Students and faculty recognize that the grade the instructor gives is a professional judgment of the quality of the student's submitted work and that grades are based on shared assumptions and expectations. At the most basic level, we expect that assignments will be submitted to the instructor on time. Submitted assignments are to be clearly focused and organized, with a discernible thesis statement. Generalizations and conclusions are to be adequately supported and, when appropriate, research documentation is to be well integrated and effectively presented. A formal writing style is required, along with proper grammar, punctuation, and spelling.
It's also important that students and faculty have shared expectations regarding the grading of assignments. The following broad definitions are based on the suggestions of the UMUC Information Literacy and Writing Assessment Task Force and offer general criteria for grading.
The grade of A reflects excellence. The A paper offers a well-focused and organized discussion appropriate to the instructor's assignment, reflects critical use of relevant materials, and demonstrates effective and formal writing requirements. Research papers must demonstrate outstanding efforts to identify varied pertinent sources, to employ those materials critically in the text of the papers, and to provide error-free citations of those resources.
The grade of B represents an effort beyond satisfactory and indicates the paper was completed in an appropriate and competent manner and, in general, demonstrates a strong attempt at original and critical analysis, writing, and research. The B paper may contain a number of minor errors of grammar or citation, and its thesis or its conclusions may be undeveloped or too weakly supported.
The grade of C indicates that the paper was done in a satisfactory or appropriate fashion and represents the average work expected for university courses. The presentation is organized around a central idea with arguments supported by relevant examples. The paper is structured into correctly written paragraphs and sentences. Although fulfilling the assignment, the C paper may exhibit one or more weaknesses including, but not limited to, errors of punctuation and grammar, imprecise or incorrect word use, inaccurate or uncritical use of materials, occasional inconsistency of organization or development, and lack of direct relevance of the selected research materials to the topic.
The grade of D indicates that the paper may have a poorly defined topic or thesis, lack clear focus or organization, and contain unsupported generalizations or conclusions. Research support is inadequate, not clearly relevant, or improperly documented. A less-than-minimal research effort is evident. The paper may also suffer from numerous or major formal writing errors.
The grade of F indicates that the paper is not clearly relevant to the assignment and that its topic and thesis are poorly focused or defined. The paper may display inadequate organization or development, unsupported generalizations, and nonstandard formal features (including language usage, sentence structure, paragraphing, and so on). Research support is absent, inadequate, or irrelevant to the assignment.