The author doesn't exactly describe her method but says "No, I answered, because I really won’t have put a grade on it." Which makes me think she's not putting

The author doesn't exactly describe her method but says "No, I answered, because I really won’t have put a grade on it." Which makes me think she's not putting numbers on things - she has, in other words, thrown out her stopwatch. Getting faster or writing better papers are both good results. Importantly, you can only know them if you are taking objective measurements. If you aren't, you will struggle to know if your methods and changes are improvements or degradations. Fittingly, the article suffers from the same relativistic malaise the author inflicts on her students. The article doesn't explain objectively why not grading is good. Instead, it's subjective feelings, preferences, and beliefs. Maybe this is a good change, I doubt it, but we haven't seen any evidence in this article.