Aspen and First Quarter Grades - How are we doing?

[Anonymous]

Just checking in with fellow parents awaiting a barrage of last minute grade updates now that the first marking period is over.

10th grade parent here. Kiddo currently has 3 As, 4 Bs. One B (B+) should become an A/A-. Hoping one B- becomes a B. Last year, one class went from 100 to a 90 at this point so kid barely had an A- because teacher said that an assignment from early in the marking period was never turned in. No WS was recorded for it. Kid went from 4 assignments in Aspen to over 12 after the marking period ended. There were two teachers last year who would do this so I never knew how drastically a grade could swing until it was too late.

Hoping that DC learns from 1st quarter as they totally procrastinated too much. I've had to nag much more than I should have. I do appreciate the new grading policy as I think DC it will lead to fewer surprises and force kids to be more accountable. My hope is that there are fewer shifts in grading at the end of a term as a result.

How are other parents doing out there?

[Anonymous]

Eighth grade family sweating bullets here over one slow-to-post teacher.
We were so relieved in the spring when our seventh grader locked in that 4.0 -- we're old enough to remember when your seventh grade final GPA was all that got reported to the application high schools. Surprise! New rule: they're now reporting first quarter 8th grade too. (How they'll weight those quarterly grades in comparison to the full year seventh grade average is anyone's guess.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Eighth grade family sweating bullets here over one slow-to-post teacher.
We were so relieved in the spring when our seventh grader locked in that 4.0 -- we're old enough to remember when your seventh grade final GPA was all that got reported to the application high schools. Surprise! New rule: they're now reporting first quarter 8th grade too. (How they'll weight those quarterly grades in comparison to the full year seventh grade average is anyone's guess.)

You may not have been focused on it, but this is not new. They’ve reported the first quarter of 8th for at least the last three years. (Walls hasn’t used it in calculating GPA, though.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Eighth grade family sweating bullets here over one slow-to-post teacher.
We were so relieved in the spring when our seventh grader locked in that 4.0 -- we're old enough to remember when your seventh grade final GPA was all that got reported to the application high schools. Surprise! New rule: they're now reporting first quarter 8th grade too. (How they'll weight those quarterly grades in comparison to the full year seventh grade average is anyone's guess.)

7th grades results can be so brutal and stressful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Eighth grade family sweating bullets here over one slow-to-post teacher.
We were so relieved in the spring when our seventh grader locked in that 4.0 -- we're old enough to remember when your seventh grade final GPA was all that got reported to the application high schools. Surprise! New rule: they're now reporting first quarter 8th grade too. (How they'll weight those quarterly grades in comparison to the full year seventh grade average is anyone's guess.)

You may not have been focused on it, but this is not new. They’ve reported the first quarter of 8th for at least the last three years. (Walls hasn’t used it in calculating GPA, though.)

Glad to hear that Walls hasn't used it in the past. Hopefully they won't decide to start now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just checking in with fellow parents awaiting a barrage of last minute grade updates now that the first marking period is over.

10th grade parent here. Kiddo currently has 3 As, 4 Bs. One B (B+) should become an A/A-. Hoping one B- becomes a B. Last year, one class went from 100 to a 90 at this point so kid barely had an A- because teacher said that an assignment from early in the marking period was never turned in. No WS was recorded for it. Kid went from 4 assignments in Aspen to over 12 after the marking period ended. There were two teachers last year who would do this so I never knew how drastically a grade could swing until it was too late.

Hoping that DC learns from 1st quarter as they totally procrastinated too much. I've had to nag much more than I should have. I do appreciate the new grading policy as I think DC it will lead to fewer surprises and force kids to be more accountable. My hope is that there are fewer shifts in grading at the end of a term as a result.

How are other parents doing out there?

Grades updated as expected. One class had 12 assignments updated at once, but fortunately trended in a positive direction.