Alternative approaches to grading have recently increased in popularity. Alternative grading schemes offer greater flexibility and customization than traditional methods, which made them particularly appealing to instructors as a response to the challenges of teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic. In general, alternative grading schemes prioritize transparency, a growth/progress orientation to learning, alignment between learning objectives and assessment practices, increased communication between instructors and students, and reduced power imbalances between the same. Despite these similarities, alternative grading schemes differ in the details. This resource summarizes a few alternatives to traditional grading processes and compares/contrasts the specifics of each approach.

It seems smarter to focus on the overall ideas that unify these different approaches. So this week, rather than introduce another kind of grading practice, we’re going to pull back to a higher altitude and try to distill what all these ideas have in common and come up with a general framework for these practices. Not a “definition” of anything — there’s still too many idiosyncrasies and varied practices to hope for something that’s both precise and general — but instead a map, with room for interpretation, that stakes out some of the common ground that we seem to be walking together.