On Adventures in Ethics and Science they're having a little debate about something called "extra credit" [Question of the day: Is extra credit fair?]. The debate seemed kind of interesting but I really didn't have a clue what they were talking about, so I asked.
Nobody answered. I gather the concept of "extra credit" for a course is so widespread in American schools that they must have thought I was joking. After a bit of internet searching I think I'm beginning to understand what this "extra credit" is all about. There seem to be universities that permit students to raise their grades by doing extra work. For example, they might get a grade of 75/100 on all the exams and tests but they could add another 5 marks to bring their final mark up to 80% if they do some project that is not required of all students in the class.
Here's an example from an introductory biology course at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign [Integrative Biology 101].
During the semester you have an opportunity to earn up to 6% worth of extra credit points to be added to your course grade at the end of the semester. You may earn any number of extra credit points up to the maximum of 6 points. To earn the whole 6% you must start early and sustain your extra credit work throughout the semester. There is also an option for one additional bonus point if you complete one of the two "Bonus" projects in addition to the maximum number of projects determined by the date you start your extra credit work.I'm dumbfounded. How widespread is this practice?
Extra Credit projects require that you engage in some independent learning in areas of biology that interest you, write a brief report or review and then read the work of your classmates and interact with them via the Web Crossing computer conferencing system to share and discuss what you and your classmates have learned.
Extra credit projects are due at three specific times during the semester - before each of the hour exams and at the end of the semester. You may earn two extra credit points at each of these due dates.
For most extra credit projects, one extra credit point can be earned by writing one project review and completing two interactions (dialog entries) by reading and replying to two classmate's extra credit projects. While you must write at least one dialog entry to a classmate for each extra credit point, you may count another student's dialog entry to your project as your second dialog entry. If no one writes to you, you must then write a second dialog entry to another student.
Does this mean that when we're evaluating transcripts from the University of Illinois we have to consider the possibility that, while a student may have an "A" on the transcript, they may have only gotten a "B" when it comes to understanding the required material in the course?
There may be a logical reason for giving out extra credits but the logic escapes me. Can someone explain it?
12 comments :
The idea is that by doing the extra work the student can demonstrate their understanding of material in practice even if they didn't demonstrate it on the exams. Is it artificial? Sure, but then exams are artificial too. I'm sure we all have encountered students who performed extremely well on exams but couldn't apply their knowledge in practice.
It's fairly widespread in terms of being known, but it's rather infrequently /allowed/(especially in the sciences, from my own, personal observation.) And it rarely amounts to much, in the term of allowed credit, when it is allowed. It wouldn't have much impact on GPA, would be my guess - and it seems to most often be used (when a professor will allow it) by people who aren't doing very well in the class to begin with, most often to avoid being forced to retake the course.
I'm a philosophy prof. In my experience, extra credit isn't exactly common, but it certainly isn't unheard of. I'd hazard to say that it would be fairly unusual for a student to be able to raise her or his grade by more than a third of a grade (roughly). The basic idea is to allow the student to be rewarded for taking on some extra work, and doing it well. In my own case, I have been known to offer "extra credit" assignments to blunt the impact of an assignment on which some students did particularly poorly.
It's just another way to "grade on the curve".
Some teachers also add "extra credit" questions to exams, which just makes the basis 110 instead of 100
Gary Carson says,
It's just another way to "grade on the curve".
We've had discussions about his before. Just to make sure we're on the same wavelength: it's extremely rare for Professors to grade "on the curve" where that term implies some manipulating other than just adding marks to everyone's grade.
As far as I can tell, by awarding "extra credit" you are preferentially favoring a subset of the class. To me that seems to be the exact opposite of what you're saying.
I would imagine that most Professors adjust the grade distribution before adding the bonus marks. If they do it afterwards then the system is even more unfair than I thought.
Jonathan Badger says,
The idea is that by doing the extra work the student can demonstrate their understanding of material in practice even if they didn't demonstrate it on the exams.
I expect all of my students to demonstrate their understanding of the material. I test them to see if they understand.
Are you saying that in some American schools the standard is to let students get an "A" in a course even if they can't demonstrate their understanding of the material? In those courses, if you don't perform well on the factual exams then you can get "bonus" marks for revealing that you can at least apply your lack of factual knowledge to something else?
Or are you saying that the examination system is flawed and some students need to be given other ways of demonstrating their knowledge? If it's the latter then why not make the "extra credit" assignment mandatory? When I taught molecular biology there was a required essay (worth 20%). Every single student had to write one. What's wrong with that?
I don't get it.
Or are you saying that the examination system is flawed and some students need to be given other ways of demonstrating their knowledge?
Yes, that's exactly what I think.
If it's the latter then why not make the "extra credit" assignment mandatory? When I taught molecular biology there was a required essay (worth 20%). Every single student had to write one. What's wrong with that?
Well, there's something to be said for that, but that does require more grading work for the professor -- and in my experience those large (several hundred student) introductory biology courses at research universities are often taught by assistant professors who are trying to balance their teaching load with the research that they need to get tenure with, and often they are only given one or two TAs to help with the grading. It's little wonder that such courses generally only test the students with a midterm and a final -- often multiple choice.
The advantage of extra-credit from the professor's side is that only a few students bother with it. To get back to Stemwedel's original question though, I do agree that it's unfair if only some students are *allowed* to do it and the professor is only offering it out of pity to failing students.
And to get back to your original question about comparing grades from other universities, I think there's probably greater concerns between comparing grades between universities besides whether they allow extra credit. An "A" from MIT/Caltech, an "A" from a first-class public university like the University of Illinois and an "A" from a state university like Illinois State are not really comparable, because the quality of students is so different.
From my own experience, extra credit is all over the place in high school, but not very prominent at the university level. I don't offer extra credit in my own classes, and very few of my colleagues do if they're teaching beyond the 100 (intro) level.
EDIT: I meant to say that my only colleagues that offer extra credit are those teaching an intro course.
Extra credit is rampant in high schools to help kids get better grades so we can get into better colleges. I think the only extra credit I ever had in college, though, was maybe a really hard question on an Organic Chemistry exam which was well above our expected level of understanding. If we guessed properly/used the knowledge we had and applied it well, the professor would give us a few extra points on that exam to counterbalance the dreadful grades we all got on his exams (I.e we would go from 50s to 55s or something). That said, I don't think it really changed anyone's grades significantly. Usually, they were just fun problems that caused us to think a bunch and introduced us to new topics in Organic Chemistry.
I *did* think you were joking when you asked, and was tempted to make a smart alecky remark that this stood as further proof that Canada is better than the U.S.
I think there are ways to set up extra credit assignments that are fair (which means, necessarily, they will be available to all the students who want to try them) *and* that legitimately test the students' mastery of the material (which is to say, you're not giving free points but points for successful completion of a challenging assignment). In the case where, say, a large proportion of a class does poorly on a particular part of an exam -- and where this may indicate that they need to get a little further to really understand that material -- an extra incentive to learn it and a second chance to demonstrate that learning seems humane.
But ...
Routine extra credit opportunities may well undercut the incentive to buckle down and master the material before the exam in the first place. And, it's always extra work for whoever devises and marks the assignments. (Besides which, when I design a course, I'm pretty careful to build *enough* credit into it; why should I need to provide *extra* credit?)
I'd heard the term before, but I had no idea that it existed as a formal system embedded with normal educational practice at college level. I had assumed this was a rare, special-circumstances, and informal phenomenon primarily dependent on the interactions between the personalities of the professor and the student. I'm surprised.
Thanks for putting this up; I don't read Adventures in Ethics and Science regularly enough, I guess.
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