Absurdity in our rules? To what extent should unorthodox assessment practices, such as ‘ungrading’, disrupt quality assurance practices in higher education?

Ungrading involves adopting a critical view on the purpose and value of assessment practices and working to shift the focus away from the awarding of grades to practices that instead focus more on feedback and activities that support learning. These practices are often deemed to be unorthodox and in tension with the policies and practices in place within our institutions intended to safeguard academic standards and quality. As ungrading is an emerging practice, the research base is currently limited; however, this paper draws upon the literature on student self-assessment to challenge the notion that summative assessment should always be marked by an academic ‘expert’. This paper advocates for greater practice which helps students to learn, and importantly to recognise and value that learning, even if it disrupts the status quo within the UK. However, given that any challenge should be evidence-led, the paper calls for more research studies to be conducted on ungrading practices.