Report Cards

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I like the new report cards. We have comments on ours and the scores and scales seems clearer.

We are new to DCPS this year. Is there any literature on what the Reading Inventory number means (beyond below/on/above grade level)?

I think RIs are useful assessments to show trends over time and they’re great because they’re really short/easy to give. BUT the results vary wildly. My 2nd grader got something like an 880 lexile level per RI on her report card and… no. She’s probably about a grade ahead of grade level. But 880? No chance. Then I saw the test. Only like 20 questions. 1 or 2 lucky-ish guesses and 150 extra points.

[Anonymous]

I feel like the first term report card is BS. My kid is in 4th grade and its not clear what the grades are even based on. I think I have seen three quizes total the entire term between three teachers. My understanding though is that showing prgoress/improvement is a major criteria for judging teachers and schools. So it makes sense for lower grades now and then they can magically "improve" to straight 4s by the last term.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel like the first term report card is BS. My kid is in 4th grade and its not clear what the grades are even based on. I think I have seen three quizes total the entire term between three teachers. My understanding though is that showing prgoress/improvement is a major criteria for judging teachers and schools. So it makes sense for lower grades now and then they can magically "improve" to straight 4s by the last term.

Grades are based on student mastery on the standards taught in that quarter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel like the first term report card is BS. My kid is in 4th grade and its not clear what the grades are even based on. I think I have seen three quizes total the entire term between three teachers. My understanding though is that showing prgoress/improvement is a major criteria for judging teachers and schools. So it makes sense for lower grades now and then they can magically "improve" to straight 4s by the last term.

Report card grades have nothing to do with teacher evaluations. Not entirely sure about school but I believe it has no impact on principal/admin evaluations either

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel like the first term report card is BS. My kid is in 4th grade and its not clear what the grades are even based on. I think I have seen three quizes total the entire term between three teachers. My understanding though is that showing prgoress/improvement is a major criteria for judging teachers and schools. So it makes sense for lower grades now and then they can magically "improve" to straight 4s by the last term.

Report card grades have nothing to do with teacher evaluations. Not entirely sure about school but I believe it has no impact on principal/admin evaluations either

DP. Maybe not, but I have been told by several teachers that they are supposed to "leave room" in the grades to be able to show progress over the course of the year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel like the first term report card is BS. My kid is in 4th grade and its not clear what the grades are even based on. I think I have seen three quizes total the entire term between three teachers. My understanding though is that showing prgoress/improvement is a major criteria for judging teachers and schools. So it makes sense for lower grades now and then they can magically "improve" to straight 4s by the last term.

Report card grades have nothing to do with teacher evaluations. Not entirely sure about school but I believe it has no impact on principal/admin evaluations either

DP. Maybe not, but I have been told by several teachers that they are supposed to "leave room" in the grades to be able to show progress over the course of the year.

I think that is explicitly no longer the case with the new report cards/grading metrics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel like the first term report card is BS. My kid is in 4th grade and its not clear what the grades are even based on. I think I have seen three quizes total the entire term between three teachers. My understanding though is that showing prgoress/improvement is a major criteria for judging teachers and schools. So it makes sense for lower grades now and then they can magically "improve" to straight 4s by the last term.

Report card grades have nothing to do with teacher evaluations. Not entirely sure about school but I believe it has no impact on principal/admin evaluations either

DP. Maybe not, but I have been told by several teachers that they are supposed to "leave room" in the grades to be able to show progress over the course of the year.

I think that is explicitly no longer the case with the new report cards/grading metrics.

Could you please share where this has been made explicit? It's not clear from the report card itself, and the DCPS site that's supposed to have more information about the report cards doesn't have anything posted. https://dcps.dc.gov/page/elementary-report-cards

I'd be grateful if you could share any other context you've found.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel like the first term report card is BS. My kid is in 4th grade and its not clear what the grades are even based on. I think I have seen three quizes total the entire term between three teachers. My understanding though is that showing prgoress/improvement is a major criteria for judging teachers and schools. So it makes sense for lower grades now and then they can magically "improve" to straight 4s by the last term.

Report card grades have nothing to do with teacher evaluations. Not entirely sure about school but I believe it has no impact on principal/admin evaluations either

DP. Maybe not, but I have been told by several teachers that they are supposed to "leave room" in the grades to be able to show progress over the course of the year.

I think that is explicitly no longer the case with the new report cards/grading metrics.

Could you please share where this has been made explicit? It's not clear from the report card itself, and the DCPS site that's supposed to have more information about the report cards doesn't have anything posted. https://dcps.dc.gov/page/elementary-report-cards

I'd be grateful if you could share any other context you've found.

Interesting. I’m afraid my child’s teacher circulated a little blurb explanation the changes in the report card with an explanation of each grade, etc. Frankly, I can’t imagine she wrote it all herself (and it seemed very much generic DCPS speak and wasn’t grade level specific), but I’m not actually sure where she drew it from.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Both my kids received what you described. Usually I don’t care, but they are also suddenly pulling 2s instead of 4s. :/

Funny, this happened to us as well...straight 3s across the board when in the past there has always been a mix of mostly 4s and a few 3s. And her test scores are many grade levels ahead of where she is for ELA in particular, so it seems just bizarre that she is at "meets expectations" for literally every single homeroom subject on the entire report card. I know that a) 3s are perfectly acceptable, b) these grades don't really matter and c) it's certainly possible that our special little snowflake just isn't doing as well this year (I mean, you can't hit 'em all out of the park, Larla) ...but it did make me wonder whether there are different criteria this year, or whether maybe her teacher (new to the district this year and seems a little...scattered) just phoned in the grading for this period and hoped nobody would notice.

[Anonymous]

Has anyone gotten 4s in their reports? It seems more and more they’re focused on showing “growth”…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone gotten 4s in their reports? It seems more and more they’re focused on showing “growth”…

My kid got straight 3s in core subjects but 4s in specials. I was mildly surprised only because when we had our parent-teacher conference, the teacher told us she was in the most advanced groups for both reading and math, and that her writing was the "best in class". I don't think she's a genius or anything, but I wasn't clear on how being in the most advanced group and being "best in class" translated into 3s across the board.

As others have pointed out, these grades don't matter for anything except an indication of how they are doing, and I'm comfortable that she is where she needs to be. But I wondered if any kids in class got 4s, or if she was just blowing smoke at the conference? Either is possible but if it's the latter, I find it annoying. I don't need a teacher trying to butter me up by telling me my kids "advanced". Just tell me what's actually going on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Both my kids received what you described. Usually I don’t care, but they are also suddenly pulling 2s instead of 4s. :/

Funny, this happened to us as well...straight 3s across the board when in the past there has always been a mix of mostly 4s and a few 3s. And her test scores are many grade levels ahead of where she is for ELA in particular, so it seems just bizarre that she is at "meets expectations" for literally every single homeroom subject on the entire report card. I know that a) 3s are perfectly acceptable, b) these grades don't really matter and c) it's certainly possible that our special little snowflake just isn't doing as well this year (I mean, you can't hit 'em all out of the park, Larla) ...but it did make me wonder whether there are different criteria this year, or whether maybe her teacher (new to the district this year and seems a little...scattered) just phoned in the grading for this period and hoped nobody would notice.

We are in the same boat. All 3s and 4s in past years, now a mix of 2s and 3s despite a glowing parent teacher conference and all the assessments showing kid above grade level. Radio silence from the school on any context for the new report cards.

Thanks to the poster who linked to the DC Assessment Guide for Families. For the Reading Inventory, it says that families should receive "parent letters after every administration" of the assessment. Has anyone ever received such a letter?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Both my kids received what you described. Usually I don’t care, but they are also suddenly pulling 2s instead of 4s. :/

Funny, this happened to us as well...straight 3s across the board when in the past there has always been a mix of mostly 4s and a few 3s. And her test scores are many grade levels ahead of where she is for ELA in particular, so it seems just bizarre that she is at "meets expectations" for literally every single homeroom subject on the entire report card. I know that a) 3s are perfectly acceptable, b) these grades don't really matter and c) it's certainly possible that our special little snowflake just isn't doing as well this year (I mean, you can't hit 'em all out of the park, Larla) ...but it did make me wonder whether there are different criteria this year, or whether maybe her teacher (new to the district this year and seems a little...scattered) just phoned in the grading for this period and hoped nobody would notice.

We are in the same boat. All 3s and 4s in past years, now a mix of 2s and 3s despite a glowing parent teacher conference and all the assessments showing kid above grade level. Radio silence from the school on any context for the new report cards.

Thanks to the poster who linked to the DC Assessment Guide for Families. For the Reading Inventory, it says that families should receive "parent letters after every administration" of the assessment. Has anyone ever received such a letter?

My DD got mostly 4s this year with a handful of 3s; higher percentage in Term 1 than previously. DS got all 4s except PE, but’s it’s his first report card so I don’t have a comparison to the old system.

We got an RI letter with a copy of the actual exam for the first administration of the test to put DD this year. Not sure if it’s been administered again or not (I thought it was supposed to be every month or so), but we haven’t heard about it if so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Both my kids received what you described. Usually I don’t care, but they are also suddenly pulling 2s instead of 4s. :/

Funny, this happened to us as well...straight 3s across the board when in the past there has always been a mix of mostly 4s and a few 3s. And her test scores are many grade levels ahead of where she is for ELA in particular, so it seems just bizarre that she is at "meets expectations" for literally every single homeroom subject on the entire report card. I know that a) 3s are perfectly acceptable, b) these grades don't really matter and c) it's certainly possible that our special little snowflake just isn't doing as well this year (I mean, you can't hit 'em all out of the park, Larla) ...but it did make me wonder whether there are different criteria this year, or whether maybe her teacher (new to the district this year and seems a little...scattered) just phoned in the grading for this period and hoped nobody would notice.

We are in the same boat. All 3s and 4s in past years, now a mix of 2s and 3s despite a glowing parent teacher conference and all the assessments showing kid above grade level. Radio silence from the school on any context for the new report cards.

Thanks to the poster who linked to the DC Assessment Guide for Families. For the Reading Inventory, it says that families should receive "parent letters after every administration" of the assessment. Has anyone ever received such a letter?

Never recieved any letter. My kid got her first 2 ever (now in 4th grade). I would be ok with that if at any time during the term the teacher reached out to let me know there were issues, or if I ever once saw a graded assisgment during the term.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone gotten 4s in their reports? It seems more and more they’re focused on showing “growth”…

this is definitely the case.