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College of Engineering
Mechanical Engineering
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TA Grading Responsibilities

Grading Responsibilities

In many classes, TAs perform these grading responsibilities in addition to the Teaching Assistant Responsibilities.  When the class employs separate graders, both TAs and Graders need to coordinate with each other to ensure consistency.

Grading Responsibilities

  1. Collect, grade, and return graded assignments in a timely manner.
  2. Use the grading rubric; if needed, develop one and suggest it to the professor.
  3. Strive for grading consistency, but do not worry about tiny variations, which have little impact on the overall class grade.
  4. Take points off for lack of clarity -- don't expend tremendous time trying to understand a confusing presentation.
  5. Consider point weight within problems, i.e., deduct fewer points for tiny mistakes and more points for major errors.
  6. If homework is turned in reasonably close to the deadline (e.g., same day), accept it.  If this becomes a consistent problem, stricter deadlines may be enforced.
  7. Coordinate and communicate with all the class Graders and Teaching Assistants.
  8. Give feedback to the instructor on concepts the students generally seem to have mastered and/or concepts that many students may not seem to understand so that s/he can tailor instruction to better meet student needs.
  9. If homework boxes are used, sign the log on the counter in 350 EB to check out the key; return the key immediately after use to the front counter.

Graders Are Also Teachers

  • Give useful feedback to the student by explaining what they did wrong and how they can fix it, rather than just marking an error.
  • Help students focus on communicating proper notation and assumptions.
  • To facilitate giving detailed feedback efficiently, develop a standard list of feedback "codes" and post the code definitions on Learning Suite.  Use these codes across all Graders for the class.
  • For unique situations, email the student "Come see me/email me/call me for an explanation."
  • If you make a grading error, correct it, but do not reward "grade complainers" with additional points.