Weird Tutor
I’m in a drawing/art elective at USYD and recently received 57/100 for an assessment worth 35%.
What confuses me is not simply the mark, but the feedback provided with it.
The written feedback was essentially: “missing some of the drawings”the presentation would have been better with “additional outside of class work”
“less text in the images”“no piano”“more engagement with experimentation”
There were no annotations or comments anywhere on the submitted presentation, and I wasn’t told which specific drawings were supposedly missing, what additional work was expected, or what aspects of my experimentation were insufficient.
The “no piano” comment particularly confused me because the piano image was just a visual element used in the presentation, not one of my assessed drawings. I also can’t work out which published assessment criterion this relates to.
What makes the “missing drawings” comment more confusing is that for Week 1 I originally intended to include all of my work, but the tutor told me there were too many pieces and instructed me to select only one. I followed that instruction.
The assessment instructions themselves say that feedback should always be “respectful, specific and helpful.” I’m struggling to see how comments like “no piano” or “missing some of the drawings” are specific or actionable enough for me to understand how to improve.
I’m not expecting a high mark just because I put effort into the assessment, and I’m completely open to criticism of the work. My issue is that with a mark of 57, I would expect to be able to understand why 43 marks were lost and how that relates to the published criteria.
I’ve contacted the Unit Coordinator to ask for clarification/review rather than arguing with the tutor directly.
For anyone who has taken art/drawing electives at USYD: is this level of feedback normal for a mark in the 50s? And if you’ve had a similar experience, did you raise it with the UC?
Posted Sep 30, 2026, 3:36 AM UTC