UC San Diego Professor Automatically Gives All Students an 'A' To Decolonize Her Classroom

“What’s up y’all? Dr. Puritty here, and I’m going to talk to you a bit about how to decolonize a classroom and how I decolonize my teaching. So first things first, we do not grade over here, OK? Anyone who takes my class automatically gets an A. They’re told in the first week that they’re going to get an A, the only thing that’s required is attendance. And I have weeks of excused absences built-in so that if people are sick, or they have family obligations, it won’t affect their grade. So since I’m not grading them, I’m just giving them As, like how do I know that they’re doing anything, and how do I know that they’re learning anything? And so, I also don’t give homework — (Laughter) — surprise, surprise. And I run a discussion-style classroom so my students and I have equal part when it comes to bringing information to the table. We all sit together and share what we’re talking about. And they get to use their critical thinking skills to apply the things they’ve learned in all their other classes.”