“Good” and “bad” are often not wrong. They are simply too low-resolution for the work Junior College writing asks a student to do.
The broader JC1–JC2 vocabulary system treats evaluation as a matter of criteria and degree.
Replace approval with criteria
- effective — achieves the intended result
- efficient — uses resources economically
- equitable — distributes treatment or outcomes fairly
- proportionate — no more severe than justified
- sustainable — can continue over time
- legitimate — authority or process is defensible
A policy can be effective but inequitable, efficient but fragile, popular but difficult to justify. Precision reveals the trade-off.
Build intensity ladders
Minor → material → serious → severe → catastrophic. Limited → inadequate → ineffective. Questionable → difficult to justify → indefensible. The writer should choose the rung supported by the evidence.
Calibrated language is not weak language
If the evidence justifies a severe judgement, make it. Calibration means exact strength, not automatic moderation.
A simple editing question
Whenever you write “good”, “bad”, “better”, “worse” or “serious”, ask: according to what criterion, and at what degree?
That one question converts vague opinion into evaluative reasoning.
Calibrated Judgement Lab: Make the Standard Visible
Evaluation becomes mature when the reader can see both the criterion being used and the degree of the judgement. “This policy is bad” hides both. “The policy is effective but difficult to justify on equity grounds” reveals them.
Six Common Evaluation Criteria
- Effectiveness: does it achieve the intended result?
- Efficiency: does it use resources well relative to alternatives?
- Equity: are benefits and burdens distributed fairly?
- Proportionality: is the intervention no more severe than the problem warrants?
- Sustainability: can the approach continue over time?
- Legitimacy: is the authority or process defensible?
Build Evaluation Ladders
- Effectiveness: marginally effective → moderately effective → highly effective → decisive.
- Weakness: limited → significant weakness → serious deficiency → fundamental flaw.
- Justification: plausible → defensible → compelling → necessary.
- Harm: inconvenience → material cost → serious harm → severe harm → catastrophic consequence.
The aim is not to memorise fixed ladders but to notice that evaluation words occupy different levels. Moving upward requires stronger evidence.
Multi-Criteria Judgement
Real policies often perform differently across criteria. A measure may be efficient but inequitable, resilient but expensive, popular but ineffective. Strong JC writing can hold those mixed results together and then explain which criterion should carry the greatest weight in the specific question.
Worked Example: Public Transport Pricing
A pricing policy might be effective at reducing peak demand, efficient if it uses existing capacity better, yet inequitable if low-income commuters with fixed schedules bear disproportionate costs. The final judgement should not hide that tension. It should explain whether targeted support can preserve effectiveness while reducing the equity problem.
Thresholds: When Does the Word Change?
At what point does a limitation become a serious flaw? When does inconvenience become disproportionate burden? Students should state the threshold where possible. This makes evaluation less dependent on emotion and more dependent on a visible standard.
Weighing Language
- carries greater weight because
- is outweighed by
- remains secondary to
- becomes decisive where
- deserves limited weight because
- on balance
These phrases are useful when they explain why one consideration matters more, not when they merely decorate the conclusion.
Counterfactual Judgement
Ask whether the option is good relative to realistic alternatives, not perfection. A policy can be imperfect yet preferable if the feasible alternatives are worse. “Flawed” and “unacceptable” are not synonyms.
Evaluation Drill
- Choose one policy or technology.
- Judge it separately on three criteria.
- Use a different intensity level for each criterion.
- Explain which criterion deserves priority.
- State what evidence would make you revise the judgement.
Calibrated Judgement Checkpoint
- What criterion does my adjective imply?
- Does the intensity match the evidence?
- Have I acknowledged dimensions on which the object performs differently?
- Am I comparing with a realistic alternative?
- Can I explain the threshold at which my wording would become stronger or weaker?
Calibrated judgement is the opposite of vague balance. It gives each consideration the weight it has earned and makes the final decision legible.
Continue with the full JC vocabulary framework.