Organizing Academic Research Papers: Grading Someone Else's Paper

Student peer grading [a.k.a., peer assessment; peer evaluation; self-regulated learning] is a cooperative learning technique that refers to activities conducted either inside or outside of the classroom whereby students review, evaluate, and, in some cases, actually recommend grades on the quality of work of their peers. Professors often utilize peer grading as an aid to improving team performance or determining individual effort on team projects. Peer grading is usually guided by a rubric developed by the instructor. A rubric is a performance-based assessment that uses specific criteria as a basis for evaluation. An effective rubric makes grading more clear, consistent, and equitable.

Newton, Fred B. and Steven C. Ender. Students Helping Students: A Guide for Peer Educators on College Campuses. 2nd edition. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010.

When professors assign students to grade the work of their peers, an assumption one could make is that they are simply too lazy to do their own grading. That may be true sometimes. However, the reality is that educational research suggests peer grading actually increases learning outcomes for students.

Professors use peer grading as a way for students to practice recognizing quality research, with the hope that this will carry over to their own work. Peer grading can also enhance learning outcomes by empowering students to take ownership over the selection of criteria used to evaluate the work of peers [the rubric]. Finally, peer grading is a way to engage students in the act of seeing themselves as members of a community of researchers.

Other potential benefits include:

1. Increasing the amount of feedback students receive about their work,
2. Encouraging students to be actively involved with and take responsibility for their own learning,
3. Providing an opportunity for learning and reinforcing essential skills that can be used in professional life, such as, being able to effectively assess the work of others and to become comfortable with having one's own work evaluated by others,
4. Fostering a more in-depth and comprehensive process for understanding and analyzing a research problem through repetition and reinforcement of key criteria essential to learning a task,
5. Offers motivation for improvement in course assignments and provides a more comprehenive perspective on learning, and
6. Using the process as a model for the internal self-assessment of your own learning [at a higher cognitive level, this is known as reflexivity, or, the process of understanding one's own contribution to the construction of meaning throughout the research process].

Dochy, Filip et al. "The Use of Self-, Peer, and Co-Assessment in Higher Education: A Review." Studies in Higher Education 24 (1999): 331-350; Sadler, Philip M. and Eddie Good. "The Impact of Self- and Peer-Grading on Student Learning." Educational Assessment 11 (2006): 1-31.

I. Best Practices

Best practices in peer assessment vary depending on the type of assignment or group project being evaluated, the rubric guiding what you are to evaluate, and the type of course you are taking. The process can be intimidating but know that everyone probably feels the same way you do when  first informed you'll be grading the work of others--cautious and uncomfortable!

Given this, the following questions should be answered by your professor before beginning:

• Exactly who [which students] will be evaluated and by whom?
• What does the evaluation include? What parts are not to evaluated?
• When during a group project or the assignment will the evaluation be done?
• What learning outcomes are expected from this exercise?
• How will their peers’ evaluation affect everyone's grades?

II.  Things to Consider

When informed that you will be assessing the work of others, consider the following:

1. Carefully read the rubric given to you by the professor. If he/she hasn't distributed a rubric to everyone, be sure to clarify what guidelines or rules you are to follow and specifically what parts of the assignment or group project are to be evaluated. If you are asked to help develop a rubric, ask to see examples. They can vary considerably and it is helpful to have a sense of what your professor is looking for.
2. Consider how your assessment should be reported. Is it simply a rating [i.e., rate 1-5 the quality of work], are points given for each item graded [i.e., 0-20 points], are you expected to write a brief synopsis of your assessment, or is it any combination of these approaches? If you are asked to write an evaluation, be succient and avoid subjective modifiers. Cite specific examples whenever possible.
3. Clarify how you will receive feedback from your professor regarding how effectively you assessed the work of your peers. Take advantage of receiving this feedback to also discuss how the rubric could be improved or whether the process of completing the assignment or group project was enhanced using peer grading methods.

Getting Feedback. The Writing Center. University of North Carolina; Froyd, Jeffrey. Peer Assessment and Peer Evaluation. The Foundation Coalition; Newton, Fred B. and Steven C. Ender. Students Helping Students: A Guide for Peer Educators on College Campuses. 2nd edition. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010; Peer Review. Psychology Writing Center. Department of Psychology. University of Washington; Revision: Peer Editing--Serving As a Reader. The Reading/Writing Center. Hunter College; Peer Review.  Writing@CSU. Colorado State University.