grades should not be dependant on the quality of the work of other students.
Though Levenson applies this principle specifically to English, other professors, such as Economics Prof. Steven Stern, think it has wider relevance.
Stern, who only teaches graduate students, said some years whole classes of students get a good grasp of material, while other years students do not do as well.
As a result, he said he thinks he is justified in giving out grades without comparing members of a class against each other.
"I have a sense of how well I think students are doing from years of experience," Stern said.
Though professors who do curve do not necessarily embrace this position, some are sympathetic to the idea that students should not be punished for the achievements of their classmates.
"If they all do great, that's wonderful," Lillard said.
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