A Case Study to Assess the Effectiveness of an Automated Essay Scorer, Grade Eleven, as Measured by the Scores on the 2010 New York State English Regents

The writing needs of America over the past several decades have been driven by the needs of the Industrial Revolution. Writing sophistication for assembly line workers, for example, was not a requirement or an expectation during this period. However, writing sophistication was expected of those in leadership positions. Accordingly, the American school system adopted instructional policies related to these expectations; as a result, students from the leadership class---or those perceived to be in the leadership class---were provided academic experiences different from students perceived otherwise.;As the nation became more immersed in the information age, and as economic globalization and competition became more evident, the need for more students to write well became apparent. Then, too, the need to address the present writing educational paradigms, driven by past practices and attitudes, has also become apparent.;Most people can write, even though their grasp of writing conventions may be unimpressive. Their written communications on social networks, for example, are prodigious. Their posted sentence structures are greatly abridged, yet communication of their thoughts is well understood. Nonetheless, it is reasonable to assume that many of these individuals are unable to write well. As a consequence, the formation of complex, coherent, and logical sentences---not to mention the expression of complex ideas---becomes questionable.;For students to learn to write well, schools must set aside class time for instruction, require several writing submissions by each student, annotate each writing submission, and provide reasonable feedback to the students. These requirements can be problematic within the present educational paradigms. However, they may be less problematic with the use of automated essay scorers (AESs).