To Grade or Not To Grade? Demystifying a Centuries-Old Debate

Abstract For decades, reformers, practitioners, and researchers have discussed the advantages and disadvantages of teacher-assigned grades. Advocates of grades frequently highlight their importance for selection and prognostic purposes and express concerns that abolishing grades could lead to substantial declines in performance standards. Opponents of grades often emphasize the limited information grades provide to help improve learning and raise concerns that assigning grades may undermine student motivation and well-being. They argue that grades must be eliminated to cultivate classroom cultures that prioritize and nurture learning processes. Despite the long-standing sociopolitical nature of this debate, no review has summarized its most prominent theoretical foundations. Moreover, there is little evidence from studies that have examined the effects of abolishing grades under natural school conditions. Therefore, we first present a review outlining the key theoretical positions and empirical findings. Second, we report results from a unique elementary school field trial in which grades were abolished in participating schools. Our analysis draws on rich longitudinal data from 1,218 students in 35 trial schools and 1,124 students in 40 control schools. To provide a comprehensive assessment, we examined a wide range of outcomes: performance in reading and mathematics, subject-specific self-concepts and interests, performance anxiety, joy of learning, well-being, and perceived classroom climate. Aside from math interest, we found no statistically significant differences between students in trial schools and those in control schools by the end of Grade 3, after accounting for baseline differences. Implications for the debate on the advantages and disadvantages of grades are discussed.