Changes to Student Grading in a Standards-Based World
Prior to the pandemic, the school district was working to create a standards-aligned protocol for assessing and grading student work at the middle and high school levels. The changes result in a grading system that is more similar to what is done at the elementary level. Below are some of the basic concepts to understand about standards-based grading as we head toward the distribution of first quarter report cards on November 6.
1-4 System: When it comes to evaluating student work, teachers will use only whole numbers, 1-4. The move to the use of just these four whole numbers is because the rubrics developed to assess student understanding have just four points; the district does not use rubrics with mid-point descriptors to support scores of 1.5, 2.5 or 3.5.
1-4 Meaning:
A Score of 1: Indicates that a student is emerging in their understanding relative to a given standard. It could be that the standard has been recently introduced, so students are still forming initial understanding of the concept.
A Score of 2: This is the widest band of scoring and includes work that is just beyond emergent all the way up to nearly proficient. A score of 2 indicates that a student is developing their understanding.
A Score of 3: This is the narrowest band of scoring and indicates that the student has demonstrated a proficient understanding of the complete standard; no more and no less.
A Score of 4: This score indicates that a student is not only proficient with regard to the standard, but has internalized the skill and can apply the standard to create new understanding with relation to new concepts. We consider a score of 4 as being advanced.
In a standards-based system, students receive a grade based on their demonstrated level of proficiency. To determine this level of proficiency, teachers work to establish a clear understanding of where the student is through assessment of completed assignments, quizzes and tests, and through something that we call formative assessments that can include things like a conversations with a student. In theory, the volume of work that a student completes is not what determines a final grade for report card purposes, only what the student has demonstrated with regard to proficiency. That said, I want to caution you that teachers need to have a fairly large sampling of student work in order to assess trends in proficiency levels accurately, so students should always work to complete all assignments and attend all classes.
Letter Grades: Consistent across the district, teachers will use trend scores to determine quarter, semester, and final grades for students. Student grades are not simply an average of all work, but instead take into consideration the trend in student scores relative to any given standard. As an example, a student may score many 2's on assignments early in a quarter with reference to a particular standard, but towards the end of the quarter the scores begin to show more consistency in the 3 to 4 range. This student would receive a letter grade more aligned to the scores of 3 and 4 that more accurately demonstrate the proficiency level than the work from earlier in the quarter. Lastly, know that scores and grades in a standards-based system are not curved or in any way based on comparative student-to-student progress. Scores and grades simply reflect a given student's own level of proficiency relative to given standards at a given point in time.
