Hello from Hamilton Ontario! I am delighted to be attending the 2026 STLHE Conference, presenting a workshop with my SoTL Canada Writing Group (SCWG) collaborators: Dave Carlgren, Alyssa Counsell, Sobia Ekram, Sue Hampton, Alvina Mardhani-Bayne, and Shawn Xiong. Thank you to all my wonderful collaborators for journeying together on this project, and thank you for your interest in our work!
Our session is titled “Exploring lived experiences of grades and grading through a reflective community of practice“; see the abstract below for more information.
- Handout: STLHE Workshop Handout TOPRINT
- Slides: STLHE Workshop Slides TO POST
- Update June 18: Thank you to everyone who joined our session! Your engagement was delightfully energizing as we move forward with this research. As promised, here are your notes:
Abstract
Grades. What does that word conjure for you? Perhaps measurement, aspiration, transcripts, fairness, disdain, currency, and/or something else entirely. Regardless of our role(s) in higher education, we share the experience of having received grades, and many also assign grades to students. As a 2025 SoTL Canada Writing Group, we have conducted a phenomenological investigation of our own lived experiences of grades through storytelling, interviews, and dialogue. Complementing historical (Brookhart et al., 2016), policy-based (Rawn et al., in press), and other approaches to studying grades, we have engaged our identities and life histories to better understand our own relationships to grades. Structured, iterative reflection has led to valuable personal and professional insights, as we continue working to answer our research question: What are your lived experiences of grades, and how has that changed over time?
Our methodological approach (see Kensington-Miller et al., 2021; Webb & Welsh, 2019) has led us to consider ourselves a community of practice, as we share a common interest (grades), and interact to further our understanding of that topic (Wenger et al., 2002). We wish to share this approach to inspire others into productive, collaborative SoTL communities. In this workshop, we invite everyone to examine and make meaning from their own experiences with grades, which may inform their approaches, research, and advocacy.
Participants will be invited to (1) reflect on their own lived experiences of grades from two perspectives (e.g., student and educator); and (2) engage with others’ lived experiences of grades. Participants will be encouraged to reflect through multiple modes: writing, artistic/imagery expression, and discussion with other participants. We hope participants will gain a deeper understanding of how current experiences of grades may relate to earlier life experiences, ideas for future practices in grading and community building, and connections to others interested in grading.
Please feel free to contact us for more details!