Tester, tested

The handwriting is so pale that at first I can't even tell whether I'm holding the paper right-side-up. I turn it this way and that until the pale scribbles resolve into words, but what words? "Btbse aaaoos ththm" is not a language with which I am familiar. I squint and stare, move closer to the light, and wonder: what kind of grade can I give for an essay I can't read?

I suppose it's my fault for making my students write this essay out longhand. Sometimes I allow students to compose their essay exams on laptop computers, but this is a different kind of exam, requiring them to write about a poem we have not discussed in class. I want to see what sort of literary analysis they can do on their own, without the aid of outside resources, and I sincerely do not wish to read a dozen bad paraphrases of an online summary of the poem, so in this case computers are out of the question.

Most of the essays in front of me are legible if a bit sloppy, and only one features print so small I may need that magnifying glass. And then there is the pale paper, written in light-blue ink that barely touches the page except where words and phrases are scribbled out. I spent a good five minutes puzzling over the first sentence, but the essay covers two full pages of legal-pad paper. How much time do I devote to a paper I can barely read? Maybe those illegible scribbles camouflage brilliant literary insights, but how would I know? I'm not interested in grading handwriting, but how do I grade what I can't read?

Frankly, I'd rather grade a whole pile of exams than try to decipher this one illegible essay, but somehow I'll find a way to read it. I've set some pretty challenging tasks for my students, but rarely do they give me quite so difficult a test! (If I pass the test, where do I go for my gold star?)