Hidden Information in a Thesis Evaluation Rubric: A Civil Engineering case study

Abstract

The objective of this article is to analyze the information provided by the rubric for evaluating a thesis for a Civil Engineering degree. For this, it selected forty-one thesis reports from 2018-2022 on the Civil Engineering career at the Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja (Ecuador). Surprisingly, the hidden information in the rubric was a bias from the thesis committee and the student's sex. The academic tool also showed limitations in its evaluation criteria, so it must be restructured or recreated. Administrative situations must be modified because is affecting the principle of the rubric. The procedure used can serve as a reference to evaluate other rubrics in similar areas of knowledge. This study shows the biases that can occur in the thesis evaluation tools and are still in use today.