Marking criteria

Marking criteria consist of a set of descriptive (not evaluative) statements that explicitly communicate to students what knowledge and skills will be assessed. As such, when creating assessment criteria for an individual assessment task, we should ensure the criteria reflect the method of assessment. For example, the criteria relating to a poster presentation may look considerably different than that of an oral presentation, despite nominally addressing similar characteristics such as clarity, cogency, etc.

Each assessment criteria should be accompanied by a set of pre-defined statements outlining different standards of achievement (1^st, 2:1, etc.). 

The design of new marking criteria is an iterative and collaborative process. Course conveners can collaborate with teaching teams and with both internal and external examiners. As well as contributing to the development of the framework, such discussions serve to develop a shared understanding of assessment frameworks.

Calibration meetings and moderation processes can help to develop and embed this shared understanding, as well as ensuring markers feel prepared and supported in their role.

Simple teaching activities such as peer assessment (against the criteria), class discussions (about marking criteria), the provision of exemplars, and even mock assessments can be used to prepare students to better understand how their work will be graded.

Marking student work requires markers to internalise marking criteria and interpret them against the assessment task. In practice, it involves one or two re-readings (depending on length, format, layout) and an iterative process of deciding marks.

 Marking criteria should be used to inform both evaluative judgements on students’ work and the construction of feedback: feedback comments should be set against marking criteria and learning outcomes. (For more guidance on effective feedback see the ‘Effective Feedback’ page of our Toolkit)

Working in teams to design, administrate and mark assessment is widespread in universities. This collaborative approach can reduce the workload for individual colleagues, yet when the work produced by a large cohort of students is marked by many markers, marking variation is likely to occur, i.e. a single piece of work may be marked differently by different markers. The quality of marking can be further affected by having frequent changing markers. Research shows the following protocols can counter this marking variation issue.

Marking Calibration before the marking window 

This involves all markers discussing their viewpoints around a particular assessment piece to reach a consensus. This method may require significant effort by all teaching staff. The complexity of the assessment task and the characteristics of markers should be considered when deciding whether this process should be adopted.

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Marking guidance to support individual markers during the marking window

During the marking window, it is important to remind all colleagues of processes, and any shared resources to support them, and with seasonal markers, the course convener should schedule check-ins where required. The following shared resources are found useful by university teachers:

• FAQs on the marking criteria

• A personal marking log file, which encourage markers to be self aware of any personal biases and keep them in check

• A team channel for quick communication between markers

• Exemplar essays or model answers

• A spreadsheet with common phrases for feedback

• Guidelines on feedback, e.g. how much you should write, what form should it take etc., and/or a couple of ‘good’ examples of feedback from a past cohort.

The table below shows one example of a judgement process when marking a large number of submissions.

Claire Wyatt‐Smith, Val Klenowski & Stephanie Gunn (2010) The centrality of teachers’ judgement practice in assessment: a study of standards in moderation, Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 17:1, 59-75, DOI: 10.1080/09695940903565610

D. Royce Sadler (2009) Indeterminacy in the use of preset criteria for assessment and grading, Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 34:2, 159-179, DOI: 10.1080/02602930801956059