Slide 1

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 2

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 3

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 4

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 5

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 6

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 7

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 8

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 9

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 10

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 11

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 12

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 13

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 14

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 15

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 16

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 17

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 18

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 19

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 20

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 21

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 22

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 23

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 24

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 25

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 26

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 27

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 28

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 29

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 30

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 31

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 32

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 33

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 34

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 35

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 36

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 37

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 38

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 39

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 40

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 41

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness


Slide 42

Coaching Essay and Essay Update

Amy Tait
GAD State Competition Essay Coordinator

Major Changes in Essay
Competition
• Completely online using the USAD system
• All essay scores will be finalized before the state
competition
• Judges will have about a week to score the essays
• Sample essays will be available for judges to
practice scoring well in advance to verify accurate
scoring before the competition

Benefits
•
•
•
•
•

Easy to use
No separate forms for scoring
Easy to verify essays needing third scores
No legibility issues
Reduces/eliminates judge fatigue during
scoring
• Track accuracy in scoring and handle issues
immediately

http://USADTest.com

Each student and judge is assigned a
Username and Password

Essays are secure.

Judges will need a seven character
Activation Key to access essays

A list of available essays is
displayed, divided by prompt

Essays may be printed for easier
scoring

Essays are scored by selecting
values from two pull down screens

Scores are not recorded unless the
Save Score button is clicked

Once an essay has been scored, a judge
may review and rescore only those
essays he/she has already scored

Judges may score at their own
convenience during the scoring
period.

How Score Is Determined: Part A

How Score Is Determined: Part B

Finalizing the Score

If the scores given by the two scorers differ by 200 or more
points, then the essay will be read by a third scorer. The final
score of the essay will be the average of the two closest
scores.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Teams will choose one of these two dates to compete:
• Saturday, February 9 at 10:00 AM
• Monday, February 11 at 3:00 PM

• The entire team must write at the same time
• Students will be given the prompts on paper which will also
serve as their scratch paper. These papers must be collected
by the proctor
• In a district where two teams may compete (due to the wild
card slots, for example), both teams do not have to compete
at the same time in the same place
It is still undetermined what will be done if a student is sick or
cannot compete with the rest of the team.

Essay Competition Timeline
• Someone other than the coach must proctor
• The prompts will be different each of the dates but
two will be from the USAD and one written by the
GAD Essay Coordinator.
• Have additional computers available in case of
issues
• The timing is on the student screen
• There will be a practice session in advance

In Case of Emergency…
• If there is a problem with Saturday’s writing
session, use the Monday time slot
• If there is still a problem on Monday, we will
resort to written essays
• The proctor will have printed copies of prompts,
paper, and pens/pencils as well as an envelope to
overnight the essays to the Essay Coordinator
• These written essays will be copied and
overnighted to the judges for scoring

Alternates
If an alternate is necessary at state competition…
• Alternates will write their essays the Friday night
of competition during the General Assembly
• The same rules from the other two sessions will
apply
• Judges will be on hand to score alternate essays

Scoring Timeline
• Judges Score Essays: February 13 - 18

• Essays Needing 3rd Scores: February 19
• All scores entered and completed by
February 20

Answers to Other Questions
• There will be a 60 minute window for each competition
time.
• We will arrange a practice session a week in advance of the
competition
• Try to have extra computers available in case there is a
problem with one
• The student screen counts down the time remaining.
• At this time, students cannot change prompts without
signing out and signing back in, but USAD is working on
changing it.
• Proctors will have detailed instructions

Essay Judges Training

USAD Essay Training Materials

General Information
Participants
• High school students (grades 9-12)
• Teams of six to nine
• Teams consist of at least
– 2 “A” or “honors” students
– 2 “B” or “scholastic” students
– 2 “C” and below or “varsity” students

• Students compete within their GPA category but
all essays are scored according to the same
standard

General Information
Essay Event
• Students respond to one of three essay prompts. Either
two prompts will focus on the Super Quiz and one will
focus on the selected literature, or two prompts will focus
on the selected literature and one will focus on the Super
Quiz
• Students have 50 minutes to pre-write, plan, organize,
draft, and write a final version of their essay
• Most all of the prompts will require students to write an
expository essy. Prompts may also solicit a persuasive
essay.

Materials
• You will be given a packet of information to
refer to while reading these essays. This
packet will come from the USAD Resource
Guides and will contain only the
information necessary to accurately judge
the essay topics assigned.
• Please familiarize yourself with this
information before reading the essays.

Beware of Biases
• Please be conscious of biases when reading the
essays.
• Try to avoid letting biases cloud your judgment
• If you feel you will not be able to provide an
unbiased assessment of a particular essay, do not
score that essay. Let the Essay Coordinator know
so the essay can be assigned to another scorer.

Scoring Procedure
• Each essay will be read independently by
two scorers, and the average of these two
scores will be the student’s final essay score
• All scorers must score each essay in
accordance with the assigned rubric

Scores
80% of Final Score =

20% of Final Score =

• Focus/Scope
• Organization
• Content/Development

• Language/Style
• Conventions

When Scoring essays online, be sure to have a copy
of the essay rubric available to ensure accuracy!

The Rubric: Focus/Scope
• How thoroughly the student addresses the given
prompt
• How successful he/she is in establishing a clear
thesis or purpose
• Student should make a specific point about a
specific topic and maintain this focus throughout
the essay
• Requires judgment on the student’s range of
understanding of the given topic

The Rubric: Organization
• Assesses the manner in which the student presents
his/her ideas to the reader
• Calls for judgment on the clarity, logic, and
sequence of the ideas presented and the degree to
which these ideas are developed and sustained
within and across paragraphs using transitional
devices
• Assesses the quality of the student’s introduction
and conclusion and the effectiveness of these
paragraphs in presenting and reinforcing the
student’s main point(s).

The Rubric:
Content/Development
• Assesses the quality of the students ideas
and the degree to which they are fully
developed through facts, examples,
anecdotes, details, opinions, statistics,
reasons, and/or explanations
• Assesses the relevancy of the information
presented to the overall focus of the essay

Determining the First Score:

The Rubric: Language/Style
• Assesses the effectiveness and appropriateness of
the student’s choice, use, and arrangement of
words and sentence structures
• Use of language should serve to create an effective
and appropriate tone and a consistent and
powerful voice
• Language should communicate ideas clearly and
effectively
• Consider choice of words, range and specificity of
vocabulary, as well as sentence variety

The Rubric: Conventions
• Assesses the correctness of the grammar,
mechanics (spelling, capitalization,
punctuation), usage, and sentence
formations

Determining the Second Score:

Off-Prompt?
• An off-prompt essay is an essay that does not
address the given prompt in any manner. An essay
that attempts to address the given prompt, but does
so in a limited manner should not be considered
off-prompt, but should instead be scored harshly
for Section A: Focus/Score -- Organization -Content/Development
• Mark the “Off Prompt” box. These essays receive
a zero score.

Illegible, Insufficient, or Blank?
• Mark the “Nonscorable” box.
• The essay earns a zero score.

Anchor Paper Prompt
“The will is never free--it is always attached to an object, a
purpose. It is simply the engine in the car--it can’t steer.”
-- Joyce Cary (British author)
Discuss the perspective that any one of the psychologists,
philosophers, or religions included in this year’s Super Quiz
would have regarding the above quotation, and compare and
contrast that perspective with the viewpoint any other
psychologist, philosopher, or religion would likely have on the
matter.

Anchor Paper A
Weak
• Does not compare and contrast the view; simply compares
the view with the views of a single philosopher
• Fails to maintain consistent focus throughout
• Essay not clearly organized around a central point
• Weak introduction -- lacking emphatic thesis statement
(does not indicate what their views are)
• Conclusion lacking in substance
• Evidence is superficial, confusing, and does not provide
substantial support for student’s claim
• Lacks some control of sentence structures
• Phrasing is simplistic; vocabulary somewhat limited
• Some serious grammatical problems

Anchor Paper B
Excellent
• Impressive comparison of Skinner and Satre’s views
• Focus is consistent throughout; clearly and logically organized
• Discussion of actual quotation is somewhat minimal (not
specifically discussed in introduction)
• Conclusion restates thesis and wraps up essay
• Smooth transitions
• Substantial information on the theories for support
• Strong command of language; appropriate and varied
vocabulary
• Word choice and word order occasionally awkward
• Adept in sentence structure and mechanics
• In a couple of instances, sentences lack parallelism (rather
awkward use of participial phrases)

Anchor Paper C
Fair/Good
• Lacks focus but does discuss viewpoints
• Introduction does not mention Freud or Rousseau and main point is
unclear
• Body strays from topic and meanders into own perspectives
• Adequately organized overall with relatively smooth transitions but
organization is lacking within each paragraph
• Some pertinent information is provided by stunted by lack of focus:
needed to be more clear and concise
• Arguments weakened by excessive qualitifications and sometimes
contradictory information
• Grammar, usage, and mechanics mostly sound with a couple of errors
• Word choice adequate but awkward at times
• Natural, almost conversational style but overuses rhetorical questions,
undermining their effectiveness