USING WEIGHTED SCORING RUBRICS IN ENGINEERING ASSESSMENT

Abstract

When evaluating student work by deducting marks for errors,it is possible to underestimate the importance ofdominant concepts and assign grades at a level that mightnot be in agreement with academic policies. Rubrics facilitateand expedite the marking process but it is importantto examine in detail the parameters and limitations of thisstructured approach to assessment. The structure of thescoring rubric considered in this study promotes the consistencyand validation of the assessment process and discriminatesbetween evaluation components by assigningdifferent weights to dominant and secondary criteria. Theshape of the weight distribution function plays an importantrole in this process. In the proposed rubric structure,an array of performance levels is multiplied by anarray of task components to arrive at a mark and a grade.A uniform weight distribution is easy to develop and utilize,especially for large classes, but it fails to recognizethe importance of dominant components. The proposedapproach allows the incorporation of single and multipledominant criteria modeled by using step or linear distributionfunctions and adjusting the relative value of dominantand secondary components.