Information for Staff

Summary

The method improves the simplicity, consistency and reliability of assessment. We define a small set of assessment criteria. Markers award a grade , not a mark, for each criterion, and supply a comment to justify the grade. The final mark is computed by the system by mapping each grade to a mark and computing a weighted-sum of the individual criterion marks. The process of assessing reports is intended to be analogous to the process of reviewing papers for journals/conferences (but, of course, the criteria/standards are different since we're dealing with 4th-year theses).

Deliverables and Assessment

An overview of the assessment items are described below.

Thesis Part A (see Marking Criteria and Grades)

• Thesis Seminar Presentation (during Week 7) (30%): Make a 30 minute presentation about the Thesis A topic and the plan
• Thesis A Written Report (Week 12) (70%)
• Thesis Seminar Attendance Sheet (during Week 7): Students must attend 4 (four) seminar presentations of other Thesis A students. When presented, please sign the attendance sheet for the students who attended your student's presentation session. There is no mark attached to this item, but it is a requirement for passing Thesis A.

Thesis A is marked out of 10 and contributes 10% towards the final mark for Thesis Part B.

Thesis Part B

• Thesis Demonstration/Presentation (During Week 11) (20%): Make a 30 minute presentation about the final outcome of the thesis. This could be a demonstration of the system built, or a presentation of theoretical work.
• Final Thesis Report (Week 13) (80%)
• Thesis Summary/Abstract (Week 13): Along with the report, students are required to submit 150-word summary of the thesis. This summary is going to be published in the CSE Thesis Digital Archive.

Note: The final Thesis Report is often called simply "The Thesis"

The mark for Thesis Part B is determined by taking an average of the marks awarded by the supervisor and the assessor for the demo and report components. It is worth 90% of the final mark (Part A is worth 10%).

Grades

The following grades apply to all of the criteria mentioned below. The descriptions of the levels of achievment may need to be adapated for some criteria.

Thesis A Seminar

What's required to mark a Thesis A Seminar:

• attend the seminar
• assign a single overall grade for the talk
• when determining the grade, consider the technical quality and presentation.
• Thesis A seminar mark contributes 30% towards the final Thesis A mark

Thesis A Report

What's required to mark a Thesis A Report:

• read it
• assign a single overall grade
• Thesis A report mark contributes 70% towards the final Thesis A mark

Thesis A Marking Criteria

Please consider the following criteria and provide a single grade in the CSE Thesis marking system.

• Thesis A Report
  • reviewing of other work/literature review
  • articulating a research question, plan and thesis outline
  • document presentation
• Thesis A Seminar/Presentation
  • technical quality of the talk including motivation, literature survey, analysis of solutions considered, justification for choices, quality of the work-plan
  • structure of the talk, content/layout of slides, ability to communicate, clarity of description, competence in handling questions

Thesis B Demo

What's required to mark a Thesis B Demo:

• attend the demo
• assign a single overall grade
• Thesis B demo mark contributes 20% towards the final Thesis B mark
• Detailed criteria will be published soon.
• This demo mark will be used to determine the candidates for CSE Thesis Showcase.

Thesis B Report

What's required to mark a Thesis B Report:

• read it
• assign four grades and write a brief comment/justification for each criteria
• a comment can be as little as just a couple of words or a single sentence
• Thesis B report mark contributes 80% towards the final Thesis B mark
• Detailed criteria will be published soon.