Name: Lucas Lim

Title: Are Computers Better Qualified than Humans to

Grade Student Essay Exams?
Author: Steven Johnson
Publication: Discover Magazine
Published: June 1st 2003

The article Are Computers Better Qualified than Humans to Grade Student Essay
Exams? is written by Steven Johnson, an American popular science author and media
theorist. This article discusses about whether computers are capable enough to grade students
on their essays. It also discusses on the advantages and disadvantages of the program made to
grade essays.
Steven explains in this article that computers have advanced to a new level to grade
exams. Machines were used to scan papers with pencil dots on them and now, the machines
can use a technique called latent semantic analysis. This technique is still being analysed by
professionals to allow machines to interact with words on a new level.
He mentions that this program has shocked some people who rely on manual work to
grade essays. This is because computers could not identify unnecessary mails in peoples
inboxes. However, he points out that the computers work differently from checking peoples
mails and it is closely related to the method humans use to grade essays. Humans use
examples of exceptional written essays to poorly written essays to determine a students
grade. The computers follows the same method. The closer the writers word use to the
example given, the higher the grade given by the computer.
The way that computers are able to do this is because of the unique function of the
software. The user first inputs information into the machine and then the software takes care
of the rest. The software first list out all the important data and gets rid of all the data that are
not needed. At the end of the software, it takes all the important words and compare them to
articles that are related to one another.
The machine does have a problem. It does not identify words that are closely related
to one another. An example would be to use the words canines and dogs in a search
engine. If either one of these words are used in a search engine, it takes one but completely
avoids the other. However, through the use of latent sematic analysis software, it is able to
relate both the words canines and dogs.
Although being able to overcome the previous problem, the software still has its
flaws. The creators of this program even admits that it lacks in certain areas only humans can
do. One of the obvious things would be creativity. An example of the softwares flaw would
be that it cannot determine the difference between the sentences World War I came before
World War II and World War II came before World War I. This actually proves that

manually grading exams are still much more useful at determining whether the essay makes
sense.
Jeff Nock, a vice president of a company that makes Intelligent Essay Assessor
mentioned that computers does have a future in grading essays. He explains that currently
two markers are used to grade an essay and if they have any disputes it is given to a third
marker. To train human graders take up a lot of time and resources and Nock believes that in
the future computers will take at least one of their places. He anticipates that computers will
be used to train students while they are young.
Having a computer to guide a student is better than having nothing at all. Computers
still does detect essays flaws that humans sometimes miss out. People grade essays by
reading a sentences from the start to the end. The software however, does not do this and
instead detects the alternation patterns in word use. Jon Kleinberg, a researcher, created a tool
that does what the latent semantic analysis does but also to detect semantic changes at a given
pattern. What this does is to catch a word that will suddenly become popular and be engraved
into the common vocabulary.
In an experiment, Kleinberg used his software on a subject that he knew nothing
about. The software does its work and detects sudden development of use. The computer then
returns data saying what time period the subject was highly being examined in.
The software developed by Kleinberg identifies words in an odd way. This allows
users to search for parts of a document that they already have knowledge about. The most
interesting application of Kleinbergs program was on the State of the Union address since
1790. Is consist of a majority of obvious words that can be easily associated with. The
program does not only flair the obvious but is also able to adapt to changes. When it reaches
around the year 1980, the program shifts to more rustic effects. A user is able to observe
Ronald Reagen renewing American political vernacular. The computer does not understand
everything is reads but it will allow users to catch on anything they may have missed in the
past.
In conclusion, this entire article not only discusses on whether computers are able to
grade essays but also about the possible advancements it could make in other areas.
Kleinberg got his idea from it and so can many others. It is truly amazing what computers
might be able to do in the future and hopefully computers will be able to help humans do
more in the future.