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Grading Criteria General grading information for the University of Washington is available at: http://www.washington.edu/students/gencat/front/Grading_Sys.html The iSchool has adopted its own criteria for grading graduate courses. The undergraduate grading criteria used by the iSchool is available at: http://depts.washington.edu/grading/practices/guidelin.htm
Evaluation CriteriaAssignments: The main purpose of the assignments is to promote a better understanding of the topics discussed in class and in the readings. In most of the assignments students are asked to employ concepts that were introduced in the course to develop their own analyses and frameworks. It is assumed that by doing so a student would reflect about a large range of aspects related to these concepts, and would develop new insights about human information behavior. The purpose of an assignment has been achieved if the student, at the end of the process, has developed an informed opinion and insights relating to the assignment’s topic. In other words, the importance of the assignment lies in the process (thinking about the issue), rather than in arriving at the “right” analysis. Most often there is no one “right” analysis. Unwarranted conclusions, however, can be identified. Working on an assignment requires reflection on concepts and a critical analysis. While a description of the concepts involved is always necessary, the analysis, rather than the description, should constitute the major part of an assignment. For example, an assignment that involves a comparison between two approaches requires a short and succinct description of each approach. The major part of the assignment, however, should be dedicated to an analysis that brings to light features that are common to the approaches, and those that are different. In addition, all analyses should be supported by factual evidence, either from readings or other documents. Generally speaking, an assignment will be graded based on its clarity, organization, balance, amount of pertinent details included, depth and clarity of analysis, and preparation. It will also be graded on the extent to which a good understanding of the material presented in the course is shown and on the extent to which directions are followed. An assignment that shows a lack of understanding of subject matter, is unclear or poorly organized, contains few or irrelevant details, does not follow directions, contains little or unsubstantiated analysis, or is poorly written or prepared (e.g., typos, grammatical errors) will receive low grades. Other aspects of individual assignments may also be included in the grading.
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