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Biases like these and many others are obviously problematic throughout our education system. Is there a good way to abstract testing away from educators so the

Biases like these and many others are obviously problematic throughout our education system. Is there a good way to abstract testing away from educators so they can focus on teaching? Isn't that the way it should be done? In high school I found video games and chess, which captivated my competitive drive. Shouldn't education have such objective competitions where possible? I think that would eliminate such biases, captivate more minds, and propel human progress. No?

retsibsi 8y ago
> Is there a good way to abstract testing away from educators so they can focus on teaching? Isn't that the way it should be done? Ideally I think this should be done at a high level -- i.e. separating the institutions that do the teaching from those that do the testing and award the credentials. More practically in the short term, it would be great if teaching and grading were separated and allocated to different staff members. (Preferably with a proper firewall between them, to guard against politics and favour-trading.) There are just too many conflicts of interest and emotional pressures involved. This separation may also increase the likelihood that grading would be taken seriously, with markers given enough time and incentive to do the job properly.
- ianai 8y ago
  I’d like something a little “panoptic”. Have everything the student interacts with the teacher be recorded on a reviewable medium. Every minute of the teachers class gets recorded from multiple angles - no blind spots. Have teachers drop in on other teachers feeds randomly. This could be recorded material but should most definitely be done so that the teachers don’t know one another. Give the students the ability to flag a grade for review. (If the student flags grades often then that should trigger a review. Maybe a discussion with a school counselor.) I’d also like surveillance in place with the express intent of catching and correcting bullying. But that’d encounter political push back. Bullying, though, should be taken as seriously as bringing a gun to school and a kill list. Lots of counseling, parental oversight, etc And if all of this is too much then we scrap public schooling and offer online teaching with plenty of library study spaces.
  - antepodius 8y ago
    You're certainly right in that people would object to the construction of an out-and-out panopticon.
    - ianai 8y ago
      Ask yourself why any part of the lecture and homework should be kept private. We already know to not assume privacy in public spaces. Teachers are in an environment where they should not assume privacy. Student grades are personal and should be under their control who sees them - but it should be possible to challenge a bad grade. There are malignant teachers in the world.
      - TheSpiceIsLife 8y ago
        Some people aren’t particularly fond of performing in front of a camera to have their performance reviewed by—the data will be leaked—anyone. It should be possible to flag a bad grade, doesn’t mean we need to institute a surveillance system to achieve this. The same goes for bad actors playing teacher.
        wallace_f 8y ago
        If you're ever been victim of bullying or abuse, especially by an authority, you'd consider the right to record yourself in public to be important. The ACLU even has an app that can start recording by voice command. You should use it any time you are in a scenario with disproportionate inbalance of power (like when a police officer pulls you over).
        ianai 8y ago
        Exactly. For me, school bullying marred me deeply. Even to this day, going on 30 years later. I didn’t know what to do back then to fight it or stop it. Even that I should have. Someone seeing it on camera could have caught it and forced the issue. I wish someone had every second of every day in one way or another.
- Gpetrium 8y ago
  Well, in theory certifications such as the CFA, PMP, GMAT follow the same rationale as yours. Other countries such as Brazil and China use national tests to follow the same rationale. Do you still think that would be the best approach?
sfgnu89q3 8y ago
I think it would be a interesting exercise to judge grades the same way we judge other types of psychometric testing. Test-retest reliability / concurrent reliability (not sure which applies): Doesn't look great. Grades can vary dramatically between classes, even if those classes are closely related. Predictive validity: Not sure. I'm not sure what, if anything, GPA is meant to predict, and I've read varying things about how well it predicts success in one's career. Face validity / construct validity: Abysmal. What are grades supposed to measure, anyway? Work ethic? Motivation? Willingness to obey authority? Intelligence? Demonstrated mastery of the material? I have no idea. Whatever they're meant to measure, they measure a lot of things no one would want them to, like the student's race and sex, whether or not they're working while in school, when the class starts, etc.
iguy 8y ago
> abstract testing away from educators so they can focus on teaching Some systems attempt this, at the level of individual courses, and what seems to happen is the educator focuses ever more on bureaucracy. It means that they can't be free to adjust the course to the class & the time, but must pre-commit to some plan which is approved by someone else, and the exam will be submitted many months ahead of time to get checked by other people, who do this in addition to their own teaching. All supervised by ever more administrators, incentives to make themselves unavoidable. Some things like bar exams are external and standardised. (And GRE etc.) But trying to run every course this way seems a terrible idea.

retsibsi 8y ago

> Is there a good way to abstract testing away from educators so they can focus on teaching? Isn't that the way it should be done? Ideally I think this should be done at a high level -- i.e. separating the institutions that do the teaching from those that do the testing and award the credentials. More practically in the short term, it would be great if teaching and grading were separated and allocated to different staff members. (Preferably with a proper firewall between them, to guard against politics and favour-trading.) There are just too many conflicts of interest and emotional pressures involved. This separation may also increase the likelihood that grading would be taken seriously, with markers given enough time and incentive to do the job properly.

ianai 8y ago
I’d like something a little “panoptic”. Have everything the student interacts with the teacher be recorded on a reviewable medium. Every minute of the teachers class gets recorded from multiple angles - no blind spots. Have teachers drop in on other teachers feeds randomly. This could be recorded material but should most definitely be done so that the teachers don’t know one another. Give the students the ability to flag a grade for review. (If the student flags grades often then that should trigger a review. Maybe a discussion with a school counselor.) I’d also like surveillance in place with the express intent of catching and correcting bullying. But that’d encounter political push back. Bullying, though, should be taken as seriously as bringing a gun to school and a kill list. Lots of counseling, parental oversight, etc And if all of this is too much then we scrap public schooling and offer online teaching with plenty of library study spaces.
- antepodius 8y ago
  You're certainly right in that people would object to the construction of an out-and-out panopticon.
  - ianai 8y ago
    Ask yourself why any part of the lecture and homework should be kept private. We already know to not assume privacy in public spaces. Teachers are in an environment where they should not assume privacy. Student grades are personal and should be under their control who sees them - but it should be possible to challenge a bad grade. There are malignant teachers in the world.
    - TheSpiceIsLife 8y ago
      Some people aren’t particularly fond of performing in front of a camera to have their performance reviewed by—the data will be leaked—anyone. It should be possible to flag a bad grade, doesn’t mean we need to institute a surveillance system to achieve this. The same goes for bad actors playing teacher.
      - wallace_f 8y ago
        If you're ever been victim of bullying or abuse, especially by an authority, you'd consider the right to record yourself in public to be important. The ACLU even has an app that can start recording by voice command. You should use it any time you are in a scenario with disproportionate inbalance of power (like when a police officer pulls you over).
        ianai 8y ago
        Exactly. For me, school bullying marred me deeply. Even to this day, going on 30 years later. I didn’t know what to do back then to fight it or stop it. Even that I should have. Someone seeing it on camera could have caught it and forced the issue. I wish someone had every second of every day in one way or another.
Gpetrium 8y ago
Well, in theory certifications such as the CFA, PMP, GMAT follow the same rationale as yours. Other countries such as Brazil and China use national tests to follow the same rationale. Do you still think that would be the best approach?

sfgnu89q3 8y ago

I think it would be a interesting exercise to judge grades the same way we judge other types of psychometric testing. Test-retest reliability / concurrent reliability (not sure which applies): Doesn't look great. Grades can vary dramatically between classes, even if those classes are closely related. Predictive validity: Not sure. I'm not sure what, if anything, GPA is meant to predict, and I've read varying things about how well it predicts success in one's career. Face validity / construct validity: Abysmal. What are grades supposed to measure, anyway? Work ethic? Motivation? Willingness to obey authority? Intelligence? Demonstrated mastery of the material? I have no idea. Whatever they're meant to measure, they measure a lot of things no one would want them to, like the student's race and sex, whether or not they're working while in school, when the class starts, etc.

iguy 8y ago

> abstract testing away from educators so they can focus on teaching Some systems attempt this, at the level of individual courses, and what seems to happen is the educator focuses ever more on bureaucracy. It means that they can't be free to adjust the course to the class & the time, but must pre-commit to some plan which is approved by someone else, and the exam will be submitted many months ahead of time to get checked by other people, who do this in addition to their own teaching. All supervised by ever more administrators, incentives to make themselves unavoidable. Some things like bar exams are external and standardised. (And GRE etc.) But trying to run every course this way seems a terrible idea.