- Date: June 3-4, 2022
- Price: $50*
- Location: Online via Zoom
About
Speakers
Schedule
Pre-Conference Assignment
Past Conferences
Questions
About
What is the Grading Conference?
The Grading Conference (formerly the “Mastery Grading Conference” is a place where faculty can join together to learn about the grading practices that best support student learning, promote diversity, equity and inclusion in the classroom, and enhance student and faculty classroom experiences. Now in its third year, the purpose of the conference is to support all instructors as they strive to challenge traditional, historically inequitable grading practices that have been shown to be damaging to students and their learning.What is the goal for these conferences?
The Grading Conferences will bring together new and experienced practitioners of a variety of grading techniques (standards-based, specifications-based, etc.) to create a community of practice. We will create a space for participants to make connections with each other, to build a strong and supportive grading community that extends beyond the workshop. Participants will learn the “nuts and bolts” of various types of alternatives to traditional grading, exchange ideas with others, and begin planning their own alternatively-graded classes. New practitioners will learn the basics of different types of alternative grading, begin redesigning their own classes in a supportive atmosphere, and make contacts that will support their continued work. Experienced practitioners will discover new approaches to alternative grading, make new connections, and share their ideas and experience with the community.Speakers
Speakers
Courtney J. Sobers, PhD, started her career as a collegiate educator in 2014. She has taught at 2-year, 4-year, private, and public colleges, and universities as adjunct or full-time teaching faculty. Currently, Courtney is an Assistant Teaching Professor at Rutgers-Newark (HSI & AANAPISI) primarily responsible for the general chemistry lab sequence. Courtney has recently ventured into the world of alternative grading, starting with ungrading her Spring 2021 remote general chemistry 2 lab. Since then, she has used ungrading in organic chemistry 1 & 2 lecture. However, she still uses a mostly traditional grading in her general chemistry 1 lab course. Courtney documents her teaching innovations and academic struggles on Twitter (@DrCJSobers).
Since 2002, Clarissa Sorensen-Unruh (@RissaChem) has been a full-time Chemistry Instructor at Central New Mexico Community College (CNM) in Albuquerque, NM. She’s currently a Ph.D. candidate in Learning Sciences at the University of New Mexico, where she previously earned M.S. degrees in Organic Chemistry (2000) and Statistics (2020). Her STEM education research blends practitioner and researcher roles and focuses on assessment and evaluation, specifically ungrading, ethics in assessment, and critical quantitative methodologies. She’s written extensively about her ungrading classroom adventures, which are curated here: https://clarissasorensenunruh.com/ungrading/. She also contributed a chapter on her experiences with ungrading to Susan Blum’s Ungrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead) (2020) by West Virginia University Press. She has been invited to share her thoughts on ungrading with many groups and institutions throughout the U.S. and Canada.
Robert Talbert is a Professor of Mathematics at Grand Valley State University. He holds M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Mathematics from Vanderbilt University. In addition to teaching courses from precalculus to abstract algebra, Robert is a writer and researcher on teaching and learning issues including flipped learning and mastery grading.
Rachel Weir is Professor of Mathematics and Director of Faculty Development at Allegheny College in Meadville, PA. She has a BSc(Hons) in Mathematics from the University of Auckland and a PhD in Mathematics from the University of Michigan. Dr. Weir was inadvertently introduced to standards-based and specifications grading after avidly reading Robert Talbert’s blog posts on flipped learning and incorporating his materials into her Introduction to Proof course in 2016. She has used alternative grading methods in all of her subsequent courses and also incorporates inquiry-based learning, which she views as a natural complement to alternative grading. As a speaker and workshop facilitator, Dr. Weir has shared her excitement about alternative grading in both the US and New Zealand.
Schedule
Schedule
Note: All times listed are Eastern Daylight Time (UTC – 04:00)
Schedule note: If more than one session is listed under a single time heading, then all those sessions run simultaneously.
10:30 AM (Conference Opens):
Session 1: Introductions and Welcome (Link Opens at 10 AM)
Welcome to the Grading Conference! We’ll get you up to speed about how the conference works, and introduce our first keynote.
11:00 AM:
Session 2: Keynote Speaker
Rissa Sorensen-Unruh
Barriers to Ungrading: Intersectionality, Cognitive Bias, COVID
Do you wish you could enact ungrading in your classroom but feel constrained in doing so? Let’s discuss/identify/name the barriers we face in enacting ungrading, an emancipatory pedagogy, in our classes. We’ll also reflect on our own contexts to gain insight into/strategize/plan how we can move past these barriers, even if our movement is in tiny incremental steps. Join us.
12:00 PM:
Session 3: Kickoff Panel
We’ll start with a quick recap of the key ideas of alternative grading, including the “four pillars” framework and a description of common approaches. Then each organizer will give a short piece of advice that helps us move from high-level ideas to practical on-the-ground implementation of new grading concepts.
12:45 PM – 1:45 PM: Offline Lunch Break
Nom! Nom! Nom!
1:45 PM: Parallel Sessions
Each of these 3 parallel sessions will introduce you to one major form of alternative assessments. Pick one that you’d like to know more about!
Session 4A: What is …? Standards Based Grading
Presenters: Kate Owens & Sharona Krinsky
Session 4B: What is …? Specifications Grading
Presenters: David Clark & Robert Talbert
Session 4C: What is …? Ungrading
Presenters: Courtney Sobers & Katie Mattaini
2:30 PM: Parallel Sessions
Session 5A: CheckIt
Presenter: Steven Clontz
CheckIt is a free and open platform for authoring and sharing randomized exercises for practice and assessment. Currently authors have created publicly-available CheckIt banks for calculus, linear algebra, differential equations, statistics, and intro to proofs courses, with more to come in the future. In this session, Steven Clontz will show how to use the newest version of CheckIt (to be released in June 2022) to generate randomized printable PDF quizzes and export randomized exercise banks to your LMS without needing to install any software. (https://checkit.clontz.org/)
Session 5B: Building Buy-In & Establishing Trust (Panel Discussion)
Presenters: Jessica Kelly, Megan Mahoney, Priya Prasad, Raj Chaudhury
When you use an unusual assessment systems, students can (rightly!) be confused and suspicious. How do you help them trust that you have their best interests at heart? How can you communicate your reasons for using alternative grading, and get students on your side?
Session 5C: Managing Large Classes (Panel Discussion)
Presenters: Renee Link, Ann Radant, Elena Bray Speth, Sarah Marcus
Anyone who’s taught large classes knows that good logistics are critical to maintain instructor sanity. In this session, panelists will discuss their diverse experiences with implementing alternative grading in classes with 100+ students.
Session 5D: Introduction to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (Panel Discussion)
Presenters: Jennifer Momsen, Amanda Harsy, Jen Friberg
The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, or SoTL, is an important way that any instructor can share research about the effectiveness of alternative grading. In this session, you’ll learn more about SoTL and how to get started in it.
3:15 PM: Coffee Break/Transition Time (offline)
Don’t forget to hydrate!
3:45 PM:
Session 6: Highlight Presentation
Katie Mattaini
Inclusive Pedagogy and Alternative Assessment
This talk will focus on how alternative grading schemes can be used to build inclusive learning environments – or not! Come prepared to reflect on your practice.
4:45 PM: Coffee Break/Transition Time (offline)
Don’t forget to hydrate!
5:00 PM:
Session 7: Keynote Speaker
Rachel Weir
What’s in a Name? Grading without Labels
Over the past several years, I have used many types of non-traditional grading methods, including mastery-based testing, specifications grading, standards-based grading, and, most recently, ungrading. In this talk, I will share how reframing these methods using the umbrella term of alternative grading helped free me to make more thoughtful choices in my classes. I will illustrate this transformation by talking about the grading schemes in two of my most recent courses, a differential equations course and a sophomore seminar on writing and speaking.
6:00 PM:
Session 8: Wrap Up Day 1
7:00 PM:
Session 9: Optional Social Hangout via Zoom (Bring Your Beverage of Choice)
10:30 AM:
Session 10: Day 2 Conference Intro
11:00 AM:
Session 11: Keynote Speaker
Courtney Sobers
The Messy Reality of Alternative Grading
Deciding to use alternative grading is easy. Implementing alternative grading is overwhelming. Effective implementation requires intentional choices that respect personal, institutional, and course boundaries. I will discuss what finally pushed me to use ungrading, outline how various boundaries changed my implementations of ungrading in “impossible” courses, and hopefully leave you feeling less overwhelmed and more ready to try.
12:00 PM: Parallel Sessions
Session 12A: Q&A About… Standards Based Grading
Presenters: Kate Owens & Sharona Krinsky
Now that you’ve had more time to learn about Standards Based Grading, come ask us questions about it in this ask-me-anything session!
Session 12B: Q&A About… Specifications Grading
Presenters: David Clark & Robert Talbert
Now that you’ve had more time to learn about Specifications Grading, come ask us questions about it in this ask-me-anything session!
Session 12C: Q&A About… Ungrading
Presenters: Courtney Sobers & Katie Mattaini
Now that you’ve had more time to learn about Ungrading, come ask us questions about it in this ask-me-anything session!
Session 12D: Late Work and Equitable Policies
Presenter: Jayme Dyer
Should a student’s grade reflect their timeliness when turning in assignments, and, conversely, should late work be penalized in the grade? Whether you have a formal late work policy or not, how you deal with late work and deadline extension requests has wide-ranging impacts on student equity. In this presentation, the equity impacts of traditional late work policies will be considered, and a variety of practical, more-equitable policies will be presented that you can mix-and-match to fit your classroom needs.
12:30 PM:
Session 13: Current SoTL research
Presenters: Sharona Krinsky, Ben Fahrman Owynn Lancaster
What do we know about the effectiveness of alternative assessment practices? In this session, speakers will share brief presentations on their current and upcoming work in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning regarding alternative grading.
1:00 PM: Lunch Break/Transition Time (offline)
Nom! Nom! Nom!
2:00 PM: Parallel Sessions
Session 14A: Rethinking Assumptions
Presenters: Heather Miceli, Spencer Bagley, Rissa Sorenson-Unruh, Theresa Gaines
Many assumptions about grades are baked in to the structure of higher education. This panel will make explicit some of these assumptions, and raise the question of what could be if we no longer felt compelled to follow some of these.
Session 14B: Dealing with Data
Presenters: Nathan Fox, Debbie Gaydos, Rebecca Reck, and Jacquelyn Rische
Learn how to use alternative grading with various learning management systems (LMSs) and other tools, including Canvas, D2L, and Gradescope.
Session 14C: Managing Workload
Presenters: Kate Owens & Robert Talbert
How can instructors manage their workload and time in an alternatively assessed class? Bring your questions to this ask-me-anything session run by two veteran alternative graders!
Session 14D: Generating Reassessments
Presenters: Greg Crowther, Angela Hodgson
How can you generate multiple versions of an assessment, for students to use on reattempts? Our presenters will share how they do this in non-math classes.
2:45 PM: Parallel Sessions
Session 15A: Using Alternative Grading in Lab Classes
Presenters: Courtney Sobers, Marney Pratt, Jeff Markert
A panel discussing the use of alternative grading schemes in both traditional and CURE lab courses.
Session 15B: Blending Ideas
Presenters: Christelle Sabatier, Cara Pina, Kristina Reardon
Many alternative graders put their own twists on specs, standards-based, or ungrading. During this session, panelists will discuss how they chose components of different systems to come up with grading schemas appropriate for the goals of their own classes.
Session 15C: I Came, I Learned, I Tried, I Wish I’d Known
Presenters: Monica VanDieren, Michael Levet
Past participants in the Grading Conference will share their experiences and lessons learned when implementing alternative methods for the first time.
Session 15D: What Could Reassessments Look Like?
Presenters: Robynne Lock, Abby Noble, Josh Veazey
How do reassessments actually work in a class? Should you use revisions or new attempts? In class, office hours, or something else? Our panelists will share how they use reassessments, why they use that approach, and advice for new practitioners.
3:30 PM: Coffee Break/Transition Time (offline)
Remember to hydrate!
4:00 PM:
Session 16: Keynote Speaker
Robert Talbert
Iterations on Specifications Grading
We should never ask a student to do something that we ourselves would not be willing to do under similar circumstances. For alternative graders, this includes engaging in feedback loops: Trying things, recognizing and dealing with shortcomings, listening to feedback, and trying again. In this talk, I’ll describe my ongoing journey with alternative grading and the feedback loops I’ve used over the last several years. Starting from my early well-meaning but not-so-great attempts at specs grading, I’ll describe what happened, what I learned, and how I am attempting to improve.
5:00 PM: Coffee Break/Transition Time (offline)
Remember to hydrate!
5:15 PM: Session 17: Town Hall Q&A and Conference Wrap Up
We’ll end the conference with an extended Q&A session to help set you on your way to using alternative grading in your own classes.
Pre-Conference Assignment
Pre-Conference Assignment
Oh boy, homework! To help you get ready for the conference, we have put together this pre-conference assignment. There are several options based on your level of experience.
Please complete the items below and submit the survey by 11:59 pm (in your time zone) on Wednesday, June 1st.
Everyone: Fill out this survey (due: Wednesday, June 1 by 11:59 pm in your time zone). We will use your responses to this to better focus the conference on your interests.
Are you new to alternative assessments? Do each of these:
- Read an introduction: Read this introduction to the “four pillars” framework that we’ll use to think about alternative grading throughout the conference. Optionally, follow the links under “More details” near the bottom of the post.
- Join the alternative grading Slack workspace and say hello. This is an active and welcoming forum, with separate channels for many disciplines and topics. We’ll use it throughout the conference. First set up an account using this link, then access the workspace with this link. Go to the #introductions channel, read the pinned post, and post a quick hello message. Click “+” on the left to find other channels and join a few that look relevant to you, including #higher-ed-conference which we will use during the conference.
Have you used some form of alternative assessment at least once? Do at least one:
- Read about the “four pillars” framework (see #1 above).
- Join the alternative grading Slack workspace if you haven’t already (see #2 above).
- In the Slack #introductions channel, check out the pinned post with a list of concrete examples of alternative grading. Read one about a different system than you’ve used.
- Read the Prologue and Chapter 1 of “Grading for Equity” by Feldman. They are available for free if you enter an email address at the link.
- Read “Teaching More by Grading Less (or Differently)” by Schinske and Tanner.
Past Conferences
Questions
Registration
Registration for this year’s conference has closed, please email us with any questions. Please check the email you used to register for conference information.