What is Ungrading? What is Collaborative Grading?
Getting our terms straight in 2025
Happy new year! After a somewhat rocky 2024, I’m ready to get on with 2025. Especially since this is the year I’ll finish the first complete draft of my book on collaborative grading (***fingers crossed***). The book is tentatively titled Collaborative Grading: A Practical Guide.
The title of the book raises the question: what exactly is “collaborative grading”? And how is it related to the practice of “ungrading” that we hear so much about?
The answer to that last question is…complicated. But in the interest of starting the year off with some clarity, I’ll attempt to answer it here. (Fair warning: this post will be pretty in the weeds. If you’re here for ungrading inspiration and emotional support, feel free to skip this one.)
According to the folks at Grading for Growth, “ungrading,” as it’s commonly used, has at least three definitions. It might refer to…
A range of alternative grading practices, as Susan Blum suggests, that fit under the “ungrading umbrella.”
A general philosophical orientation that, as Jesse Stommel suggests, involves “raising an eyebrow at grades as a systemic practice.”
A specific model of alternative grading, as Robert Talbert suggests, in which students receive feedback, but no grades, on assignments, submit a final portfolio of their work in the course, and determine their final course grade in consultation with their instructor.
To be honest: I’m not super interested in the debate over terms here except insofar as it’s causing confusion. And it does seem to be causing some confusion. It’s not uncommon for me to see people getting their wires crossed about this, first on Twitter, now on Bluesky, and occasionally even in spaces like The Grading Conference. Unfortunately, the confusion presents some difficulty for me, since I’m writing a book about #3 above, a specific model of alternative grading. I have to make a decision about what to call that model: “ungrading” or something else.
I’ve settled on something else—and that something is “collaborative grading,” a term I’ve taken from practitioners like Lindsay Masland and Jayme Dyer (and perhaps others) who independently coined it.
I believe the first published use of “collaborative grading,” at least in reference to the specific model of alternative grading I’m talking about, was in Lindsay’s piece “Ungrading: The Joys of Doing Everything Wrong.” For Lindsay, “ungrading” is “a philosophy of assessment that seeks to decenter grades (i.e., letters or numbers) in the learning process.” One practice Lindsay uses that reflects this philosophy is “collaborative grading,” in which she “never place[s] a grade on any single piece of student work” and “collaborate[s] with each of [her] students to determine a reasonable course grade for their entire body of work.”
My working definition of “collaborative grading” is similar. This is what I’ve come up with:
“I define collaborative grading as a system in which students and instructors determine grades for a given course in consultation with one another, usually through a process that combines extensive instructor feedback with regular student self-assessment and opportunities for students to continuously enhance their understanding through revisions, retakes, or resubmissions. Instructors who grade collaboratively offer feedback on student work throughout the semester but typically refrain from assigning points or letter grades to that work. Students then use the feedback, along with their own assessments of their work, to continue improving their assignments. Students and instructors determine final course grades through a holistic look at individual students’ performance over the course of the semester, usually by reviewing a portfolio or other collection of student work. Based on that work or other evidence of learning, students propose a final course grade for themselves, often (though not always) in conjunction with an individual conference between student and instructor. Some instructors exert more control in the process of settling on a final grade than others, but the key is that students have the opportunity to offer input in the assessment and grading process.”
I think this captures the way most people practice collaborative grading while also leaving some flexibility, since every course and every instructor is different. But I welcome feedback on the definition from those of you who employ the methods described above.
Why call this practice “collaborative grading”? Well, given the confusion about “ungrading,” it’s probably more clear. I like that it specifies what the practice is or does rather than what it’s not. It also avoids the common misconception that “ungrading” is “not grading.” Unfortunately, I still have to grade, at least at some point; I’m just going about it in a different way. Additionally, I like that the term suggests that grading is something instructors do with students rather than something the instructor does to them. Altogether, it seems like a more apt name for the practice I’m trying to describe.
The fact that I’m using the term “collaborative grading,” however, doesn’t mean I want to get rid of “ungrading.” There is a lot of debate about the usefulness of the term, some of which Jesse addresses in his piece “Do We Need the Word ‘Ungrading’?” I have seen some suggest that we should abandon the term lest people think we want to get rid of grades entirely.
Let me be clear: I do want to get rid of grades entirely. If I had my way, I would never have to assign a final grade again. So, if that’s the connotation of the word, I’m not bothered, personally.
But we’re still left with the problem of what, exactly, “ungrading” is. Does it correspond to definition 1 or 2 above? Or is it something else?
Unfortunately, that is, as they say, “outside the scope of my project.” But I will say this: I think “collaborative grading” fits within just about every definition of “ungrading” that there is. Significantly, it’s both a specific model (one of many) that lives within the realm of alternative grading and a way of “raising our eyebrows at grades as a systemic practice.”
So, whatever term you use, I hope we can all keep pushing the boundaries of (un)grading in 2025. Cheers to another year of learning!
This is very helpful!
So, I'm currently trying to figure out how to push against traditional grading in my online courses. I find that a bit more difficult than my onsite courses. But I want to experiment with it soon, to figure it out.
I appreciate your distinction between ungrading and collaborative grading, Emily. If "ungrading" is a useful term at all, I believe it's only as an umbrella term. But, I think "alternative grading systems" does an even better job of playing the umbrella role. At least "collaborative grading" is helpful in distinguishing it from other forms of alternative grading.
Your definition of collaborative grading is helpful. Because of the entanglement between grading and assessment, I feel it would be stronger if you said more about the "work" students complete. I suspect you elaborate elsewhere, but the type of work students do is as important as what you do with it as a grader. In other words, an instructor could give misaligned, opaque, backward-looking, unscaffolded, etc, assignments and still meet your definition of collaborative grading. Maybe this is OK in your conception. I'm suggesting that some of the philosophical underpinnings about ungrading that Strommel argues could be helpful here. As you know, all grading systems are much more than assigning assignment-level or course-level grades.