Teaching English in Korea - ESL blog

Bad grades

I've just finished marking two of my six classes today. I've already gotten my first complaint (a double complaint via email and text message).

The student has a reason to complain (just not to me). His girlfriend received similar marks but she got a B+ while he got a C+. Why?

My response (via email since I don't know how to text message): There's only one reason: the grading curve. As you know I have to add up students' points and rank them. There were only 5 points separating you and XXXX and only two more points would have put you in the B+ range. Naturally I would like to raise your grade, but I can not do this unless the university drops the curve for our class.