Entirely explained by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_Chinese_surname...
U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
261–270 of 284 posts
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#262Earlier quoted context omitted.
Introducing a slight bias factor that is randomized each time results in a lower average bias compared to a bias factor that is the same every time. Plus, as these weren't take-home assignments, I think someone finishing earlier is more likely to be either someone who was already going to score well, or someone who was already going to make the most common errors.
I take tests extremely quickly, I either know the answer or guess it from what I know. I don't think about it. I was usually one of the first people to turn in tests. I was usually (almost always) the last person to turn in assignments, I like to be one of the last people out of a door or the last person in a line (I don't like crowds). Grading by order-turned-in would almost always mean my assignment would be one of…
You need to find a classmate to be a chaos gremlin that randomly mixes up the pile when they drop off their assignments.
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#263I work in academia. When we grade exams, the order of the exams on the stack is the order in which they were collected in the room (people can sit wherever they like). For grading, we are usually 5 people in a single room, and everyone grades a specific exercise for consistency. The exams are getting shuffled heavily , with everyone just grabbing stacks, looking for exams where "their" exercise was not yet graded, an…
This might come off rude on accident, but I mean genuinely without malice. When I'm writing an essay to submit to my professor/teacher, I am asked to make multiple drafts to get a proper end result that is ready to submit. Understanding that educational staff is already often overworked, should I expect _less_ from the person I receive my education from? If you acknowledge that many of the grades I receive are actual…
I know it's not the point of your post, but I think it's worth pointing out that you're misunderstanding randomness (albeit in a very typical way). Although randomness is likely eventually (over a lot of instances) going to be the most "fair" way to distribute where your submission is in the order, it does not guarantee that it will always be different, and in fact a "random" algorithm that took previous orderings into account would be provably less random than one that didn't
It's also worth noting that randomization in a context like this is inherently an imperfect solution to a problem that generally can't be solved perfectly. If we find out that weird ordering biases exist, I think randomization is done on the assumption that many we don't know about could also exist, that there's no clear way to mitigate them completely, and then randomizing the order per-instance is just the best we can do to ensure it's fair (Which, again, won't be perfect. Perfect isn't available)
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#264It's the same with applying to jobs. The first applicants have a greater likelihood to get the job. If you're given a list of names... you're just generally more likely to pick something from the top of the list than the bottom.
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#265Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it would mean that the graders are just getting tired/lazy/inattentive the further they get in their stack of papers Or maybe they are getting better / more picky. I know in code reviews I often pass a few and then notice something that I realize was also wrong in previous reviews I allowed, but later reviews that day (week?) will not allow that.
Yes, and: Additionally, universities (and, by extension departments) want grades to approximately follow a normal distribution (and yes, you in the back, their actions show they do actually want that, even if they say otherwise). When you start grading a problem you have some idea what a "good" solution looks like, what an "ok" solution looks like, and same for "bad" solutions... If you award points based on that, th…
That's thought-provoking - thank you.
Essentially, unless it's an old exam where the universe of bad answers is already known, you need two passes - a discovery pass followed by the grading pass.
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#266I bet this correlation goes away if you separate the data by ethnicity.
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#267Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was a grader once. I guarantee if someone gives a good answer they'll get full marks even near the bottom of the stack. For BS answers I'll admit I got less generous as the hours went on. No one's getting hurt by this system if it's randomized. It's a matter of graders giving out partial credit for wrong answers which is discretionary. Rarely students are granted a small mercy. Seems OK.
I was one of many TAs for a large math class in college (pre-calc - think high school math for college students). For uniformity, the prof had the partial credit down to a science - specifying points for getting certain aspects of the problem. For the finals, a few TAs would be assigned to a given page, for uniformity. The fascinating thing was that the distribution of grades was about the same every year. And I had…
Oh, that brings back memories! "For every epsilon, there is a delta ..."
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#268I bet this correlation goes away if you separate the data by ethnicity.
Yeah Chen, Cho, and Cohen are up there and would bias results.
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#269Earlier quoted context omitted.
It happens in your phone contacts when you’re deciding who to talk to. You’re starting with your Abrahams, Billys and Changs, probably rarely reaching out to your Xaviers, Yusufs and Zeldas about going out tonight because you’ve already assembled a crew by the time you reach the Mimis, Natashas and Ottos.
Do none of your friends like or dislike any of your other friends?
Probably but that’s not how they’re organized in my contacts. It’s a list not a graph.
Re: U-M finds students with alphabetically lower-ranked names receive lower grades
#270As someone whose initials are Z and W, I tend to notice alpha sort a lot. Asking a friend whose initials are A and B about this, it's not something they ever noticed. I haven't noticed a grading/ranking difference, but far more frequently I'll hear that "oh, we ran out of item/time/etc. before we got to you", which has made me much more sensitive to issues of planning/organization.
Outside of school I can’t think of even a single instance of alphabetical sorting of my name (I have a middle letter). What situations are you in that this comes up a lot?
The order in JIRA boards during the daily standups comes to mind. I am sure there are similar examples in other domains that are not software related.