A partial return to letter grades in elementary school and a discussion of revising how grades are issued in middle school and high school will form part of today's Wake County school board discussion.
As noted in today's article, staff will present to the board a number of changes they want to make in a draft R&P on grading policies. It would go along with revisions they want the board to make to the grading policy.
The secondary school changes would mirror efforts begun in 2001 at elementary schools to separate out what could be considered classroom behavior from the academic grades. But the changes may be going too far for some parents and board members.
Among the changes in the R&P:
* Changing the way middle school and high school grades are awarded to record academic and behavioral grades separately. Report cards would now have a separate behavioral grading section.
* Reducing how much homework can be counted for the academic grade – from 15 percent to 10 percent per marking period – in grades 6-12.
* "Homework for practice" can't be included in the academic grade. But "homework for evaluation" can be used.
* Prohibiting K-12 teachers from handing out extra credit.
* Requiring teachers to allow students to have up to five days to hand in late assignments with the penalty capped at 10 percent.
* Requiring that higher scores on retests replace the original exam grades.
* Restoring the use of A-F letter grades on report cards in grades 3-5.
All but the restoration of letter grades in grades 3-5 were recommended by staff. Spearheaded by board member Deborah Prickett, the board asked staff to go back to letter grades for upper elementary grades. She cited how Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools use traditional letter grades, a level system and a separate behavioral grading system for grades 3-5.
There appears to be broad board support for using letter grades in elementary schools. But the level of support for the other changes isn't as certain.
School board chairman Ron Margiotta said he and other board members are hearing from a lot of parents who don't want the changes to be made to middle school and high school grading practices. They're concerned about the message that would be sent about work habits.
"Parents believe you should be held accountable for your actions,” Margiotta said. “If you handed in your assignments late or mouthed off to your employer, there would be consequences.”
But staff says that the grades should reflect mastery of material and not these other factors. They also say that the changes will ensure that grades are awarded consistently.
Click here for a handout the board received in July.
Click here for the proposed policy revision and R&P that the board will get today. There are still a lot of unanswered questions about the R&P, which is vague about what it considers to be classroom behavior.
Could it mean something like what the various middle schools have been piloting?
For instance, Zebulon Middle went to a A, B, C and I grading system. An I, or incomplete, is a 76 and below. Students who get an I will keep redoing the test or assignment until they can get a 77 or higher.
"Grading practices we will simply not allow any student to 'fail' a class," according to Zebulon Middle's website.
Or will it look more like what's done at Lufkin Road Middle. For instance, students who are caught cheating the first time don't get a zero. Instead, they're allowed to take an alternative assignment where they can get a score as high as 80.
Comments
I am not sure this subject
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 18:52 — user12345I am not sure this subject will improve the poor performance of our schools. Only 13% of the schools made progress under Ron leadership. Whether teachers give grades or not does not seem like the turn around idea our schools need at this time. This is like the all consuming keeping kids in the neighborhood and havie them link arms to walk to school is the magic bullet bone head idea.
Window Dressing
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:30 — Solon77In the 2009 elections the GOP focused on "graduation rates" so the answer - lower the standards. Let the trouble makers stay in school and disrupt the rest of the class and as an added bonus - take an extra 5 days for homework with a minor penalty and take as many retests as you need. So much for instilling personal responsibility.
This is more the work of the
Wed, 08/03/2011 - 00:27 — DrActualFactualThis is more the work of the appointed one-Keith Sutton. He is the one with the Justice Center ties. He is the one pushing to lower the suspension rates and make school as easy as possible to graduate as many as possible. Prison pipeline reforms etc.
Excessive juggling for our teachers?
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 18:29 — paulastamDiscussion about, and even reform of, certain aspects of WCPSS' grading policies may be necessary. However, Prickett needs to be cognizant of the fact that WCPSS teachers already have full loads which have been made heavier with the GOP board majority's removal of the Blue Diamond instructional/assessment tool recently. I would suspect that our teachers, and their administrators, are scrambling to come up with a proxy formative assessment system to monitor student progress and adjust instruction to continue to support student achievement. In addition, our teachers have to prepare for the transition to the common core standards. I fear that abruptly forcing new grading practices on our teachers (and kids!) may further exhaust the overloaded teachers and support staff. Perhaps implementation of any resolution could be delayed....
Paula, "Independent, Fair & Speaking Up for MY Kids."
EVERYONE, teachers, students
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 18:52 — woodstockEVERYONE, teachers, students and administrators alike are happy not to have to deal with Blue Diamond anymore. And no one is "scrambling" since Wake was one of only 2-3 districts that even used Blue Diamond, so there are plenty of examples from other systems available... so don't worry your little head about that.
As for grading, teachers -- and especially parents -- will welcome the return of a standard, common sense grading scale with open arms. It won't be a "burden"at all, it will be a relief.
Exactly WCPSS was the flagship system!
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 19:27 — paulastamWoodstock, WCPSS was ahead of the game using Blue Diamond and you should keep in mind that historically the district has outperformed the rest of the state in most areas. Your claim that Wake was just 1-3 possible NC users of the instructional/assessment tool is a prime example of WCPSS leading the way as usual. However, we seem to take backward steps most the time with the current GOP led board: Ronnie M initially withdrawing WCPSS from NC School Boards Association; his hiring a General from the controversial DC school district to run our local schools without any public or teacher input; taking us to the brink of losing high school accreditation; his refusal to aggressively lobby for more funding for WCPSS from county commissioners while severe cuts were being implemented; and his recently tossing out Blue Diamond - a tool to improve student achievement. Those are just a few of the prime examples of Ronnie M taking us backwards!
By the way, your claim that EVERYONE disliked Blue Diamond reveals a degree of profound ignorance on your part when it comes to curriculum and instruction in WCPSS schools. I hate that I have to be so snarky, but your widesweeping and dismissive comment really was over the top so I have to address it as such!
Finally, I am glad that as a self-declared teacher representative, this evening, you are happy to share that you are very confident that teachers having to adjust to another grading change will be a breeze for them. I'm sure our overworked teachers will have been put at ease by your supreme confidence (ignorance?). Have a good evening Woodie!
Paula, "Independent, Fair & Speaking Up for MY Kids."
For what its worth, I
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:37 — jeffrey1For what its worth, I tutored a 7th grader earlier this evening that just started back to school (Track 4). His math teacher gave him an assessment today to see how well prepared the class was for pre-algebra. When I mentioned Blue Diamond, he said that they would not be using it, but the teacher was already using a suitable replacement.
Good teachers find a way!
Really Jeffery1?
Wed, 08/03/2011 - 20:04 — paulastam"Jeff", I'm curious, what is the "suitable replacement" they have brought in to replace the widely used and relied on Blue Diamond instructional/assessment tool?
Paula, "Independent, Fair & Speaking Up for MY Kids."
I don't know, Remember, I'm
Wed, 08/03/2011 - 21:35 — jeffrey1I don't know, Remember, I'm talking to the student.
He took an assessment test, which helped the teacher tailor her lessons to the class. I know you really want to be able to scream "The sky is falling," with the loss of Blue Diamond. And you probably would not mind teachers failing miserably without BD. Sorry to disappoint you, Paula, but our teachers seem to be adapting just fine.
Leading the way?
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 20:51 — Bob_SconceWith a tool that obviously hasn't been kept up to date and hasn't seen any significant market penetration (total of 4 other school districts) since it was introduced a decade ago ? At one point, my parents were ahead of the game when they bought a Betamax. They still have it, but they're hardly leading the way with it.
The district could commission a replacement, and OWN IT for under the cost of licensing Blue Diamond for a single year.
It is customary
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:16 — Solon77Sound leadership is when you want to replace something the due diligence and replacement plan is in the wings ready to be rolled out. This is just another example of throwing something out without a replacement plan. On another topic you talked about the issues uncertainty creates - this is just another example of uncertainty this board is causing and part of the reason why there are record numbers of applications out of the public school.
So...
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:34 — Bob_SconceI never said that I thought that dropping Blue Diamond made sense this year. But, there's an awful lot of rhetoric about its cancellation (mainly coming from paulastam) that makes it seem like the next thing to armageddon. I just don't think it's that big of a deal -- there are somewhere around 14,000 school districts and only 5 of them use Blue Diamond. How important could it be?
Rhetoric
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:50 — Solon77I am not going to pretend I know how Blue Diamond is used by the teachers, however it is poor leadership to discontinue something without a plan. It is one thing to discontinue and replace a system in a small district of a couple of schools, it is something entirely different to replace a system in a district with 140,000 students and 160 schools. Ron is still thinking small town and doesn't have a clue as to what it really takes to run a large district. The whole assignment process was way over his head - that is why he crawled back into his shell.
Eh....
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 22:20 — Bob_SconceA good part of the blame for any fallout (if there is any fallout, which isn't clear) has to lie with the staff: they put the contract on the CONSENT agenda after the previous contract had expired and the new school year had already begun. Had the district signed the contract, it would have been stuck with Blue Diamond for ANOTHER two years, at which point staff would have AGAIN blindsided the board, and we'd be back in the same place.
I don't think there's going to be much problem. From my brief amount of research, there are a lot of products and services out there that compare quite favorably to Blue Diamond. Check out http://www.testwiz.com , for example.
Oh the irony "Bob"...
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:17 — paulastamOver the weekend you posted that our teachers can "handscore" assessments since the GOP led board tossed out the useful Blue Diamond instructional/assessment tool. That my friend is like deciding to toss out a scientific calculator in exchange for an abacus...indeed a backwards step. Thanks Ronnie M! :(
Paula, "Independent, Fair & Speaking Up for MY Kids."
Good grief...
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:38 — Bob_SconceThey're MULTIPLE CHOICE tests, and the questions can still be used by the district without paying a gargantuan licensing fee. Your comparison is extreme.
Outsource to
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 21:32 — Solon77Could outsource the test scoring to India or China.
You are more clueless than
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 20:56 — woodstockYou are more clueless than usual this evening. You have no earthly idea what you are talking about. But, I did like the "flagship" comment...funny; however Blue Diamond was not something special. All it was was a half@$$ed, piecemeal product thrown together by a former employee who then sold it back to her former colleagues for an exorbitant price.
BTW Don't apologize for being snarky, it is a vast improvement over being your typical imbecilic self.
Have a wonderful evening.
These practices do not
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 16:28 — jeffrey1These practices do not prepare kids for college or the real world.
A 10% cap on penalties for work turned in late is too lenient. I would use a graduated scale:
On the block schedule, homework is essential, particularly in the maths and sciences. Teachers should require homework to be completed, i.e. "Homework for Practice." It is too much work for teachers to have to grade homework ("Homework for Evaluation"). Homework is part of the learning process -- check to make sure it's done, but leave the evaluation to quizzes and tests.
Allowing students to take a retest and receive the higher score is not fair to students who scored high on the original test. Often retests are very similar to the original test, and that's beneficial to the student taking the retest. They know what's coming. Allow retests for those who fail the original, but set a cap for the highest grade allowed on the restest.
Don't like the idea of a separate behaviour grade in middle and high school. Behaviour grades are important in elementary school as it helps parents to identify behaviour issues. By the time students are in middle school or high school, good behaviour should be a given in the classroom.
Perhaps good behavior should
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 18:44 — woodstockPerhaps good behavior should be a given at a certain age, but when the subject is math and the grades given reflect a couple class disruptions or a project turned in a day late, I think there is a problem. I want math grades to reflect math understanding and history grades to reflect history knowledge.
What is "behavior"
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 11:48 — NC4kidsBehavior does not mean just conduct in a classroom. In our BAC meeting, we discussed that "behavior" is work skills and could mean turning things in on time, quality of classwork, homework, working collaberatively, etc. Sounds like 21st century work habits almost. What are we teaching our kids and what do we expect them to do---just mastery of curriculum or how to learn and real life skills too!? Is this proposed 5 days late window for assignments and constant retesting supporting all students learning?
Great article! I checked out Lufkins website as mentioned and to clarify, it's a zero for second offense for cheating. Their rubric is very clear.
thanks! This is a great conversation to be having!! I am so glad that the Board is discussing it and hope everyone knows what is meant by "behavior" not being part of the academic grade. If you mean conduct, say conduct. If you mean working behavior, maybe we need to define them.
Don't like this....
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 09:47 — Bob_SconceI don't have a problem with separating academic and behavioural grades. But, the rest infringes too heavily on the teachers' perogative. In particular:
The idea that these changes will mean that grades are "awarded consistently" is a farce. Why? Because the assessments used to create those grades aren't standardized -- if one teacher's test consists of a bunch of relatively easy problems like "101 x 202 = ? " and another teacher's tests consists of a bunch of harder problems like "784 x 393 = ?", the mechanism for grading the tests would be the same, but the results would still be inconsistent -- many students who got an A on the first test might only get a C on the second. That sort of difference is why teachers need the ability to hand out extra credit and vary the percentages that different assessments count -- those are tools that teachers can use to help ensure that eventual grades accurately reflect the student's understanding of the material.