Tell us about your course.
I teach BIO 312 – Writing in Biology (Junior Year Writing), an in-person class with 25 students. Class meetings consist of small-group activities, mini-lectures, independent work, and one-on-one conferences.
What specific practices do you use to ensure students are engaged in your classes?
Ungrading:
- I don’t grade. Instead, I provide extensive feedback on all rough and final drafts.
- Students reflect on feedback, their progress, and aspects of their writing that they want to focus on.
- I still have deadlines.
- The class create a self-evaluation rubric. We revisit and revise this rubric throughout the semester.
- Final grades are proposed by students, with supporting evidence from coursework.
- At the end of the semester, I meet and discuss final grades with each student.
- I reserve the right to change a grade (up or down), but only after discussing this with the student.
A variety of equity-minded writing projects:
- Nature is Queer – Natural History Posters
- Racism & Antiracism in Biology paper and presentations
- General Audience Articles
- Introductory Biology Chapters
How do you know when your practices are working?
I know it’s working based on student feedback. Plus, I’ve observed that groupwork is less stressful for students when grades are removed. Usually, three-quarters of the way through the semester I question whether ungrading is worth it, but then students share how this process helped them grow as writers and learners. For example:
- “I felt like I put more time and effort into it since I wasn’t focused on letter grades.”
- “Having no grades made me read feedback.”
- “Since I don’t like writing the ungrading made it less bad.”
