Straighterline English Comp

[a2jc4life]

And in my view if its a good essay regardless of the grader you wont get any problems.

Unfortunately, this isn't true.  I'm a pretty good writer, and I had issues with my writing assignments.  Most of them weren't truly content-based; they were graders being fussy about following certain formatting that directly contradicted the instructions.

[armstrongsubero]

And in my view if its a good essay regardless of the grader you wont get any problems.

Unfortunately, this isn't true.  I'm a pretty good writer

Of course you would say that. "Self praise is no praise". Have you looked at Illusory superiority and the downing effect?

You must recognise that sometimes you may not be as good as you think you are. I see it all the time particulary in writing and programming. Some guys think that they are 'rockstar' coders but when you look at their work its sloppy.

Where I worked before I had the same problem. We needed a custom analog front end and I'm a digital guy, I know analog but not to that extent we needed. My friend introduced me to some guy claiming to be an Analog design God so I convinced the boss to hire him soley on the words of my friend and when you hear this guy talk he was sounding like the best analog engineer out there!...I dont know analog that good but I knew enough to know a few weeks down the road the guy was doing crap. All the way of his contract being terminated he insisted he was good and we dont know what we're talking about. But his design dint do what we wanted cause he simply lacked the skill.

I'm not saying you arent a good writer. I just think an A essay is an A essay. Shakespeare is a good writer regardless if who reads it. Sure one grader may give you 100 and the other 95 but at the end of the day an A essay is an A essay.

You may not agree with me and depsite having a published book (traditional publisher) I would say that my skills are okay.

A good writer wont be complaining about an online english course, they would be writing and publishing books.

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And about the foramatting thing I did the 2 courses and I felt they were spot on with the marking scheme.

[Merlin]

I haven't done SL's English Comp I, but I did English Comp II and the graders were a nightmare.  I don't mind picky grading, but they're completely unclear/inconsistent so it's a crapshoot trying to figure out what they want.  That's definitely the weak link.

If you don't use the teacher-led version of the class, you get a random Smarthinking grader.

I only recommend taking the SL English Comp courses if you pay extra for the teacher-led course. The teacher is amazing and she's very consistent with her approach and grading. Plus you can talk to her if you have a question or issue and she'll work with you.

[a2jc4life]

Actually, I am writing and publishing books. I'm also two courses away from a completed bachelors degree with a 4.0 GPA and multiple comments from instructors commending my ability to integrate ideas. None of that has anything to do with the fact that I still have to take these silly classes because that's how degree plans work, and none of my previous English classes transferred in appropriately.

But you conveniently missed the point, which was that I had grading issues with things that are *not subjective*. I got marked down for formatting my papers according to the instructions. I also, on at least one paper, lost points for grammatical errors, based on a rubric that explicitly denotes the *number* of errors found, and the grader was unable to point out any errors, nor could SL's help department find any. It really just is a matter of which grader you get. An A essay may be an A essay but if the grader is lazy and decides he's going to grade everything straight C's and bank on no one complaining, it really doesn't matter that it was an A essay.

Considering you're so quick to point out that "self praise is no praise," you're awfully quick to assume that everyone else must just not be as good a writer as you are if they had any issues with the grading.

[armstrongsubero]

@ac2jc4life Congrats on the books and the 4.0 gpa!
Any of those were transfer credits for GPA calculation? Is it a STEM degree or a Liberal Arts something?

I dint miss the point, in my experience of doing 3 classes that require instructor graded material from them (did both Eng Comp 1, Eng comp II and doing C++ right now all of which require marking from them) SL has been spot on with marking according to guudelines they set out, so I am not inclined to believe what you are saying, thus I concluded it must have been from your content based on my experience with them.

Did you read my post? I'm an okay writer. I wont say I am better than everyone. In the realm of digital design and low level programming, I would say I have an edge over most though.

Does your school require a letter grade from SL? cause if they dont, then use your decision making skills. Surely a being such as yourself with a 4.0 gpa in a difficult discipline can realize that it dosent matter if you get an A or C..all that matters is that you get the credits from ACE.

Cause the degree is only to give to HR for a pay increase, get licesure or to pass them and show the hiring manager what you are made of, they dont care if you got all A's or if you got all C's all they care about is that you get the job done.

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@ac2jc4life Congrats on the books and the 4.0 gpa!
Any of those were transfer credits for GPA calculation? Is it a STEM degree or a Liberal Arts something?

I dint miss the point, in my experience of doing 3 classes that require instructor graded material from them (did both Eng Comp 1, Eng comp II and doing C++ right now all of which require marking from them) SL has been spot on with marking according to guudelines they set out, so I am not inclined to believe what you are saying, thus I concluded it must have been from your content based on my experience with them.

Did you read my post? I'm an okay writer. I wont say I am better than everyone. In the realm of digital design and low level programming, I would say I have an edge over most though.

Does your school require a letter grade from SL? cause if they dont, then use your decision making skills. Surely a being such as yourself with a 4.0 gpa in a difficult discipline can realize that it dosent matter if you get an A or C..all that matters is that you get the credits from ACE.

Cause the degree is only to give to HR for a pay increase, get licesure or to pass them and show the hiring manager what you are made of, they dont care if you got all A's or if you got all C's all they care about is that you get the job done.

[a2jc4life]

Much of my general ed was transfer. (You can see in my sig line.) Although I have actually already TAKEN some of them (like English Comp - ) but they didn't transfer so I'm having to take them again.

I'm don't really care what grade I get on my SL classes, as long as I pass. But if someone is able to produce C-level writing, and then loses points for ridiculous things, it could make a significant difference, so people need to be aware that the grading is hit-or-miss and to pay attention to *what* is being downgraded. (You can see for yourself some of the examples of inconsistency in this thread. Joe, I think, posted screenshots, for instance, of having been told to not underline his thesis, and then when he didn't, to underline his thesis, and then when he did, to not underline his thesis.)

[cookderosa]

I don't think Rachel's writing skill matters- the complaints about SL graders are generally central to problems with the rubric or formatting, I don't think anyone here has reported problems with the *actual content of their papers, but I might have missed them.

As an example I've seen posted here many times is the thesis statement. SL's style is to have you underline your thesis statement. Easy enough, but some assignments specifically instruct you to NOT underline your thesis. There have been a handful of students (including at least one of my sons) who had points off for not underlining a thesis statement despite the instructions. Clearly, people want to do the right thing and are frustrated when SL's random grader deducts points incorrectly.

I've also heard MANY people express frustration about getting specific feedback in a draft that they change ABC to XYZ, they make corrections, but then the final grader takes off points because instead of XYZ it really should have been ABC. There are some aspects of the delivery model that are poor.

[armstrongsubero]

@cookderosa Well I guess I've been lucky thus far with SL and grading, cause I dint experince that but if you also had a similar experince then its been luck so far.

The only problem I have with SL are their precalc and calc I where the material being taught does not align with assesments.

[MNomadic]

I thought I would add something. My english/written communications requirements are already met from B&M and SDC. I took the foundations of english comp course through sophia because it was free and was a good opportunity to practice my writing. So far they have provided excellent constructive feedback and been extremely precise behind why they graded something a certain way by pointing out everything they commented on in my essay and backed it up by referring to the rubric. They had my graded essay returned to me within a day or 2 of me submitting it as well.
Unfortunately they only have english comp 1 and not 2. I would definitely recommend them for the english comp 1 course though for someone who values a quality grader who can offer consistent quality feedback.

[armstrongsubero]

I also recommend Sophia for anything. Their platform is EXCELLENT. I wish they would add more courses.