CT2: Meet The Markers (Part 4)

This is the fourth and final article in our Meet The Markers Special Report

Yesterday, the school administration filed a police report upon realising that no GP tutor had been seen since the GP CT. Having completed their marking in double-quick time, the other academic staff had turned their attention to more important matters including playing ping pong and laughing at students’ scripts only to realize that their marking went unmolested by the vociferous arguments that usually emanate from that particular department. Missing person posters are expected to be up soon as students and staff maintain their vigil in hope of the return of the General Paper tutors.

After several days investigating, our reporters believe that they have found the GP examiners, still intently grading essays, in the jungles of Mongolia. Even 5 weeks after the paper, there appears to be no respite for our brave GP tutors, who have been working endlessly since the end of the paper to power through the long and convoluted essays that students have produced.

Some GP tutors appear to have developed severe asthma, citing this as a crucial factor in their move away from busy, and often hazy, Singapore. One particular tutor noted the profound irony in students beginning their essays with the saying “There’s no smoke without a fire.”

Discussing the scientific basis of such a claim with the Department of Chemistry was entirely inconclusive as Chemistry tutor Dr Shu was preoccupied with the colour of the smoke. However, her conclusions about the aromatic qualities of the paper fell flat when she declared the scripts “burnt with a sooty flame”.

We spoke to GP tutor Mr Mak Shi Tup, a marker of the Application Question in the paper. Mr Mak was entirely unsurprised to see poor responses in the paper, with some students managing only a few feeble lines on eating culture in Singapore. He found that many responses demonstrated a poor understanding of the passage, allaying fears the GP department had that someone might actually figure out what the author was saying.

Mr Mak also revealed some insights into the actual marking procedure. He told us a bit about the complex thought processes that went behind the indecipherable squiggly, wavy, straight and double lines that often litter papers. When asked about the random number generator open on his laptop however, he was quick to shoo us away.

Once again hit hard by the tragedy were our Semiconductor friends. Due to the strategic placement of the GP exam a day before their final exam, their minds were far too preoccupied with the massacre that was to come to be cognizant of the massacre they were already embroiled in.

This concludes our special report revealing what exactly markers get up to with students’ scripts. Fortunately, students and markers alike will soon get to relive the trauma of the paper come next week. On behalf of the markers we would like to remind students any whining protests about their marks is unlikely to be paid much attention to as “markers are never wrong, reality is simply frequently inaccurate”.