Williams revisits Oral Exams to combat Grade Inflation
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Anonymous
| Amazing institution with a strong intellectual mission: https://today.williams.edu/magazine/socratic-style/ |
Anonymous
| What's William's average GPA? 60% gets A? |
Anonymous
| Seems like this will produce the same issues. Profs are still pressured to give good grades. |
Anonymous
| Seems to favor extroverts over writers. |
Anonymous
It’s just biased examination with less ability to actually regulate potential bias. |
Anonymous
|
Swarthmore honors does orals
It’s hard More lacs should do it |
Anonymous
|
DD’ is an IR major at W&M and has had a couple oral finals. She really liked them and scored higher than on most written finals. She has ADHD and writes very well, but can get overwhelmed and have trouble organizing her thoughts and starting to write essay exams.
Oral exams have been in small classes where ther has been a lot of discussion as part of the class and she knew the professor well. I think any LAC grad should have had to take a combo of oral exams, written exams and final papers/projects. They require different skill sets and let kids showcase strengths, while requiring them to work on weak areas. Of course, I also think they should bring back blue books for written exams. |
Anonymous
| I don’t see the purpose. |
Anonymous
or go back to blue books & have orals. im an introvert who's gregarious mama made me learn to fake it and im so so grateful to her!! |
Anonymous
| The return of oral exams is also a key tool in the arsenal of assessment in the age of AI. I’ve recently heard an MIT prof talking about how he is using it. DD who is a freshman at Pomona also already had oral exams in some (non-language) classes this fall. |
Anonymous
| This is an ineffective form of examination when your professors are committed to grade inflation. |