College grades are supposed to differentiate the exceptional from the competent and the competent from the incompetent—yet students, employers, and even faculty struggle to connect a specific set of skills to a specific grade. Employers complain that GPA fails to differentiate once students are hired. Traditional grading is time-consuming, frustrating, and prone to inconsistencies across students. Grade inflation has become so problematic in academia that most students are no longer just above average: most are exceptional.

To motivate students, faculty tend to focus on extrinsic motivators (e.g., extra credit, dropping test scores) instead of building and relying on students' intrinsic motivation to learn. This focus matters: when grades as extrinsic rewards become the primary emphasis of education, students (and universities) can become distracted from more aspirational objectives—such as personal development, the intrinsic value of learning, and the satisfaction of developing new skills. Students in effect become conditioned to learn—not for their own personal development—but only when they receive something in return.

To address these assessment concerns, this workshop will introduce motivational tiered assessment (MTA), a new grading approach that builds on specifications grading. For grading assignments, MTA eschews partial credit in favor of simpler credit/no credit approaches. MTA also integrates opportunities for student revision and learning from mistakes. MTA reduces faculty workload, because faculty need only to assess assignments against a list of specifications—not use partial credit. And to add meaning to letter grades, each letter grade is assigned to a competency tier, which reflects specific levels of student achievement.

Workshop attendees will adapt an existing course to MTA. When completed, participants will have a revised assessment plan for their course with improved grading reliability and validity. The plan will also result in significantly less grading. In the spirit of TBL, attendees will be expected to complete pre-readings in MTA and specifications grading. The facilitator will use RAPs to activate and develop foundational understanding and application exercises to develop deeper understanding. Finally, participants will develop their own MTA grading approach for one of their classes. If time allows, some attendees will present their approach to the rest of the group, to improve understanding on how MTA can be used.

Attendees are asked to bring the syllabus for an existing course