Adapting Methods of Student Evaluation and Grading in Electrical Power Engineering

Since 1990, authors’ experience in the evaluation and grading of students, as evidenced by a decline of students’ motivation, has been a clear reduction in the effectiveness of classical methods of evaluation and scoring. This paper presents results obtained from using software called Hotpotatoes's in the initial evaluation and grading of students in electrical power generation at the Power Engineering Department of the University Politehnica Timisoara. The Hot Potatoes package, used by the authors in evaluation and scoring, is quite diverse, Its effects on how students of electrical power engineering learn were identified by using JQuiz and Masher. The use of these modules generate packets of questionnaires. Each questionnaire represents a theory chapter, or set of applications. One advantage of JQuiz is the use of multiple forms of answers to questions. For questions aiming the fixing and verification of the theory are used two of these forms: the single correct answer from multiple choices and answer by multiple-select options to achieve the correct answer. For questions testing the ability of solving simple applications, the form used for response is to input of a character set consisting in the correct value of the result. Advantages highlighted by using this method of evaluation and grading include eliminating the subjective component of evaluation, a dense coverage of the knowledge taught with questions, less time spent evaluating and grading students, and a simpler and clearer differentiation in higher and lower performing students.