department raised the students’ scores without informing professor

[hamburger]

In my department, if a student's score needs to be changed, the professor in charge of the course has to fill in a form and sign to approve it first before forwarding it to the head for approval. However, I just found that my department raised the score of a few students last semester without informing me. Is this unusual even in CC? I have never heard of such practice in previous universities I taught.

[ciao_yall]

In my department, if a student's score needs to be changed, the professor in charge of the course has to fill in a form and sign to approve it first before forwarding it to the head for approval. However, I just found that my department raised the score of a few students last semester without informing me. Is this unusual? I have never heard of such practice.

Yes, and unethical.

What was the department head's justification?

[hamburger]

In my department, if a student's score needs to be changed, the professor in charge of the course has to fill in a form and sign to approve it first before forwarding it to the head for approval. However, I just found that my department raised the score of a few students last semester without informing me. Is this unusual? I have never heard of such practice.

Yes, and unethical.

What was the department head's justification?

When they found out an email from a student was forwarded to me by mistake, they told me to disregard it and they would take care of it.
It is very nice that they leave me alone. There are so many strange things in this CC.

[clean]

Do you have a union (even the generic AAUP) there?

Do you have a regional accrediting body (like SACS - southern association of colleges and schools)?

Do you have a Fraud Hotline?  (often these will allow you to leave an anonymous report).

Perhaps you could contact any of these 3 bodies and ask your question to them.  Perhaps the provost would be interested in knowing what the lower level administrators are doing.

[Aster]

If you have a new dean who is still feeling his/her way around and trying to be nice to everybody, then yes this can happen. With time, the new dean will learn what is appropriate behavior and what is not appropriate behavior.

[ciao_yall]

If you have a new dean who is still feeling his/her way around and trying to be nice to everybody, then yes this can happen. With time, the new dean will learn what is appropriate behavior and what is not appropriate behavior.

That is a legal issue - only the professor can grade or change grades. Even the sleaziest places I ever worked had that rule, because otherwise they would have lost their accreditation.

[eigen]

If you have a new dean who is still feeling his/her way around and trying to be nice to everybody, then yes this can happen. With time, the new dean will learn what is appropriate behavior and what is not appropriate behavior.

That is a legal issue - only the professor can grade or change grades. Even the sleaziest places I ever worked had that rule, because otherwise they would have lost their accreditation.

Is this true even in the case of a grade appeal? My understanding of the places I've worked is that in the case of a successful grade appeal, the grade would be adjusted without the instructor doing the adjusting.

Given some of what the OP has posted (email chain with the Dean), I'm wondering if this is the result of a successful grade appeal.

[ciao_yall]

If you have a new dean who is still feeling his/her way around and trying to be nice to everybody, then yes this can happen. With time, the new dean will learn what is appropriate behavior and what is not appropriate behavior.

That is a legal issue - only the professor can grade or change grades. Even the sleaziest places I ever worked had that rule, because otherwise they would have lost their accreditation.

Is this true even in the case of a grade appeal? My understanding of the places I've worked is that in the case of a successful grade appeal, the grade would be adjusted without the instructor doing the adjusting.

Given some of what the OP has posted (email chain with the Dean), I'm wondering if this is the result of a successful grade appeal.

Well, the professor would have to be involved in the grade appeal process to defend their grade in the first place.

[Aster]

I am unaware of any institution that has not had something like this happen. Public schools do this. Private schools do this. Elite schools do this. Graduate schools do this. For-profits do this.

Yes, colleges sometimes alter student grades without the professor's consent or knowledge. Yes, it is unethical and possibly illegal. It is done for political reasons. It is done for donor/alumni support reasons. It is done for legal/liability reasons. It is done for CYA reasons. It is done for incompetent reasons. It is done for stupid reasons. Important/wealthy students tend to get this treatment. Backseat lawyer students tend to get this treatment. Relatives and friends of senior administrators/board members tend to get this treatment. Athletes get this treatment.

But the #1 Reason: Graduating students get this treatment.

Run a search on the CHE or Inside Higher Ed and you will find that secret grade changes get reported quite frequently every year. Multiply those news reports by 100x and you probably can include all of the instances where it *wasn't* reported to the media.

Heck, one of my colleagues reported that the dean changed a student's grade without his consent just this week.

But normally, the practice seems to be quite rare within an individual institution. It takes a special set of circumstances to coerce/pressure a dean to stick his neck out and alter a grade without the professor of record's direct approval or knowledge. I know many professors at many universities who have had this happen to them. But I don't think I know more than one or two professors that have ever had it happen to them more than once. Of course, if the grade was changed secretly after the term was over, it might be hard for the professor to ever even know.

[Myword]

I agree with others. Very sneaky and unethical.
Never heard this happening in community colleges or anywhere.

You will need to investigate this, nicely. Are you new there?
Have they had complaints about your grades before, and how did you handle them?
They have any cause to do this? Did any students ask you to change his or her grades?

[mahagonny]

If you have a new dean who is still feeling his/her way around and trying to be nice to everybody, then yes this can happen. With time, the new dean will learn what is appropriate behavior and what is not appropriate behavior.

That is a legal issue - only the professor can grade or change grades. Even the sleaziest places I ever worked had that rule, because otherwise they would have lost their accreditation.

Is this true even in the case of a grade appeal? My understanding of the places I've worked is that in the case of a successful grade appeal, the grade would be adjusted without the instructor doing the adjusting.

Given some of what the OP has posted (email chain with the Dean), I'm wondering if this is the result of a successful grade appeal.

Well, the professor would have to be involved in the grade appeal process to defend their grade in the first place.

I wonder about that. There are professors and then there are professors. The tenured professor has the option to reward the grade appeal or prefer to deny it for lack of grounds. The part timer has the option to calculate how much he needs the job in four months. So why even bother him? You're sparing him humiliation.
What galls me is they not only changed the grades which hamburger had already calculated (by his rubric, we would assume), but they weren't planning to tell him. He found out by accident.
My impression after having watched several cycles of accreditation: accreditation is all on board with reinforcing the supremacy of the unfortunate, threatened tenure track, which means, necessarily, denying the part time instructor of any standing to act authoritatively, should the bosses not wish him to.

[hamburger]

Senior colleague told me that changing scores without telling the professors is common in my department. I don't know if this is really true but some they ways they treat me...

[hamburger]

Senior colleague told me that changing scores without telling the professors is common in my department. I don't know if this is really true but some they ways they treat me...

I mean "...from the ways they treat me...".

[mahagonny]

Senior colleague told me that changing scores without telling the professors is common in my department. I don't know if this is really true but some they ways they treat me...

I mean "...from the ways they treat me...".

It sounds like there's no union. Is there a faculty handbook with instructions/policies about grading?

[hamburger]

Senior colleague told me that changing scores without telling the professors is common in my department. I don't know if this is really true but some they ways they treat me...

I mean "...from the ways they treat me...".

It sounds like there's no union. Is there a faculty handbook with instructions/policies about grading?

There is no faculty handbook, I asked already. I heard that the college does not like people to know about the existence of the union.