From our ivory towers: Enacting our collective daily resistance through ungrading in a feminist co-mentoring group

Grading has been central to schooling of all levels. Aligned with many critical educators, we argue that conventional grading systems in higher education contexts perpetuate a transactional relationship between student and professor and student and university. In this collaborative self-study, we, three pre-­tenured teacher educators at the same midsize, midwestern university, formed a feminist co-mentoring group and explored ungrading in our own teacher preparation classrooms. Through narrative inquiry, our data uncovered themes of (1) traditional grading practices limit; (2) renewed resolve in ungrading despite obstacles; (3) ungrading as an act of resistance.