Criterion, a web-based, instructor-led writing evaluation tool, is revolutionizing the ways professors and instructors at community colleges and minority serving institutions (MSIs) teach students necessary skills for writing competency.
“Disposable time is often a luxury MSI and community college students don’t have,” says Chrystal Anderson, a client relations specialist for ETS. “Criterion’s technology frees up time for institutions to focus on teaching, not correcting, and it gives more opportunities for students to practice and improve their individual writing skills.”
Many community colleges and MSIs face the added pressure of staying accountable for their students’ success, and “a large portion” of community college and MSI students are placed in remedial English courses that can be a “path that often contributes to these students never completing their degrees,” says Andrea King, director of project management for ETS.
ETS began to develop the writing evaluation tool in 2000 and the system is powered by ETS’ proprietary software engine called ‘e-rater.’ After a student completes an assignment given by an instructor, the e-rater scoring engine provides the student with annotated diagnostic feedback and a holistic score “based on level-specific models built from essays pre-scored by ETS-trained readers,” the Criterion website reads. The e-rater’s automated grading closely matches human scorers’ grading.
To access the tool, an institution, a specific department or a professor can order the Criterion service. Students must then log in to the online system using an access code provided by their instructor.
While Criterion cannot take the place of teacher instruction and feedback or grade specifically for content, using the tool in a writing course saves time, provides consistency for grading and can empower professors and instructors to focus on higher-level student learning, King says.
