A survey of Roman history or a general education Classics course can enroll a few hundred students, and a short essay on Pliny's letters becomes a serious grading project. Professors and teaching assistants must read dozens of papers each, often on a tight timeline and across multiple discussion sections. The stakes are real, because first-year students are forming impressions about what college writing demands. Consistent and informative grading is one of the most useful things a course can offer them.

The main risk in a large course is variation among graders. Two TAs reading the same essay may land on different scores because they weigh the thesis, evidence, and style differently. Students notice, and complaints about unfair grading often follow. A shared rubric helps, but only if graders interpret it the same way, which requires deliberate calibration before the stack is distributed.

Design the assignment to make grading more reliable. A narrowly focused prompt about a specific feature of Pliny's account, such as how he portrays his own role in the evacuation, produces papers that are easier to compare than an open prompt about the eruption in general. Clear word limits also help, since they prevent the longest papers from receiving inflated marks simply because they contain more material.

Run a Calibration Session Before Grading

Calibration is the single most effective tool for consistent grading in a multi-grader course. Choose five or six papers that represent a range of quality, have every grader score them independently, and then discuss the differences. The conversation often reveals that graders interpreted the same descriptor differently, and the group can agree on a shared reading. Keep notes on these decisions to guide future terms.

• Select sample papers that illustrate each score band
• Have graders score independently before any discussion
• Compare scores and identify rubric rows where disagreement was largest
• Agree on written clarifications for ambiguous descriptors
• Spot-check a sample of graded papers midway through the grading period

Provide Feedback That Scales

Detailed individual comments on every paper are not realistic at this scale, so aim for high-impact feedback. A short summary at the end of each paper, tied to two or three rubric rows, is usually more useful than scattered marginal notes. Pair this with class-wide feedback addressing patterns you noticed, such as the common tendency to retell the story of the eruption instead of analyzing the author's choices.

Comment banks can speed up the process while keeping the quality high. A TA who writes a strong explanation of how to integrate quotations once can reuse and adapt it for every student who struggles with the same issue. The key is to personalize at least one sentence in each comment so the student feels read, which makes the feedback more likely to be acted on.

Manage Academic Integrity in the Era of AI

Short essays on a well-known text are especially vulnerable to automated writing assistance, and professors increasingly need a clear policy. State what is allowed, such as brainstorming or grammar checks, and what is not, such as generating the argument or analysis. Pair the policy with assignments that require engagement with specific passages and personal interpretive choices that are harder to outsource.

Process-based components can also reduce risk and improve learning. Asking for a short proposal, an annotated passage, or a revision memo gives you a window into the student's thinking and makes it harder to submit work that does not reflect their own understanding. These steps add to the grading load, but a lightweight check on each one is manageable and pays off in the quality of final papers.

Use Technology to Reduce the Load

Many instructors in large courses now rely on AI-supported grading to generate initial rubric-aligned comments, which graders then review and edit. This does not remove the need for human judgment, but it can reduce the time spent on repetitive observations such as missing thesis statements or unexplained quotations. Faster turnaround means students receive feedback while the material is still fresh in their minds.

Whatever tools you adopt, evaluate them against your own standards before using them at scale. Run a pilot on a small set of papers, compare results with your human scores, and adjust prompts or rubrics as needed. A careful rollout builds confidence among graders and ensures that the technology serves the course rather than shaping it in unintended ways.