Grading is always a time-consuming and often opaque process: we spend so much time justifying a letter or percentage grade, teasing out the differences between an 89% and a 91%. Our students, too, spend so much of their time vying for the highest grade, figuring out exactly what needs to be done to get that coveted “A,” and focusing on the end product rather than the process.

Compelling research tells us that grades are actually counterintuitive to learning. The process is quite subjective: what is “quality”? What does a particular instructor “value”? Why is an “A” for one instructor a “C” for another? As Alfie Kohn shows us, grades lead to students doing the least amount of work. And importantly, the act of grading can add to already existing inequities between students – traditional grading privileges the already privileged, like white students, neurotypical students, resourced students, and students whose first language is English.  

Yet, we’re stuck with grades. So, below, find strategies for making grading more equitable for your students and (at times) less time-consuming for yourself.

  • Give substantive feedback on drafts instead of finals: this has the two-fold benefit of showing students that writing is a process and revision is a key step in that process and saving you time as the instructor. While it may seem like this wouldn’t save time, you can actually give much more honest feedback much more quickly when you aren’t concerned with tying that feedback to a letter grade.
  • Create rubrics on your LMS: particularly if used in conjunction with giving formative feedback on drafts, rubrics allow you to quickly assess a student’s work. After having given feedback on drafts, you’re already aware of what the student needed to work on, leading to a much quicker grading process for the final. Simply use the rubric to provide the grade and feedback to students.
  • Limit your assessment categories: my personal rule of thumb is to identify the top three skills a particular assignment asks students to expand upon, and these three assessment categories make up 75% of the grade (the other 25% is made up of drafting and revision, grammar and flow, and attention to directions). Limiting what you’re assessing allows for quicker grading because you’re not concerned about absolutely everything you could conceivably focus on in a final product. More importantly, it increases grading equity because you can spend a lot more time in class (online or in person) talking about and analyzing fewer categories for assessment. And as an added bonus, fewer categories makes building rubrics faster!
    • I build on assessment categories for subsequent assignments. For example, if “detail,” “structure,” and “audience awareness” are the categories for the first assignment, I still expect students to work on these categories in their subsequent assignments, and I make this expectation clear to students.
    • You can make this even more equitable by choosing the assessment categories collaboratively with your students.
  • Take cues from contract grading: contract grading replaces a focus on qualities with a focus on behaviors. For example, you’re not grading a student on how advanced their thesis creation is; you’re rewarding points for students having conducted a peer review, turned in a draft on time, incorporated your feedback, etc. The premise of contract grading is that with repeated practice, students will improve intellectually. Creating a course contract is a lengthy process, but you can incorporate small aspects of contract grading into your current grading system:
    • Allow revisions, no questions asked. This signals to students that writing is a process that is never fully complete. It also allows students to grow from their mistakes. To save time on grading revisions, I follow this process:
      • A student must wait 24 hours after receiving a grade and then contact me to let me know they want to revise.
      • Students must create a revision plan and meet with me. I okay the plan or help the student revise it.
      • Students then have a week to revise their essay.
      • Students turn in two things: the revised essay with the changes highlighted and a brief memo wherein they walk through the changes they made and why they made them. 
      • I basically just use the memo to assign a new grade.
    • Create behavior-based rubrics. Creating these with students adds to the level of equity and transparency in the grading process.
    • Adopt a portfolio system. This might mean providing no grades or tentative grades and lots of feedback, asking students to revise a set number of items and turn them in as a portfolio at the end of the semester. 
  • Take cues from ungrading: ungrading is exactly what it sounds like – you never put grades on student work. Instead, you provide formative feedback and ask students to grade themselves.
    • To start small, have students grade their own participation and attendance.
      • In the beginning of the semester, create a participation rubric with students. 
      • At the end of each unit, have students grade their own participation by filling out the rubric and writing a reflective paragraph in which they justify their grade and use concrete examples.
    • Have students grade their own low-stakes assignments, like discussion posts.
      • Provide formative feedback on students’ low stakes work and have them then assign themselves a letter grade, along with a paragraph of justification.

While these techniques won’t always make grading easier, or at least not right away, they will make your grading more equitable for students – something important all the time but especially in the midst of a crisis. With repeated practice, though, many of these techniques will also cut down on grading time. Win win!