Law School Grades Suck

Law professors hate grading and grades just as much as law students.

This is a column about grading.  Not what grades you got and why, but the terror, thrill, and ultimate significance we place on an activity that is quite disconnected from learning.

Last week, I started to tweet some random thoughts about it.  If you’ve read these, you can skip down a bit to where it says “**END TWEETSTORM**”:

**BEGIN TWEETSTORM**

I hate #grading.  For many reasons.

I hate that so much rests on what grade someone earns in my class.

I hate that I read exams repeatedly to assure I’m not grumpy or too tired or in some other way biasing the result.

I hate that law firms love top 10% students without wondering why someone in the top 11% is there.

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I hate that what I put on an exam will ultimately mean that someone might feel like a failure, robbed, or somehow misunderstood by me.  I hate that someone who got an A might take that as a sign that they are all-powerful or all-knowing, etc.

I hate that when a student comes to see me about their grade I HAVE to presume they are there to challenge the grade because that one time…. #WhyWeCantHaveNiceThings

I hate when I’m the student’s lowest grade for a semester.  I hate when I’m the student’s highest grade for the semester.  I hate having to justify the differential to employers.

I hate that I could easily dispatch with my concerns about essay grading by giving a multiple choice and calling it “objective.”

I hate no matter how hard I try, my exam is 10 times easier than every real-world problem I’ve worked on.  Not one word from you, clinical profs….

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I hate that if a student shares with another student that they got an “A,” sometimes they’ll assume it wasn’t smarts, but rather a bribe or extortion or something.  I mean, maybe.  But usually it’s a well-written exam.

Mostly, I hate making invidious distinctions between a B and a B- when there is sometimes a tiny difference.

I hate that no matter what exam method we use to evaluate students, it sounds like a torture device.

I hate that there is greater potential sometimes for the C student to learn from their mistakes than for the A student to learn from their successes.

I hate that the times I’ve shared exams with others in my field we have come up with equally brilliant, yet entirely different answers.  Makes me wonder if students would be rewarded if they did the same.

**END TWEETSTORM**

I discovered I was not alone.  I discovered that many of us are quite thoughtful about what it is we spend a great deal of time doing. Law profs, English profs, Chemistry profs, Ph.D. candidates, Adjunct profs, all have spent some time thinking about grading.

So, here’s what I think after my x years of teaching.  (Where x = a number greater than one might think for someone my age):

  1. Professors either give too many grades or too few. Elite schools don’t necessarily bother to give them, some settling for Honors Pass, Pass, Fail.  Their students are presumed smart because they are at an elite school.  Most students are not presumed smart by employers if they don’t have the right grades.  Maybe it’s time we take away that signal to some degree.  What say you all?  Honors, Pass, Fail?  Or maybe we should just absolutely rank each student’s exam.  1/400 versus 200/400 might communicate meaningful information.  Will 201/400 versus 202/400?
  2. The purpose of giving a final exam is twofold. One, is to evaluate what the student learned in the class.  Did they master the concepts?  Did they get the gist of the concepts?  It’s not about the grade, it is about giving students a chance to demonstrate what they learned.  Second, it is to push them.  Can the students take what they learned and extend it to a new level of sophistication?   Grades get in the way of all of that.
  3. Everyone needs to come to terms with the fact that law professors are not uniform in grading.  We may be looking for the same things, but not necessarily the same way.  So basically a student may get an “A” in my class for beautiful analysis.  A student may get an “A” in another class because it is closed book and that student has a great memory.  Which “A” should we value more?  I suppose that depends on the employer.  I’m not suggesting that one thing ought to be valued over another; I’m just suggesting that grades are not homogenous.
  4. Everyone needs to remember that no matter how objective law profs try to make grading, it is subjective. Yes, we can set up our grade sheets (or spreadsheets) to list out what we are looking for, but there’s lots of give in there.  I view grading as a Figure skating program.   I might be looking for a triple lutz, but how well the student lands it is a matter of subjectivity.  Of course, this is like dealing with different judges, so I suspect in part that’s fine.  Except for the part where a grade based upon how well one landed a triple lutz one particular day seems ominous.
  5. If it weren’t for grades, many of us might actually have more opportunities for student feedback. But, yet again, there’s a reason we can’t have nice things.  I suspect many of us fear backlash.  Students who are given feedback suggesting marked need for improvement might take it out on their profs in yet another completely biased, arbitrary, and useless grading mechanism: The student evaluation.  Ah, the circle of life.

LawProfBlawg is an anonymous professor at a top-100 law school. You can see more of his musings here He is way funnier on social media, he claims.  Please follow him on Twitter (@lawprofblawg) or Facebook. Email him at lawprofblawg@gmail.com.