Randomizing SpeedGrader ABC's: Sequential Grading Bias

[valentinesking]

Howdy Instructors!

A few days ago, I shared on Instagram the Insider Higher Ed "Why Faculty Should Randomize Grading Order" article with the teaser about Univ. of Michigan research finding sequential grading bias impacts students with alphabetically lower last names. Recommendations were made to include more training on grading bias, hiring more graders in large classes, and improved LMS functionality in terms of making random ordering available.

Each instructor grades different based on evaluation criteria, any curving requirements, and other various parameters. Many of our Canvas instructors enable manual grade posting policy to hide the grade and comments until the instructor has graded all of the assignments. I know when I graded as an instructor, I found myself midway into grading going back to earlier submissions to adjust scoring. For many instructors, such practices are common. 

But there's good news- in it's most recent Canvas release notes Instructure announced that instructors can randomize the order of students in SpeedGrader settings to prevent grading fatigue and grading bias. Recently in May, I participated in a Instructure Discovery session where this feature was discussed and presented. Instructure listened and did the thing; love this focus on "quick wins" to release great features we've asked for into existence!

Beyond creating robust rubrics, would love to hear about how other mitigate grading bias in their classes.

Val King the ID

Sr. ID Project Leader, The Wharton School of UPenn