Rereading the preface to this book was a little depressing. The first time I read it over three years ago, I had highlighted “but should we, assuming an end to the lockdown, just go back to business as usual? What if the usual is problematic?” (p. xxii). At the time, I was experiencing “business as usual” despite a glimmer of hope between spring 2020 and 2021 when it looked like grading practices were going to shift in a massive way. They did not.

The “Why?”
Blum’s book includes about 15 chapters, each by a different author Like all the classroom assessment and grading books I’ve reread, Blum’s intro includes a section on why this work must be done. I was reminded of this when rereading “little has been published in print or peer-reviewed formats” (p. 2). That is, ungrading/going gradless is still very much a grass roots movement, despite the evidence against grades. What’s missing is evidence to support alternatives. I hope that the next phase of my research provides some empirical support for the best practices being written about by practicing teachers, authors, and teacher trainers. There’s definitely something here.

Other chapters also begin with their “why?” sections, so you’ll get a lot of reinforcement when reading through, especially with a focus on equity. That word is increasingly becoming unpopular these days, which is all the reason to keep it front and center until the winds change and systems are recognized by the majority of people for creating very real barriers for different kinds of learners.

Self-Assessment & Portfolios
As far as I can tell, ungrading/going gradeless doesn’t work without self-grading, which is the result of self-assessment (or self-reflection). This is true for Stommel, whose chapter gets into nuts and bolts of enacting an ungraded/gradeless system. Sackstein’s chapter also touches upon this, as well as using portfolios to support self-assessments, and ultimately self-grading. Reflections and portfolios were also described by Schultz-Bergin.

Relationships & Redesigning Assessments
Blackwelder’s chapter has some juicy quotes, like “my relationships with students were dependent on the accumulation of points in my gradebook” (p. 45 ), and “assigning grades was the easy way out of doing the actual work of teaching” (p. 50). Like most educators who interrogate their grading, things for Blackwelder quickly moved towards redesigning assessments. This was reiterated by Blum’s next chapter.

Grades > Feedback
Arthur Chiaravalli’s chapter reiterates results from Ruth Butler’s work (1988; 1989) that appeared in previous chapters. In short, “something about the letter grade causes learning to stop” (p. 83). Other researchers have found the same thing, and it’s worth the reminder. Chiaravalli also writes about using a 0% weighted category, which I was a big fan of for a long time. I’ve since learned that in most gradebooks you can select a grading category that isn’t even listed in the weighting, making this subversive move even less-conspicuous. Laura Gibbs wrote about a similar idea, saying, “so if you’ve ever asked why students don’t read or use your feedback, try not giving grades and see what happens” (p. 96).

There are plenty more gems to be found in this book, but I don’t want to unearth them all. Needless to say, upon reading this book you should have a solid understanding of ungrading/going gradeless.