Dear colleagues,
The editorial team at the Journal of Writing Assessment (JWA) is excited to announce the publication of Volume 18, Issue 2 of JWA. The issue features several regular issue articles focused on ePortfolios and fairness, and on Automated Writing Evaluation (AWE) technology. The issue also includes a symposium on labor-based grading with three manuscripts.
Volume 18, Issue 2 of JWA includes:
- Editors’ Introduction: New Editors, New Directions in Writing Assessment.
Mathew Gomes, Lizbett Tinoco, Stacy Wittstock
The editors’ introduction contains a welcome by the new journal editors, Mathew Gomes, Lizbett Tinoco, and Stacy Wittstock. The introduction remembers Les Perelman and his contributions to JWA. It also provides an overview of the two articles and symposium in the issue: Bradley Queen, Kate Kirby, Maryam Eslami, and Kameryn Denaro’s (2025) exploration of ePortfolios as instruments of fairness; Daniel Ernst’s (2025) examination of the use of automated writing evaluation (AWE) technology in writing assessment; and Megan Von Bergen’s (2025) critique of labor-based grading discussions by Kryger and Zimmerman (2020) and Carillo (2021), followed by responses from Griffin X. Zimmerman (2025) and Ellen Carillo (2025). - Exploring Fairness and Seeking Social Justice for Writing Assessment: ePortfolios, Language Difference, and Metacognition.
Brad Queen, Kate Kirby, Maryam Eslami, and Kameryn Denaro
This quantitative validation analysis applies antiracist methods to longitudinal ePortfolio assessment data to study language difference through the lens of a metacognitive literacy construct. With interdisciplinary research reshaping the field of writing assessment using quantitative and intersectional demographic approaches, this essay advances language as a meaningful register of validity evidence and an indicator of fairness across linguistically and racially heterogeneous students sorted into three cohorts that establish comparisons of ePortfolio assessment scores from samples tracking from 2016–2020. To contribute to the critical study of social justice in writing assessment, this exploratory analysis offers nuanced responses to its guiding heuristic question: Can ePortfolios be instruments of fairness in a local assessment ecology? For this formative curricular assessment, rigorous statistical methods complicate claims derived from the ePortfolio assessment results, with post-hoc power calculations and disparate impact analysis used to search for differences between language cohorts and intersectional demographics defined by race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and first generation. These quantitative methods further inferences about the ePortfolio instrument’s fairness by problematizing the use of singular demographic aggregations for underrepresented students when attempting to validate assessment constructs and engage in the ongoing study of fairness and social justice in a local writing assessment ecology. - The Effects of Automated Writing Evaluation Technology on Improving Student Writing.
Daniel Ernst
Advances in automated writing evaluation technology have shifted the aims of the tools from reliably and holistically scoring and ranking essays to providing formative and analytical feedback to users for improving writing. This study uses a quasi-experimental design to test the ability of one automated writing evaluation program to improve college student writing. Using a comparative judgment model of assessment, four college writing instructors evaluated pairs of essays with one per pair treated by the program and selected the better of each pair. The essays treated by the automated evaluation program significantly underperformed the null hypothesis of 50%. Results suggest the automated evaluation program fails to improve student writing in the eyes of instructors. Theories and implications for why are discussed.
Symposium on Labor-based Grading
- On Neurodivergence/Disability and Labor-Based Grading: A Response to Kryger and Zimmerman (2020) and Carillo (2021).
Megan Von Bergen
This essay responds to existing scholarship on neurodivergence/disability and labor-based grading, contending that current critiques define labor-based grading too narrowly and conflate the lack of quantitative grades with a lack of scaffolding. The essay further suggests that labor-based or other alternative assessment approaches, especially those which move away from authoritative, quality-based judgments of student work, invite students to express agency over and open a conversation about expectations around writing processes and habits. The article concludes by calling for additional research and conversation about how labor-based approaches may account for access and accessibility. - Troubling Definitions, Expanding Conceptions: A Response
Griffin Xander Zimmerman
Zimmerman’s “Troubling Definitions, Expanding Conceptions: A Response” contextualizes “Neurodivergence and Intersectionality,” writing that, while several years on, they might revise their definition of labor-based grading contracts today, they nevertheless stand by the claim that “neurodivergent students can be adversely impacted by any pedagogical or assessment method that seeks to assess student labor through documenting their labor, especially through time spent” (p. 2). Zimmerman reminds us that, as Von Bergen observes, their earlier article is not “a universal prohibition against LBGC or alternative assessment in general,” (pp. 2–3) and notes
similarities between their current grading practices and those Von Bergen describes. - Continuing the Conversation: A Response to Megan Von Bergen’s “On Neurodivergence/Disability and Labor-Based Grading”
Ellen C. Carillo
Carillo’s “Continuing the Conversation: A Response to Megan Von Bergen’s ‘On
Neurodivergence/Disability and Labor-Based Grading’” explains the context around the
publication of her book and how she has developed concepts of “engagement-based grading” since its publication (p. 3). Carillo also explains how a recent special issue on ungrading in Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture (2024) helps meet Von Bergen’s call for more expansive conceptions of alternative grading. Finally, Carillo underscores the importance of editorial work, reminding us that “editing constitutes serious, scholarly activity” (p. 4).
Thank you to the authors for all of their incredible work, and to the team of reviewers that contributed to this issue. We hope you enjoy the new issue!
Matt Gomes, PhD
Assistant Professor of English
Santa Clara University
Co-Editor, The Journal of Writing Assessment
pronouns: he/him