Grading Group Projects
The discussion
Priya: I think everyone in a group project should get the same mark. The whole point is learning to work as a team, and in a real job nobody splits a client's feedback into individual portions.
Tomasz: That sounds fair until you're the one doing eighty percent of the work. In my second-year engineering project, two members barely showed up, and we all got the same B-plus, which felt like a punishment for being reliable.
Amara: I'd go the other way and have tutors grade each person's contribution separately using the version history on shared documents. It's more work for staff, but it stops free-riding before it starts.
Priya: The version history only shows who typed, not who planned or explained things to others. Some of the most useful people in my groups hardly wrote a word but held everything together.
Tomasz: Fair point, so maybe a mixed system: a shared mark for the final product plus a smaller individual component based on peer assessment. That keeps the team incentive but gives the lazy members somewhere to lose points.
Amara: I could accept that, as long as peer ratings are anonymous and tutors check for obvious revenge scoring. Otherwise a group that falls out just drags everyone down.
Priya: Anonymous peer feedback I can live with, though I still think the shared mark should be the larger part.