2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Consistency Matters: Practical Grading Tips for Large Undergraduate Labs

Presented at Assessment, Grading, and Feedback Innovation

Practical considerations of teaching large, undergraduate lab courses often call for the use of instructional teams that work under the supervision of a course director to teach, grade, and otherwise support the success of a class and its students. Grading and feedback are frequently challenging to align within an instructional team of diverse backgrounds. Much of the grading in undergraduate lab courses includes evaluating subjective answers and student writing, a challenging but important skill. Many teaching assistants and new instructors have little experience providing feedback and grades for these types of assessments. This also leads to unique challenges in providing consistent feedback and grades between instructors in the same course.
Our community of engineering lab and design course instructors has found that challenges with consistent and timely grading are a recurring theme in both formal and informal conversations. Both new and experienced course directors bring different challenges forward and exchange ideas for how to address those challenges. Questions that have come up include how to ensure that grading is consistent across sections, how to provide timely feedback, and how to train teaching assistants. We received feedback from students on these courses about inconsistencies in grades, application of course policies, and related support.
In this tips and tricks paper, we will summarize knowledge gained from these discussions so that others may benefit from our community’s work. We will focus on rubrics, team grading calibration activities, grading tools, and alternative grading methods. Each of these areas has had a positive impact on the consistency and timeliness of grading and feedback in our courses. We observed that adopting new tools and practices opens the door for collaborative learning and continuous improvement within instructional teams.

Authors

Dr. Christopher D. Schmitz http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9673-9832 University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

Christopher D. Schmitz received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois in 2002.
Dr. Jessica R TerBush http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8438-7411 University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

Jessica received her B.S.E, M.S.E., and PhD in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. After graduation, she worked as a post-doc for approximately three years at Monash University in Clayton, Victoria, Australia. She then spent three years working as a Senior Research Specialist at the Missouri University of Science and Technology in Rolla, Missouri, where she trained users on the focused ion beam (FIB), scanning electron microscope (SEM), and transmission electron microscope (TEM). In 2016, she moved to the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, to serve as a lecturer in the department of Materials Science and Engineering. Here, she is responsible for teaching the junior labs as well as providing instruction on writing in engineering.
Katherine Ansell http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5823-9506 University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

Katie Ansell is a Teaching Assistant Professor of Physics at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her teaching and research activities focus on the practical and social aspects of the classroom that contribute to the development of student expertise in Introductory Physics Laboratories.
Elaine C. Schulte University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

Elaine C. Schulte is the Assistant Director of Undergraduate Programs for the Department of Physics and Senoir Lecturer at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her teaching interests include formalized problem-solving technique in non-major introductory physics courses and encouraging open-ended exploration in introductory physics laboratory. She also develops and manages graduate TA training and professional developent activities.
David Mussulman University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

IT professional newly transitioned to teaching faculty. Engineering and Information Sciences.
Chandrasekhar Radhakrishnan University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign
Siva Nalla http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3691-8038 University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

Siva Nalla is a Graduate Student Teaching Assistant in Bioengineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), where he assists with courses in Quantitative Physiology and Cell and Tissue Engineering. He earned his B.S. in Materials Science and Engineering at UIUC, M.S. in Teaching Chemistry at UIUC, and is currently a final year Ph.D. candidate in Bioengineering at UIUC. His master’s thesis focused on inquiry based learning in general chemistry courses. Prior to his Ph.D. program, he has 12 years of lead TA instruction experience in General Chemistry and Biomaterials Engineering courses at UIUC. He also developed and instructed a Science and Engineering Physics course at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology for a Center for Talented Youth summer program from 2011-2019.
Prof. Caroline Cvetkovic http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3035-7313 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign [biography]

Caroline Cvetkovic is a Teaching Assistant Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where she instructs courses in quantitative physiology, neural engineering, biofabrication, and heat transfer. She earned her B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in Bioengineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She then completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the Center for Neuroregeneration and Department of Neurosurgery at the Houston Methodist Research Institute.
Dr. Rebecca Marie Reck http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5894-4130 University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

Rebecca M. Reck is a Teaching Associate Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Her research includes alternative grading, entrepreneurial mindset, instructional laboratories, and equity-focused teaching. She teaches biomedical instrumentation, signal processing, and control systems. She earned a Ph.D. in Systems Engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Iowa State University, and a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology.

Note

The full paper will be available to logged in and registered conference attendees once the conference starts on June 21, 2026, and to all visitors after the conference ends on June 24, 2026

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