Reconsider the Grading Paradigm

Why do educators continue to use the existing extrinsically-driven grading paradigm? In private conversations, most agree that grading is not a good indicator. And imagining how the whole educational system might work in the absence of grades may be daunting. Reimagining how this might affect our jobs as educators may be dangerous for both people and organisations. However, we have all learned from the Covid-19 pandemic that both individuals and organisations can adapt quickly and creatively when required change.

It is time for the educators to reconsider the grading paradigm. We can enhance this grading system and restore the participants’ passion for learning with the cooperation of other educators, students, parents and interested organisations.

Dr Tariq Banuri’s punctuated “four-year tenure” as chairman of the Federal Higher Education Commission will end on May 28. Without issuing any charges, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government dismissed Dr Tariq Banuri in March 2021 by changing the Ordinance 2002 to lower the chairman’s tenure from four to two years. On the premise that in the post-Covid, knowledge economy, the government modified the HEC ordinance to limit the chair’s term to two years. A court restored him 10 months later, allowing him to finish his four-year term minus 10 months.

Now, the term of the HEC chair has been codified, the next chairperson will get two years to keep the lights on. While the legislation mentioned Covid-19 and the knowledge economy, it did not introduce regulatory guidelines for online education, digital libraries, or students’ internet access and computers.

Dr Banuri frequently critiqued the higher education institutions of Pakistan, terming them “degree mills”. A few months back, I asked about his claim.

Dr Banuri argues that a degree is merely a piece of paper. When he looks at that piece of paper, it either tells him something, or it doesn’t tell him anything. A proper degree indicates the holder of this degree has some competence. There are things that this person knows; there are things this person can do. They have interpersonal characteristics and can work with others. So, if somebody has a degree from LUMS, Habib University, Agha Khan University, NUST, UET Lahore, NED University, and UET Peshawar, he feels confident about their subject matter and interpersonal skills.

Dr Banuri argues that the other universities (read majority) don’t maintain consistent quality standards. A degree from an institution that engages in unacceptable activities doesn’t tell you anything most of the time. The degree holders could be good people, probably not genius, because they would not go to such an institution. Or it could be somebody who doesn’t know anything. So you see, you have two degrees. One degree gives him some information. And the other gives him no information whatsoever.

Institutions that are flooding the market with ‘inconsistent’ graduates are neither helping the students nor the country by not providing the skills, expertise and knowledge that the country requires.

Higher education is a good business. University announces they are open for admissions and keep on lowering the standard to increase enrollment. And at the end of a particular period, they hand out a piece of paper. They throw ‘graduates’ into the market. Dr Banuri claims that:  “Beginning around 2002, under the HEC, the universities were made to believe that they could issue degrees indiscriminately. The more graduates you produce, the better you are, the more students you can admit, the better you are. The larger the number of degrees with exotic names, the better you are. The degrees from most of those places are useless.”

Dr Banuri claims that the HEC is an intricate structure, highly resilient to intervention and progress. Today’s university graduates enter a market altered by automation and a pandemic requiring new skills.

According to the ILO, the youth employment rate was expected to fall by more than twice as much as the adult rate by 2020. With 149 million new digital jobs will be added to the global economy by 2025, the shifting skills environment offers workforce possibilities. However, employers and students alike believe that there is a mismatch between the capabilities students graduate with and the skills necessary in the industry.

The Campus Skills Report 2022, released by Coursera, captures the trend among the learners worldwide and suggests important initiatives that the higher education institutions can take to align with the industry, boost student employability, and increase their enrollments.

The Campus Skills Report 2022, based on Coursera’s 3.8 million registered student learners across 3,700 free and paid campus customers, measures campus learners’ skill proficiencies for five emerging roles, provides skill-to-job pathways for 10 academic disciplines and highlights the learner skill trends for nine countries. Some students utilise self-directed online learning to study independently. Still, other curated programmes were developed by their higher education institutions in collaboration with Coursera.

Data scientist, data analyst, software engineer, machine learning engineer and marketing experts are the top positions in student demand. In India, for example, around 18 per cent of Coursera for Campus students want to be software engineers. In comparison, 15 per cent want to be data scientists.

While the students worldwide have made some progress in achieving baseline competency in job-relevant abilities, the majority have yet to reach the goal proficiency required to transfer into these positions.

Students in the arts and humanities who want to be professors or K-12 teachers prioritise communication, research, and writing abilities.

Business students are as enthusiastic about data analysis and financial analysis as marketing and consulting. They are looking for computer programming and machine learning abilities to help them gain data fluency.

Because the top employment for engineering students is a software engineer and data scientist. They prioritise essential skills like mathematics, statistical programming, and computer programming.

Data scientist is the desired employment for the students in the health sciences who are learning data analysis, data management and general statistics abilities that will allow them to contribute to the healthcare technology.

The top jobs for social science students include researcher, data analyst and economist. They are learning statistical programming and business analysis to supplement their research talents.

The students in India are developing digital skills, ranging from C programming to cloud computing, to prepare for careers in a rapidly rising digital economy. Most Coursera students in the Philippines are women, a trend that higher education administrators should capitalise on to reduce gender inequalities in STEM disciplines.

The students in Egypt gravitate towards technological skills such as software architecture, software testing and software engineering to begin their own companies in its burgeoning startup ecosystem. The students in the United States combine technical skills with human abilities such as decision making and change management to survive in the face of fast technological change. Many Colombian students study programming, software and data analysis abilities, which is a healthy trend, as the government promotes technical undertakings.

To compete in an era of fast transition, higher education institutions in advanced nations are increasingly integrating skill-based learning with skill-based hiring, preparing their students for high-growth digital employment.

(The writer is the CEO of Iqra University Extension)