Julia McKenna, a senior at the University of Notre Dame, used to stress out over grades. Then she took four “ungraded” courses.
“The real world isn’t graded. Grades don’t take into account your work ethic, challenging semesters, mental health or growth,” Ms. McKenna told The Washington Times.
The 21-year-old sociology major supports a growing trend in higher education of evaluative feedback from professors rather than A through F grades, especially for first-year undergraduate and graduate students.
Advocates of the method, also called “ungrading” or “alternative assessment,” blame letter grades for making freshmen anxious, perpetuating racism against minority students and increasing dropout rates.
Others say the push to end grading, which has exploded since the COVID-19 pandemic shuttered campuses in March 2020, reflects colleges’ desperation to stop losing students.
“College enrollments are falling and schools have enormous expenses that cannot be reduced in the short run, so they are having what in retail is called a ‘first sale,’” said Robert Weissberg, a retired University of Illinois political scientist and specialist on pedagogy. “Instead of 75% off, they are saying, ‘Come to our school, have fun and don’t worry about grades.’ Next, there will be a ‘going-out-of-business sale’ with diplomas sold for ‘only a dollar’ each.”
Some mental health specialists warn that eliminating grading systems could reinforce students’ beliefs that they aren’t strong enough to handle traditional academic standards, even though their parents did not have to endure the increased anxiety, depression and other emotional struggles caused by pandemic lockdowns.
The specialists also note that ending letter grades won’t stop young people from comparing themselves with others on social media.
Stress can “optimize performance” and is not harmful mentally or physically at tolerable levels, said Dr. John V. Campo, a pediatric psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center.
“There is a risk of setting the bar too low and selling young people short,” Dr. Campo said. “It strikes me as a bit misguided to target grades and academic stress as the primary source of any perceived increase in reported emotional distress in youth and young adults, as the challenges have been long-standing across generations.”
Although most colleges require letter grades at the end of each semester, three methods of “ungrading” all coursework have become popular among professors:
- Contract- or labor-based grading in some first-year writing courses. As long as students finish the work, they can agree on final grades.
- Standards-based or specifications grading in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) classes. Professors determine which concepts or skills students need and give assessments on learning.
- Portfolio or conference-based collaboration in various subjects. Professors encourage feedback and reflection and determine the semester grade in discussion with each student based on the body of work.
‘Ungrading’
Susan D. Blum, a Notre Dame anthropologist who uses the third method, hasn’t given a letter grade on a paper in seven years.
She said she overrides two final grades out of an average of 50 to 60 students each semester. One grade ends up higher than a student wants, one ends up lower and the other students get the semester grades they say they deserve.
“They’re honest with me. They’re not all A’s,” Ms. Blum said in an interview. “It is not easier; it’s just better. When you introduce high tension, it makes people freeze and they can’t do things they otherwise do.”
Ms. Blum stopped assigning grades after watching how people learned crafts, sports, music and hobbies outside the classroom. She compared those observations with her experience with students who ignored her feedback when she added letter grades to assignments.
In 2020, she published a book about her findings titled “Ungrading.” Since then, she said, she has participated in more than 70 talks, podcasts, book discussions and presentations about the topic — up from 15 talks from 2017 to 2020.
Her book says nine institutions were entirely grade free for four-year undergraduate students in 2019: Hampshire College, Evergreen State College, Deep Springs College, New College of Florida, Alverno College, Fairhaven College of Interdisciplinary Studies at Western Washington University, Prescott College, Antioch University and Goddard College.
Three others — Sarah Lawrence College, Reed College and Brown University — offered options for alternative assessments, and 96 medical schools gave only “pass/fail” grades in pre-clinical science courses during the first two years.
First-generation and international applicants have offset enrollment declines over the past three years, and activists say those students struggle the most with letter grades.
Schools should prioritize students’ mental health over academic competition, said Dr. Panagis Galiatsatos, a physician and associate professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
“We would never ask an athlete to compete if they had an injury, and the same goes for mental health,” said Dr. Galiatsatos, who serves as health equity lead in the school’s office of diversity, inclusion and health equity.
Fragile students
Medical schools and law schools did not always assign grades. Many decades ago, students taught themselves and either passed or failed standardized examinations.
Schools once judged excellence in subjects such as rhetoric and mathematics based on the ability to impress others in public debates, lectures and oral examinations at the end of the courses of study.
Mount Holyoke College became the first campus in the U.S. to assign letter grades as a measurement of student progress as more adults sought degrees in the late 1800s. That system became standardized nationwide in the 20th century.
“Grades are the simplest and most convenient way for teachers to tell students how much of a subject they have successfully learned,” said Peter Wood, president of the conservative National Association of Scholars and a former associate provost at Boston University. “Without grades, students have to rely on their own guesses and on the teachers’ verbal assurances, which inevitably reflect personal sensitivities.”
Colleges began experimenting with alternatives to widespread grading in the late 1960s.
Since the start of the pandemic, more academic officials have met to discuss ways to eliminate letter grades in response to heightened student stress.
In March, the University of California Board of Regents’ academic and student affairs committee reviewed a report that said traditional grading methods could perpetuate bias against some racial and linguistic minorities. It encouraged schools to explore alternative grading.
Online ungrading forums have attracted professors from Texas Christian University, Florida Gulf Coast University, Grand Valley State University, the University of New Hampshire, the University of South Alabama, Colorado College and several community colleges.
Professors at Prince George’s Community College in Maryland, just outside the nation’s capital, say they are using labor-based and specification-based grading and other nontraditional methods. The majority-Black school hosted a panel discussion on ungrading at a staff meeting last year and now offers alternative assessments in some English classes.
“Overall, I find removing grades is a way to significantly reduce the stress associated with school,” said Keith W. Mathias, an English instructor at the college. “Giving students the space to prioritize their physical and mental health allows them to focus on their learning.”
Other academics say killing grades is a temporary fix and could leave students unprepared for real-world stress.
“As a college professor for over 30 years, I can certainly see the downside of traditional grading among today’s youth, who are much more fragile when it comes to anxiety, depression and other mental-health-related issues,” said clinical psychologist Thomas Plante, a professor at Santa Clara University.
Mr. Plante, a member of the American Psychological Association, said online classes during the pandemic inspired him to implement a contract-based system in which he gives A’s to students who complete a list of tasks on schedule.
Among the disadvantages, he said, students work less, learn less and do not challenge themselves when they need to be building resilience and solid coping skills for the real world.
“This includes facing your fears and anxiety in a thoughtful way,” Mr. Plante said. “We do the opposite when we allow students to avoid anything that stresses them.”
Some conservatives say colleges’ coddling has created a generation of “snowflakes” raised on participation trophies. They say the problem with “everyone gets an A” is that it tells students nothing about their strengths and weaknesses.
“Grades, like democracy, are the worst system of academic evaluation, except for all the others,” said Wilfred McClay, a historian at Hillsdale College in Michigan. “Without grades, students have only the vaguest idea of how they are doing.”
• Sean Salai can be reached at ssalai@washingtontimes.com.
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