Given over 20 years of schools attempting to implement standards-based grading (SBG), Lee Ann Jung’s 2024 release, Assessing Students Not Standards, offers a refreshing alternative. Is it part of a post-SBG era? Maybe. There are a lot of SBG concepts that are universally good, and the message is clear from researchers and teachers: let’s keep those. But there’s more. We can rebuild SBG. We have the experience. We can make SBG better than it was. Better, stronger, faster.

Another message is getting clearer, too, and seems right at home with the ungrading movement. Jung states “we need to grade better, but we also need to grade less. A lot less” (p. 20). This is aligned with my own research on exploring 1) ways to reduce summative grading, and 2) find formative grading alternatives (i.e., so they remain formative). So, let’s get into some stuff in the book…