Giving Up the Grade by David Noble
Structure of argument
Main idea: Noble strongly supports the idea of not grading students at institutions of higher learning. 1) Grading serves the teacher rather than students and merely transfers teachers’ anxieties of their own abilities to questioning students’ abilities. 2) Grading serves the purpose of classifying students into potential employees/workers of different abilities, which should not be the responsibility of higher learning institutions. 3) Students would be learning and be truly educated. Without anxiety or fear of a backlash from grades, intellectual excitement becomes the focus in education. 4) Time is better utilized for learning, as time is not wasted on discussing evaluation. 5) Students need not worry about what the teacher wants, but rather can concentrate on their own thoughts and enriching their own knowledge. Students take themselves and their thoughts seriously, increasing self confidence and self respect. 6) Students do not need to compete among themselves, and hence self-worth is not measured according to the curve but according to their own learning.

Evaluation
In support of the author’s position: 1) Grades can prevent ‘real’ learning, as students can just regurgitate what the teacher wants without truly comprehending or critically thinking through. Noble notes that ‘the elimination of grades at a stroke shifts academic attention from evaluation to education, where it belongs’. Hence, education can return to a focus on continual intellectual investigation, rather than focus on an end point (grade and employment). Students may then be encouraged to learn beyond the prescribed set of notes or textbooks, and hence may read beyond the syllabus. [Singapore as example? Changes in school syllabuses]

2) Grading can lead to unhealthy competition, and education should be about