I agree with your suggestion of getting Grand Sorting out of education. I
also agree that this solution is finally institutional. However, I disagree
that "the isolated actions of individuals" do not play role in making
institutional change. Making historical analogy, I'd argue that slaveowners
who had left their slaves free contributed to abolishment of slavery. Their
act became a strong contribution in the public debates on slavery.
Applying the situation to us, instructors, I think it would be strange to
put our efforts in "humanizing" Grand Sorting and inventing "better" and
"less harmful" ways of grading.
As to students,
>she is now concerned solely about
> her record and the consequences for her future, and has explained her
> analysis in detail ... (there are perhaps some personality
> factors involved
> as well, as she somewhat grudgingly admits)
Very few people can ignore pain... Grades are punishments for msitake
making and violating instructor's expectations. They are often detrimanetal
to quality of education.
What do you think?
Eugene
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jay Lemke [mailto:jllbc@cunyvm.cuny.edu]
> Sent: Tuesday, December 22, 1998 5:18 PM
> To: xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu
> Subject: Robotized competitive grading
>
>
>We could move to affirm Quality and
> Standards in our schools and universities at the same time we opt out of
> the Great Sorting. If we did, other institutions would tend to take over
> the Sorting, but society would change, in some unpredictable ways, and
> schools and universities would change in at least some, more predictable,
> positive ways. HOW we could opt out, or at least significantly reduce our
> institutional coupling into the Sorting, is a solvable problem of
> strategy.
> It requires looking at the relevant economics, politics, and ideologies
> from the individual scale (us and our colleagues, students) to the
> institutional scale (governance forms, budget dependencies) to the
> trans-institutional scale (resource inputs and trade-offs, political
> authorities). It's a classic political problem: how to mobilize resources
> from the lowest level to reorganize the intermediate level in
> ways that are
> permitted by the constraints from the higher level, resulting over time in
> change in all three levels. Just as this kind of social change cannot be
> accomplished by the isolated actions of individuals, so it also cannot be
> prevented by general social structures. It is similar in logic to Mike
> Cole's mesogenetic strategies, but easier insofar as it does not require
> the creation of entirely new institutional forms. It is also, contrary to
> general belief, not necessarily incremental or reformist: it can have
> radical, revolutionary, large-scale (and small-scale) consequences -- they
> just don't happen to be predictable.
>
> JAY.
>
> PS. sitting on my desk is an appeal from a student who still wants an
> A-minus grade from last spring changed to a full A grade ... this is no
> longer mainly an issue of quality, as I've already explained very clearly
> just what was lacking and she's tried to remedy some of the defects
> retroactively (partly successfully) ... she is now concerned solely about
> her record and the consequences for her future, and has explained her
> analysis in detail ... (there are perhaps some personality
> factors involved
> as well, as she somewhat grudgingly admits).
>
> ---------------------------
> JAY L. LEMKE
> PROFESSOR OF EDUCATION
> CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK
> JLLBC who-is-at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
> <http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/education/jlemke/index.htm>
> ---------------------------
>