hen in 1968 Ellis Page and Dieter Paulus published The Analysis of Essays by Computer, they saw a promising future for programs that could evaluate both the aesthetic traits of essays and their substantive content (191). Now, more than thirty years later, the future that Page and Paulus envisaged seems to have arrived: computer power has increased exponentially, textand content-analysis programs have become more plausible as replacements for human readers, and our administrators are now the targets of heavy marketing from companies that offer to read and evaluate student writing quickly and cheaply. E-rater, developed by Educational Testing Service (ETS), is today used as one reader for evaluating the essay portion of the Graduate Management Admissions Test-a human is still the other reader. Intellimetric, developed by Vantage Technologies, is used for evaluating writing in a range of applications, K through college. WritePlacer Plus, developed by Vantage for the College Board, is being marketed as a cheap and reliable placement instrument. The Intelligent Essay Assessor, developed by Landauer, Laham, and Foltz at the University of Colorado, is now being marketed through their company, Knowledge Analysis Technologies, to evaluate essay exams for college courses across disciplines. The firms that are marketing the machine scoring of student writing all explicitly or implicitly define the task of reading, evaluating, and responding to student writing not as a complex, demanding, and rewarding aspect of our teaching, but as a burden that should be lifted from our shoulders. The current scene in American postsecondary

Begins with a quick history of the English profession’s response to the prospect/specter of the computer as reader of student writing. Describes two programs that are now being heavily marketed and publicized nationally. Sketches out some of the implications of these programs for members of the profession of English in America.

Preview this article: Review: English and Emerging Technologies, Page 1 of 1 < Previous page | Next page > /docserver/preview/fulltext/ce/60/2/collegeenglish3680-1.gif

Preface Introduction: Writing a History of Computers and Composition Studies 1979-1982: The Professions Early Experience with Modern Technology 1983-1985: Growth and Enthusiasm 1986-1988: Emerging Research, Theory, and Professionalism 1989-1991: Coming of Age: The Rise of Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives and a Consideration of Difference 1992-1994: Looking Forward Afterword Author Index Subject Index

Preview this article: Comment & Response, Page 1 of 1 < Previous page | Next page > /docserver/preview/fulltext/ce/56/7/collegeenglish9203-1.gif

Recent Surveys indicate that writing-in-the-disciplines programs have been established or projected by more than one-third of the colleges and universities in the United States. The fourteen essays in this volume chart the history of this interdisciplinary development in both the United States and Great Britain and examine the wide range of forms that writing-in-the-disciplines programs have taken in American higher education. The collection outlines the social, intellectual, and political forces that have shaped the movement; presents perspectives on the programs from disciplines outside English studies; describes the relations among writing, reaching, and learning; and considers the future of the movement.This work is perhaps the only book-length treatment of the subject to explore the historical roots before turning to the practitioners (a number of whom helped invent the field).... Recommended. Choice

Preview this article: ELECtronic Mail and the Writing Instructor, Page 1 of 1 < Previous page | Next page > /docserver/preview/fulltext/ce/55/6/collegeenglish9284-1.gif

Preview this article: Review: Computers and English: What Do We Make of Each Other?, Page 1 of 1 < Previous page | Next page > /docserver/preview/fulltext/ce/54/2/collegeenglish9408-1.gif

John Paul Russo. I. A. Richards: His Life and Work. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989. 843 pages. Robert J. Connors, ed., Selected Essays of Edward P. J. Corbett. Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press, 1989. xxii + 359. W. Ross Winterowd, The Culture and Politics of Literacy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989. 226 pages. Booth, Wayne C. The Company We Keep: An Ethics of Fiction. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. xii + 557 pages. Chris Anderson, ed., Literary Nonfiction: Theory, Criticism, Pedagogy. Carbondale and Edwardsville, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press, pp. xxvi + 337, 1989.