The Story of Grades, with Luke Green

Dave and Bonni have got a short announcement for you regarding a new Teaching in Higher Ed website coming in the next day or two and wanted to give you a heads up on a couple of potential impacts.

For resources, recommendations and more information about this episode’s host and guest(s), visit the episode 636 page on the Teaching in Higher Ed website.

For resources, recommendations and more information about this episode’s host and guest(s), visit the episode 635 page on the Teaching in Higher Ed website.

For resources, recommendations and more information about this episode’s host and guest(s), visit the episode 634 page on the Teaching in Higher Ed website.

Beth Cougler Blom on how teaching and facilitation skills are built in life’s ordinary moments — noticing, saying hello first, and staying curious. [divwrap class=”one-half first”] Quotes from the episode When you love what you do, you see it everywhere. -Beth Cougler Blom I’m here in Canada, and I’m on the West Coast, and there’s so many people learning here all the time about how to be living and working in a diverse community. -Beth Cougler Blom If we hone our noticing skills, then we can notice what’s going on with ourselves when we’re teaching. -Beth Cougler Blom When I make a mistake, often, I’ll tell the group, because that’s how we all learn too. -Beth Cougler Blom [/divwrap][divwrap class=”one-half”] Resources Everyday Acts of Facilitation, by Beth Cougler Blom Design to Engage, by Beth Cougler Blom Facilitating on Purpose Podcast BCB Learning Inc. Scarlett Johansson Has a Trick for Answering Questions (Dorie Clark) How Librarians Find Their Next Read (Instagram) ClassPass Jazzercise Your Brain on Art, by Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross [/divwrap]

Bethany Morrison shares civic professionalism and how disciplinary identity shapes civic discourse on episode 632 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast. [divwrap class=”one-half first”] Quotes from the episode Democracy needs to be born every generation. We can’t just assume it… Every generation, we have to kind of rebirth it, and it has to happen in our schools. -Bethany Morrison One of the principles that we often recommend is setting some community discussion guidelines, talking together as a classroom community about how we want things to go when those hot moments come up later. -Bethany Morrison Not saying anything has meaning too. So if you don’t say anything, you are making a decision, and students are going to read that to mean it was okay. -Bethany Morrison [/divwrap][divwrap class=”one-half”] Resources Promoting Democracy, Fostering Skills (Bethany Morrison, CRLT Substack) Selecting Classroom Activities for Promoting Democracy (Bethany Morrison, CRLT Substack) Promoting Democracy Teaching Series (Ginsberg Center) How My Profession Influences Policy: Assignment Guide and Instructions A Framework for Planning and Facilitating High-Stakes Discussions Making the Most of “Hot Moments” in the Classroom (CRLT Handout) Talking Maize & Blue (University of Michigan) Center for Research on Learning and Teaching (CRLT) Ginsberg Center for Community and Civic Engagement Dignity: Its Essential Role in Resolving Conflict, by Donna Hicks UMICH Votes AllSides Finch [/divwrap]

Jeff Kim shares how faculty can use video in our teaching and make it sustainable on episode 631 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast. [divwrap class=”one-half first”] Quotes from the episode You raise what you praise. So through these vlogs, you’ll see me not complaining, but actually praising a lot. -Jeff Kim Sometimes people can feel a little bit wary about being on social media; they know that the way that I’m going to produce the video is going to be in such a way that’s uplifting. -Jeff Kim A vision that I have for my channel is helping students to find out what they’re good at so that they can do good with it. -Jeff Kim [/divwrap][divwrap class=”one-half”] Resources Dr. Jeffrey Kim, Irvine Unified School District Board of Education The EdFamily YouTube Channel E222: How to create YOUR YouTube Video in 5 Easy Steps EdFamily with Dr. Jeff Playlist: Cambridge Virtual Academy (CVA) EdFamily with Dr. Jeff Playlist: Education for Love and Wisdom Book EdFamily with Dr. Jeff Playlist: Understanding the Roots of Saigu EdFamily with Dr. Jeff Playlist: BTS — Behind the Scenes on the School Board Mendez Freedom Trail Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, April 14, 2026 (Sylvia Mendez Day) E427: Seoul Station to Busan, Korea by KTX Train (Day 8) — Jeff’s Most Viewed Video Cambridge Virtual Academy, Anaheim Union High School District Korean American Studies Course at Anaheim Union High School District (EdSource) Mendez Freedom Trail Brings Landmark Desegregation Case to Life for OC Students (OCDE Newsroom) Mendez Tribute Monument Park and Freedom Trail (City of Westminster) Sylvia Mendez (Britannica Biography) Mendez v. Westminster: The Final Ruling, 75 Years Later (OCDE Newsroom) OCDE (Orange County Department of Education) Education for Love and Wisdom: Effective Teachers for Challenging Times, by Jeff Hittenberger, Pamela Tupy Scott, Andrew Ntzouras, Renee Rose, Alexander Lin, Jeffrey Kim, Joanne Van Boxtel, Megan Chaney, Rebecca Spady, Glen Warren, Christine Hittenberger-Corbin, Seon Chun-Burbank Education for Love and Wisdom Podcast Love, Wisdom, and Human Flourishing in Education, with Jeff Hittenberger (Teaching in Higher Ed Episode 541) Vanguard University School of Education California State University, Fullerton — College of Education Faith and Community Empowerment (FACE) Asian Pacific Islander School Board Members Association (APISBMA) Think Media on YouTube Alan Levine — CogDogBlog Civic Access Pouch 2L (Evergoods) POD Conference Fumbling and Evergoods Access Pouch (YouTube) Poll Everywhere [/divwrap]

Anna Mills shares Peer and AI Review and Reflection, plus a layered approach to writing feedback on episode 630 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast. [divwrap class=”one-half first”] Quotes from the episode My sense of the value of feedback has not changed. It’s more important than ever, more meaningful than ever, when we do have that connection through words. -Anna Mills I think overall I’ve advocated for more sort of technical support for transparency about what is AI and what is not. -Anna Mills Students preferred both the peer and the AI feedback. They did not want one or the other. -Anna Mills AI companies should be designing so that their agents don’t go in and say, “I’m a student taking a quiz.” -Anna Mills [/divwrap][divwrap class=”one-half”] Resources Poll Everywhere AXL 2026 Keynote with Alex Vasquez Statement on Educational Technologies and AI Agents, Modern Language Association Peer & AI Review + Reflection (PAIRR), UC Davis Writing Program Contradictory Feedback Chatbot on PlayLab Anna Mills on Amazon vs. Perplexity and Distinguishing Agentic AI Bots from Humans (LinkedIn) Anna Mills on Judge Orders Perplexity to Stop AI Agents (LinkedIn) More Than Words: How to Think About Writing in the Age of AI by John Warner Jellyboard Bad Ideas about AI and Writing: Generative Practices for Teaching, Learning, and Communication MyEssayFeedback.ai AI and College Writing: An Orientation [/divwrap]

Luke Green uses the Santa Claus story to rethink what grades measure and the case for ungrading on episode 629 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast. [divwrap class=”one-half first”] Quotes from the episode Each student at some point throughout their academic career is going to receive a grade, receive some sort of an assessment that is going to fundamentally alter how they feel about the classroom. -Luke Green The narrative that we sell to our kids is that these gifts are earned. The metric is, those who are good children or better children, you receive more. -Luke Green What are grades, and what purpose do we want them to serve? -Luke Green Usually, it’s a proxy of understanding a student’s overall experience. And GPA is even worse, because you’re putting all of your course grades into a meat grinder and spitting out one number. -Luke Green [/divwrap][divwrap class=”one-half”] Resources Luke Green, St. Cloud Technical & Community College Luke Green Recognized at MinnState Board Awards Grading for Growth, by David Clark and Robert Talbert Unmaking the Grade, by Emily Pitts Donahoe Learning About Grades from an Emerging Failure, with Emily Pitts Donahoe and Hannah Stachowiak Campbell’s Law Hood Politics with Prop There Really Is a Santa Claus, by Glenn P. Crone [/divwrap]

Remi Kalir shares the Fair Feedback Project for addressing bias in student evaluations on episode 628 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast. [divwrap class=”one-half first”] Quotes from the episode If you actually have students write about affirming values as a kind of open free write before they complete an evaluation of teaching, it actually has been shown to mitigate bias. -Remi Kalir There are many people who are experiencing the effects of these structural patterns of bias who don’t look like me. So what can I do? How can I show up as an individual in this? -Remi Kalir I did not want people coming to the Fair Feedback project and then having long-winded, tangential, potentially problematic conversations with Claude as a chatbot. -Remi Kalir You can call it my complicity, you can call it my complexity, whatever you might call it, but I am very much entangled in this AI moment, trying to understand how I am navigating all of this. -Remi Kalir [/divwrap][divwrap class=”one-half”] Resources The Fair Feedback Project Remi Kalir at the Duke Center for Teaching and Learning Remi Kalir — remi(x)learning Claude’s Remi Record The Research on Course Evaluations, with Betsy Barre (Teaching in Higher Ed) The Potential Impact of Stereotype Threat, with Robin Paige (Teaching in Higher Ed Episode 79) How Better Teaching Can Make College More Equitable, with David Gooblar (Teaching in Higher Ed Episode 599) Claude M. Steele, Stanford Department of Psychology Whistling Vivaldi: How Stereotypes Affect Us and What We Can Do, by Claude M. Steele Ludmila Praslova, PhD — Vanguard University The Canary Code: A Guide to Neurodiversity, Dignity, and Intersectional Belonging at Work, by Ludmila N. Praslova Teaching: Is There a Fix to the Teaching-Evaluation Problem? by Beth McMurtrie (The Chronicle of Higher Education) A Practical Guide to Modern Teaching Evaluation, by Michael McCreary (Engaged Learning Collective) Transforming College Teaching Evaluation: A Framework for Advancing Instructional Excellence, by Ann E. Austin, Noah D. Finkelstein, Andrea Follmer Greenhoot, Doug Ward, and Gabriela Cornejo Weaver Rebecca Fordon — AI Law Librarians Aria Chernik, JD, PhD — Duke Learning Innovation & Lifetime Education Claude Code Cowork by Claude Bartz v. Anthropic — Anthropic Copyright Settlement Anthropic Settles With Authors in First-of-Its-Kind AI Copyright Lawsuit (NPR) My Tech Disclaimer, by Doug Belshaw My 2026 Tech Stack, by Bonni Stachowiak (Teaching in Higher Ed) The Data Fix with Dr. Mél Hogan (podcast) Poll Everywhere [/divwrap]