Copyediting versus grading-an alternative approach for critiquing students´ work

The author´s grading strategy in an upper-division technical writing course is documented. Students taking the course plan technical communication careers. They complete 50 pages of editing exercises and generate more than 75 pages of double-spaced copy for eight assignments. The author responds to students´ work in several ways: (1) personalized memos and extended handwritten comments, (2) marginal handwritten comments and questions, (3) internal copyediting of student manuscripts, (4) individual conferences, and (5) assignment of a grade. When editing student assignments, criticism is provided of content, communication effectiveness, and appearance. For content, the accuracy, consistency, logic, and evidence are evaluated. For communication effectiveness, the appropriateness of the narrative and visuals for the audiences, organization, clarity, and conciseness are evaluated, and for appearance, checks are made for spelling, mechanics, stylebook, and format errors