(As I wrote in the earlier comments, I always have a TA make copies of each exam to prevent an event like this. But she somehow forgot to copy 2 of them, and one of them is lost.)
Any suggestions on what I should do with this student, who is an above-average student whose got a few absences.
- Give him points proportional to his performance on the MC section, or multiply his MC score * (Average class Total score)/Average MC score, but he'd have legitimate grounds for a complaint. The guy who hears complaints in our department is notoriously hard on students, but the student could legitimately take this up to the dean.
- Let him retake the exam, which already gives him an advantage, and give him a few bonus points for the time he needed to retake it.
- Give him the highest score anyone received on the exam. I'd rather not do this for obvious reasons.
Remember, we have a forced curve, so if he brags about getting a generous settlement, I'm screwed. (And sadly, he's from the afternoon section.)
I remember reading something like this on the Chronicle Forums a few years back, so it's probably happened in the history of academia. Any suggestions on how to handle this with the student?
(I have yet to look in my office to see if it was somehow put in the wrong folder. But I remember putting his exam, along with the others I looked at, in the accordion folder with the rest, so it's likely gone.)
I'll be very interested to see what Stella has to say about this one! LOL!
ReplyDeleteAs for me, I'd give him a make up for that portion of the exam. New questions. He might not like it, but shit happens. That is a fair solution (in my opinion).
One more thing: Something like this happened to me, minus the TA. In the end, after the class was over, I figured out what happened. The student had not written her name on the front of the test. She had written nothing on the front of the test. So, I put her exam with the blank blue books. And found it later when I reason to use the blue books again.
ReplyDeleteI would explain to the student, as straightforwardly and factually as possible, what happened: "We made a mistake,and we apologize. We lost the SA portion of your exam. We still have the scantron section. I have generated a list of options to help us resolve the situation--each of them have drawbacks and advantages, but I would like for you to choose the option you are most comfortable with."
ReplyDeleteThen (or before, actually) come up with a list of options you'd be willing to live with for the student to choose from:
-SA grade extrapolated from/proportional to MC grade
-Exam grade calculated using some formula involving the class average on the SA section
-Exam grade calculated using some formula involving his current class average
-retake the exam w/ new questions
This puts the control in the students' hands - I would offer these choices without telling him his MC section score - but any of the four options may be advantageous depending on how he thought he did on the exam. Just don't offer an option that you're not comfortable with (say, giving him a score equal to the highest on the test). Or offer him a chance to propose his own solution if none of those are acceptable, and treat it as a negotiation. but don't give away the farm if that's not on the table.
It doesn't seem fair to turn this into some exercise in game theory by withholding relevant information about the choices. He ought to know the outcomes of choices without having to guess.
DeleteA fair point. I could pretty easily be persuaded to this position. In my field, the idea of turning this into a en exercise in game theory would be precisely the point. :)
DeleteHi Vietcong,
ReplyDeleteBella, that's an interesting story. I'm glad you found it.
The idea of offering him options is an excellent one.
As for the new exam option, I'd rather allow him to take the exam with the same questions, and perhaps with a bonus. If I were the student and I believed I had a higher SA/MC ratio than the class, I wouldn't feel comfortable being forced to study for and retake a completely new SA section because of an administrative snafu that had nothing to do with me. After all, I don't accept late assignments because of snafus on their end. In addition, most of these students are taking a high credit load, so even retaking the current exam is a "cost" to them.
Yes you are right, same questions is better. And the bonus would be that the student knew exactly what was going to be asked, this time. That is quite a bonus in my book.
DeleteWhy not simply exempt that part of the exam for that one student? Doesn't hurt his grade, he earned the points he got, etc. Easy peasy. You'll still need to explain the snafu to him but he should be fine with that solution.
ReplyDeleteMidwest May, much depends on how the averages across the two sections look. I'll have to look at the averages. If he believes he did significantly better on the SA section, then there's a problem
ReplyDeleteI just looked at last year's scores from the section held at that same time, which tends to draw similar types of students every year. The SA scores were, on average, 2% better than the MC, but the standard deviation on that difference was huge. This year's MC was harder and the SA slightly easier, so that the SA scores should be significantly better than the MC. Given that, using the MC score for the whole exam wouldn't be fair given the circumstances.
ReplyDeleteStupid suggestion:
ReplyDeleteChoose your favorite 2 or 3 options, and put it to a class vote.
I might have your answer for you:
ReplyDeleteCall the student in. Ask how the student felt about the essay and ask for a description of how the essay was answered. Then, based on those oral answers, give a general A, B, or C.
A colleague of mine never had this happen to him in 14 years of teaching. Then, last year, it happened TWICE. Two different students, two different classes, two different months.
It happens to us all. We just never know when.
Since it sounds like you're relatively low on the totem pole (i.e. untenured), I'd first ask my chair (or division head, or dean, or whoever is relevant) whether there's a policy for dealing with this. As Monkey says, it happens, so there may well be, and, if so, you want to know what it is before you talk to the student. Even if there isn't a policy, I'd ask and take the advice of the person to whom the student would complain, so if the complaint does happen, it will be the chair (or whoever's) own procedure that the student is complaining about. There's no one right, fair answer, but there is a politically smart thing to do, and I'm pretty sure that that's to ask for advice. This seems especially true because your institution seems to have fairly clear and firm policies about grading.
ReplyDeleteHi Cassandra,
ReplyDeleteMy institution has a firm curve, but very few policies about grading or curriculum. The person to whom he'd complain is known for being extremely strict, much stricter than I'd be. (This person is an excellent teacher but from what I've heard, gets more than his/her share of complaints from students, from ) For example, this person doesn't allow regrades even if there's a clear grading mistake. Also, with some maneuvering, the student can go over this person's head, which wouldn't look good for me.
So my hesitation about going to this person is that the policy this person would advise would be overly strict and could cause the student to go further up the chain.
That does make it trickier. It's hard to seek and take advice when it's not clear that the higher-ups will agree. That puts you potentially in the middle of a battle of the Titans -- not a good place to be. There probably should be a policy for this, given how much your students' grades affect each others' (because of policies that do exist). Precisely because we don't have that kind of a system (and because I don't often give exams), I'm somewhat out of my league on this one.
DeleteMany of you have offered excellent advice, and I'm just trying to figure out what path to choose. If I'm lucky, I'll find the exam hiding in my office tomorrow, but I doubt that will happen.
ReplyDeleteBeat up the TA!
ReplyDeleteThe only fair thing to do would be for you to give the student 100% on the section of the exam that got lost, because it was your fault, or rather your TA's fault, that it got lost. That student took that exam in good faith: it's not fair to expect this student to take the exam again, and I can just imagine the ensuing hue-and-cry if you were to try to be fair by making the entire class take the exam again. I'd suggest kicking the TA somewhere it hurts, HARD, to prevent this carelessness from happening again.
ReplyDeleteIf you lose an exam, you have to either give the student 100% on whatever portion you lost (even if you lost the whole exam), or "encourage" the student to take it again by assuring them they will get at least a two-grade bonus. You also have to instruct the T. A. to provide the student a very serious apology, because it's totally unprofessional to lose exams, and because it's a pain in the ass and a source of stress for the student to have to retake the exam, especially if you plan on changing anything.
ReplyDeleteWhat you cannot do is force them to take it, or average the rest of the exam, or their performance in the rest of the course. If you or your T. A. fucked up, you have to fix it to the student's advantage. Ask them to retake, offering a bonus, but if they refuse, or don't get around to it, be prepared to give them full credit on the portion you lost.
Stella, you always offersuch no nonsense useful advice. In this case I do disagree with you though. I would not give the student a one hundred for any reason unless they could prove they earned it. I like the oral exam option as well as the take the test again option. I would agree to the same questions which would be advantage enough.
DeleteI am thinking that this would not be the hill id choose to die on however. If said student made a big enough fuss id probably renegotiate.
This is the one time when Stella is wrong (this millennium). Last time she was wrong was 1974, if I remember correctly.
DeleteThis student should not receive both the 100% on that portion and the very serious apology. If you give the student anything less than 100% for that portion, then the apology is appropriate.
The person who should receive the apology is the proffie. If the TA hasn't apologized profusely to the proffie, then that TA is deeply flawed. The TA should have already given the proffie a case of good bourbon and an apology. The proffie will be answering to the dean if the shit hits the fan. Goddamn fucking jesus h, if that portion of the student's exam ends up being circulated widely on the internet, then the school and the proffie could face a fucking lawsuit. Not to mention the damage to the reputation of the proffie and the school. The TA needs to get with the program. I'd sit the TA down and tell hir to create an exact likeness of the student's exam, to the best of hir abiity. This is just not acceptable.
I agree with Stella on the solution.However, it doesn't seem fair to use his performance on the this for the rest of the exam, even with a premium. I think the only way to go is a retake of the same exam or simply giving him the top score on that section. (Given that his MC performance was below the median, it's highly unlikely he'd beat the top score.)
DeleteHowever, I agree with Bubba about the apology. To the student, making one of his classmates apologize in front of them appears cruel. I will tell him she lost it though.
But Bubba, the TA can't make a likeness of the exam, since she hadn't started grading it when I notified her that it wasn't in my set of copies.
@Penny: Is the TA an undergrad or grad student? Is the TA being paid for this work?
DeleteBut Bubba, the TA can't make a likeness of the exam....
DeleteExactly. The exam is lost forever. The test-taker might have written the 21st century equivalent of The Tractatus, and now it is lost forever. The TA needs to understand that he lost somebody's hard work. And it might have been quite valuable.
I'd make hir try to reproduce it. I'd then ask hir why s/he should remain employed as a TA.
Bubba, The TA is an undergrad who is being paid. (I was promised a grad student but wasn't given one.) I wasn't sure if you were being sarcastic. If she had graded the exam before it was lost, she might have been able to reproduce some of it from memory.
DeleteIn fact, I, on my own initiative, am paying her extra for a few weeks because the TA took over for someone else who backed out with zero notic. If I had other options, your tactic would work great. But I'm in no position to fire a TA at this point in the semester, and the TA knows it.
@Penny: Just because an undergrad is an "above-average student" with exceptional intelligence does not mean that student will be a good TA. Retrieve all class-related material from the TA and then tell hir that hir services are no longer required. Then tell hir that you'll be filing charges against her for theft in 16 hours if s/he can't "find" the "lost" test.
DeleteBefore doing that, speak informally with the department chairman. Come clean about what happened. Then speak informally with the most senior appropriate police officer or dean of students. Be prepared to follow through when you turn the screws on the TA.
You say the TA's got you by the balls--"and the TA knows it." Extricate yourself from this mess immediately. You can't let an undergrad have you by the balls. Especially not an undergrad who "loses" other people's classwork. What reason do you have to trust hir?
Even if it means working an extra 20 hours this week to clean up this mess, get it cleaned up.
This is a goddamned mess. On top of it all, it sounds like you might not even have any paperwork showing that the TA is an employee. So when you have your final talk with hir, record the conversation and get a recording of her confirming that she was being paid to work for you. Or document it somehow. Otherwise, she'll get paid (your money) to smile sheepishly and say, "Oops, I'm such an adorable, clumsy student who lost a few pages."
Get out of this mess.
@Penny: Don't let any of those people on horsies get you down. They can be real bastards when they're drunk. You sound like a good person. And eager to learn.
DeleteP.S. Check around the copy machine in case the TA accidentally left the exam there. Maybe even dig through the green recycling bins a little bit early in the morning before anybody else gets there.
Good luck. I hope it all works out.
Where's the "kick the TA in the taco" portion of this discussion?
ReplyDeleteSnowflake her. Claim that she never turned in the exam but, out of the goodness of your heart, allow her to take it again.
ReplyDeleteJust give the student an A for that portion, since it's technically your fault for its going missing. They'll be happier than your making them redo it and you won't have to make an alternate exam; and since you're concerned about evals, that will be less likely to show up as a complaint on there.
ReplyDeleteWhat are you doing about the TA-flake?
Cynic, there's nothing I can do about the TA. Another TA is taking over the second section after the exam in any case. There's no way I can find anyone else in the middle of the semester.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, I put his exam (with several others that are accounted for) back in the folder with the others, but there's no way to prove that.(I still have to look through a few piles in my office to make sure it's not there.) As a result, it's hard to demand an apology when it's still possible that it was my mistake. I see that she's working harder now, and that's the only apology I need.
I'm in awe of your ability to just leave it alone and not go rushing to your office to check if it has been misplaced. Were this me, I'd have been in my office as soon as I thought something were missing. I'm compulsive that way and have been known to search for hours for a missing textbook on a Friday night.
DeleteI'd also not use the TA ever again, if it were the TAs fault (we don't allow TAs to remove student materials from our department for that very reason), but since you don't know if it was your fault or the TAs, no way to blame the TA...
DeleteThis is the one time Stella and I actually agree on something.
ReplyDeleteVery Interesting perspectives on this issue....I did a google search on appropriate actions for a lost exam after my daughter's teacher has lost two exams. I find it most interesting the variation of opinions among educator. It is hard for me to believe there is not a standard course of action. In the world of medicine, we are familiar with common mistakes that humans make and have protocols to deal with such mistakes....we are constantly adding to those protocols...In my line of work someone gets sued for such errors.
ReplyDelete