BY DAVID MASON
In January of 2020, I decided not to grade anymore.
It wasn’t a nod to the chaos of a pandemic, which had not yet affected the United States. I had stumbled onto Jesse Stommel’s “How to Ungrade,” which pointed to a body of work on the topic. On the realness of the problem, Alfie Kohn’s summary of decades of research was particularly convincing:
- Grades tend to diminish students’ interest in whatever they’re learning.
- Grades create a preference for the easiest possible task.
- Grades tend to reduce the quality of students’ thinking.
I had to confront the possibility that my own commitment to traditional letter grading indicated that I didn’t much care what and how students learn.
On the other hand, I couldn’t ignore that students without letters in the expected places could find themselves with fewer registration options, holds on their financial aid, or other bureaucratic obstacles. I figured that, whatever I did, I would have to type grades into the computer system. Stommel’s response to this problem grabbed me by both ears, shook my head fiercely, and then slapped me: “So, I ask them to grade themselves.”
On the first day of class in 2020, the syllabi that I handed to students had no tables showing how many points were possible for each thing they might do, no sum of possible points for the semester, and no correlation of points or percentages with letter grades. I told students that first day that when the time came, they would tell me what letter grades to type into the computer.
At midterm, the time came, and rather than calculate grades, I met with each student to talk about class—what students thought was working and not, and why. Also, to talk about how I was doing. I can’t say how honest students were on this point, but I learned some things that I might not have. At least, it seemed to me that how effectively a professor teaches should matter to a student’s grade and that such things as financial burdens, family members who need care, illnesses, and pets who pass away should matter—and the person best equipped to appreciate the impact of such things is most certainly the student, not me.
Finally, I asked each student for a grade. Considering the various sheepish, skeptical, heavily qualified responses that followed, I must surmise that letter grades have formed people who feel, deep in their bones, that it is given to someone else to sort them into piles and that their valuations of themselves are immaterial.
I built a tool whereby students can anonymously tell me what they think of this not-grading. Here are some assessments from three semesters of this practice:
- “I felt like my well-being was being thoughtfully considered, and I remained motivated to complete all my work without feeling excess stress.”
- “It definitely made me feel like the goal of a more equitable power structure in the classroom was becoming closer to being realized.”
- “Thanks for allowing me to explain my situation!”
- “It’s definitely refreshing to grade each other while coming to an agreement on a grade.”
This last comment refers to the fact that I also ask students to grade me. Anonymously. Every week. I’ve hoped that by subjecting myself to letter grading, I might earn back some trust that grades surely erode. Because they do not go into an institutional file, to be used to propel or to arrest my career, these “me-grades” are institutionally trivial. However, I see these grades, each week, with short comments on my in-class performance. These evaluations are remarkably kind. But students do tell me that I’ve rambled, that I’ve shown up unprepared, or that I’ve overlooked their concerns, and I see the metric each week—a B+ or C, for example—that marks each student’s valuation of me. Those grades have inspired in me a trust in students that did not exist in my earlier career.
bell hooks is probably most responsible for the need I feel to “un-grade.” After two decades in the profession, I can’t unsee the great gap between academia and the ethical ideals it claims. I have to “professor” differently or stop professoring altogether. In Teaching to Transgress, hooks offers me something aspirational:
Progressive professors working to transform the curriculum so that it does not reflect biases or reinforce systems of domination are most often the individuals willing to take the risks that engaged pedagogy requires and to make their teaching practices a site of resistance. (21)
I need the risk of ceding grades to students. A minimal risk, for me, since my not-grading hardly resists the system. If nothing else, my disavowal of grading constitutes a resistance to my self and its inclination to reinforce the systems of domination that have been built to affirm, nurture, and protect its prerogative. To the extent that I would like to make my practice a site of resistance, I can certainly begin by making my practice resist me.
I’m convinced that abolishing letter grades would make the world a better place, but I’m not abjectly naïve. I teach small classes at a small college. My substitution of direct and substantial personal interaction with each student is not practical for everyone. But we can’t ignore the case against grades. If letter grades work against learning, if they contribute to the stratification of society, if they harm students, we have to “do different.”
Guest blogger David Mason is associate professor of theatre at Rhodes College. He is editor of the journal Ecumenica.
Interesting article David. I notice that although you don’t grade the students, you ask the students to grade you. How do you reconcile this? Could it be that you are taking into consideration the student’s recommended grade evaluation of their and your performance, and weighing all the facts and circumstances, giving your evaluation after all; or, do you always type what the student tells you what grade to type into the computer?
Also, I teach large classes (multiple sections of 80 students each) at Ohio State University, and you acknowledge that your approach is not practical for everyone. But do you have any suggestions for how one might practice avoiding grading at the level of larger classes?
My last question: Have you looked at your college’s rules to see what the faculty rules are with regard to this practice? For example, at OSU we have a rule entitled, “Academic Freedom and Responsibility.” Under the part defining academic responsibility, it states:
” Academic freedom carries with it correlative academic responsibilities. The principal elements include the responsibility of faculty to: … 4. Evaluate student and colleague performance on a scholarly basis; … .”
If a similar rule exists at another university, before suggesting this practice, I would be concerned that it could invite disciplinary action by an administrator looking to get rid of a professor who does not grade in the customary manner. But perhaps the citations you provide, and your blog post, might provide the basis for arguing that this approach is being done on a “scholarly basis.”
Thanks for the thoughtful post.
John B.
John, thanks for the response. I do enter the grades that students choose, without an added layer of figuring, on my part. Also, I do “evaluate student performance” to the extent that I return to students written evaluations of all their work. In my courses, most of this work is written work, and I edit, interrogate, and comment on student work in much the same manner that I attend to scholarship that is submitted to the journal that I edit. Certainly, the practice that I describe couldn’t be done in the case of “multiple sections of 80 students.” Indeed, I’ll confess that I don’t have a ready suggestion for that situation. Were I in that situation, I might look for some computer-driven tools by which students’ own grading of their work could be reconciled with my grading of their work—not perhaps in a straight-up average, but in some way that would account, in a substantial way, for students’ self-valuation. I’d probably also offer students the means to grade me and to evaluate my courses in an ongoing way throughout the semester. One thing that we might consider is that the conventional letter-grading system pretends to be objective and universally applicable, but the great differences between our respective teaching situations rather demands that evaluation in these cases be conducted differently.
Dave, thanks for the suggestions. Ever since I read Noah Zatz’s March 21st blog post here (link below), I’ve been thinking about the letter grading system during the pandemic in relation to the differential living conditions our students face. Here at OSU, some of our students are on campus living in dorms; others are at home; others still are in situations where they or their family members are suffering from the virus. Your post gets me thinking more broadly about it, to include the post-pandemic period, if we ever get there.
Thanks again for sharing your thoughts on this forum.
John B.
p.s. Here’s the link to Noah Zatz’s AcademeBlog post.
https://academeblog.org/2020/03/21/grading-in-a-time-of-crisis/