Open Pedagogy: Ungrading, Pt. 2

Last semester, we met to discuss ungrading! This is part two of a series of Open Pedagogy workshops the OpenLab Community Team is developing to address inequity in assessment and anti-racist pedagogies. For this event, we’ll be joined by co-authors of a recent article from the Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy titled “Resisting Surveillance, Practicing/Imagining the End of Grading” to hear about practical strategies for implementing ungrading into classroom settings. 

From the co-authors:

Our article suggests that grading systems in higher education settings are part of a larger network of surveillance technologies that students and faculty are subjected to and/or enact, reflective of schooling’s place in a “carceral continuum” (Shedd) premised on anti-Blackness and colonialism. We do not believe that grading is something that can be made more fair, just, or anti-racist. To resist surveillance in higher education is to embrace the end of grading. After an overview of these contexts and assertions, we offer a series of reflections, tracing juxtaposing moments where we individually or collectively taught, learned, and/or organized outside/against grading systems.

Questions for discussion:

• Traditional models of education treat instructor and student as adversarial. Instructors often replicate harmful authoritarian structures by embracing institutional surveillance practices and assumptions, including that students are cheating and must be observed at all times, adopting the role of disciplinarian by reporting student misbehavior to the institution. How do we shift this culture of authoritarianism so common in educators?
• Last time we talked about different motivations for learning; what new perspectives do we have on this from discussing ungrading with these scholars?How can we adjust our focus to the intrinsic versus extrinsic values of teaching and learning? 
• Why are we talking about ungrading as the OpenLab team? What does this have to do with open digital pedagogy?

Readings:

Resisting Surveillance, Practicing/Imagining the End of Grading by Marianne Madoré, Anna Zeemont, Joaly Burgos, Jane Guskin, Hailey Lam, and Andréa Stella