I pity your undergraduates. They should find a better school.
No, it just means I use a better one.
Exactly what point are you trying to make, clifyt? You began with sweeping generalizations about the nature of undergrad vs grad courses. I pointed out that your generalizations were false, but rather than either acknowledge your error or provide evidence in support of your assertion, instead you seem to have changed the subject, so that now you appear to be making an argument about whether multiple choice questions are a valid form of assessment. (And in part contradicted yourself by doing so: first you assert that all undergrad courses are taught in broad strokes and superficial black/white false dichotomies and are just about knowledge retention, but then you claim that you yourself point out exceptions and encourage critical thinking in such courses.) But the validity of MC wasn’t the point of the conversation: the topic was your assertions about the universal use of MC in graduate courses and the superficial nature of undergraduate courses.
Not all undergraduate courses are as superficial as you claim. Mere knowledge isn’t understanding; nor is it the ability to apply that knowledge to solve new problems, to analyze and assess information, to or generate new ideas; any decent undergraduate program will foster all those abilities in its students. Multiple choice questions and exams are one possible assessment method, but they aren’t suitable to assess all learning outcomes in all disciplines.
