Postdoctoral Fellowship: STEMEdIPRF: Investigating the Use of Alternative Grading Systems in Undergraduate STEM Education

Traditional grading methods can cause students anxiety, decrease their motivation to learn, and increase competitiveness among classmates in undergraduate STEM education. To address these issues, there has been increased interest in ‘alternative’ grading methods that are designed to improve students’ learning experiences. However, little is known about the impact that these practices have in college STEM classrooms.

This project aims to investigate the use and impact of alternative grading methods in college STEM courses by summarizing the current state of the literature, understanding students’ learning experiences, and investigating instructors’ teaching choices. As a result, this project has the potential to contribute to the fundamental understanding of alternative grading practices in undergraduate STEM courses.

The knowledge generated from this project could support researchers and instructors in improving undergraduate STEM education.

To better understand the current landscape of alternative grading practices in STEM, this project aims to conduct three lines of scholarly work. First the project aims to produce a scoping systematic literature review on alternative grading practices, identifying alternative grading methods used in undergraduate STEM classrooms and exploring their reported impacts on student learning.

Concurrently, the project aims to investigate students’ learning experiences and instructors’ teaching choices related to alternative grading practices through semi-structured interviews. Interview participants will be recruited from two comparable higher education institutions with one known to use traditional grading methods and the other known to use alternative grading methods.

Interview protocols will be guided by established theoretical frameworks that have previously been used to explore students’ learning experiences (Self-Efficacy theory and Self-Determination theory) and instructors’ pedagogical decision making (Teacher-Centered Systemic Reform theory). Qualitative data produced by student and instructor interviews will be analyzed through thematic analysis.

Ultimately, this project could contribute to our fundamental understanding of the impact alternative grading methods may have on undergraduate students’ STEM learning experiences and instructors’ reasoning for using a particular grading method.

This project is funded by the STEM Education Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (STEM Ed PRF) program that aims to enhance the research knowledge, skills, and practices of recent doctorates in STEM, STEM education, education, and related disciplines to advance their preparation to engage in fundamental and applied research that advances knowledge within the field.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.