Grading

Group Assignments

Assignment 1 is simply graded as pass/fail. To pass, you must:

  1. Make a reasonable effort to complete all required work
    • Include all required components listed above in your A1 report
  2. Demonstrate a satisfactory ability to apply path analysis
    • Does your work demonstrate that you understand what you’re doing?
      • Mindlessly implementing a sequence of memorized actions is not sufficient.
    • Does your report show that you understand what you’ve done, why you’ve done it, and the implications of your results?
    • Can we understand your analysis and results after reading your report?
  3. Submit your assignment before the deadline

Otherwise, you will fail the assignment.

Individual Assignment

Assignment 2 will be fully graded on the usual 10-point scale. We will follow the procedure described below to compute your A2 grade.

  • Each report starts with a baseline grade of 7.
  • We will evaluate the quality of your work to adjust your grade above or below this baseline.
    • As we read through the report, we add credit (e.g., 0.1 points, 0.25 points, 0.5 points) for each “good” aspect that demonstrates above-average understanding or effort.
    • Likewise, we deduct credit for each “bad” aspect that indicates below-average understanding or effort.

So, if your report aligns with a satisfactory (but not exceptional) level of understanding and effort, your grade will be 7. Your mark will be higher, however, to the extent that you can demonstrate more-than-satisfactory levels of mastery and/or effort. Likewise, your grade will be lower if you do not meet expectations. Importantly, the added and deducted credit will be assigned independently,  so the additional points you get for good aspects can counteract any points you may lose for negative aspects.

  • The adjustment points will be allocated according to the extent to which your submission addresses the required components listed above.
  • The evaluation matrix gives an indication of how these points will be apportioned.

Assuming your group passes the first assignment, your final course grade will simply be your Assignment 2 grade.

Resits

You must get a “pass” for Assignment 1 and score at least 5.5 on Assignment 2 to pass the course. If you fail either of the assignments, you will have the opportunity to resit the failed assignment(s).

Procedure

The resit procedure is very simple. You revise the failed assignment, and your score on the revised submission will replace your failing grade (assuming a better grade for the revision).

Take note of the following points.

  • The same submission deadline applies to both resit assignments. You are, of course, free to submit your resits early.
  • You must resit each failed assignment. If, for example, you failed both A1 and A2, you must revise both A1 and A2 and submit both revisions before the deadline.
  • You must complete the A1 resit in your original groups. If some group members have dropped the course, complete the A1 resit with the remaining group members.
  • You must complete the A2 resit individually.
  • Your revised grade for A2 cannot be higher than 6.
  • Submit your resit assignments through Brightspace.

Grading Standards

Your resit score will not be a simple additive transformation of your original score. We will not grade the resits by comparing your original report to your resit and checking if you corrected “enough” issues to have produced a passing score in the context of the original report. Such an approach would be the educational testing equivalent of HARKing. So, if you score a 5 on your original submission, for example, and you correct two big issues (the absence of which would have implied a passing score in the original report), you can still fail the resit.

The resits are your second chance to demonstrate mastery of the relevant concepts (i.e., path analysis, latent variable modeling). If your corrections bring the report up to a level that seems to suggest that you “know what you are doing”, you will pass. If your report still suggests fundamental misunderstandings (or is otherwise substantially deficient), you will not pass. A passing grade in this course is supposed to show that you can use lavaan to conduct a sensible path analysis, CFA, and SEM, not that you can hack some haggard instructor’s goofy evaluation scheme.

I don’t want any of you to fail this course. I derive no pleasure from your suffering. Anyway, from a purely selfish perspective, failing grades make much more work for the instructors than passing grades do. That being said, I do want the degree you earn from UU to be a meaningful marker of the skills and knowledge that your study program is meant to impart. So, if you did not achieve the learning goals for this course, you should not pass the course, even though that’s an unpleasant outcome for all parties.

Example Assignment

You can find an example of a good submission (for an older version of Assignment 2) here.

This example is not perfect (no paper ever is), and several points could be improved. That being said, this submission exemplifies what we’re looking for in your project reports. So, following the spirit of this example would earn you a high grade.