Changes to grading for all MCPS high school students

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If grades weren’t important for learning, we wouldn’t have them. But they absolutely are necessary, at least for students whose minds are not fully developed, and would not be intrinsically motivated to learn algebraic equations. Also, teachers cannot adequately measure a students learning without grades. If you would like to keep living in La La Land, go ahead…

I love this response! It really demonstrates super well how the most vehement opinions are often based on false assumptions and cognitive biases:

1. Research consistently shows that grades are not necessary for learning and may in fact undermine it. See Self-Determination Theory (external rewards (ike grades can actually crowd out intrinsic motivation); and mastery vs performance orientation (Dweck) - emphasis on performance comes at expense of mastery.

For younger and less motivated learners, research consistently shows that clear goals, support, and feedback work better than letter grades.

2. *Feedback* is necessary; grades are not. More than thirty years of research demonstrate that adding a grade to feedback actually reduces the effect of the feedback.

tl;dr The opposite of what you said is true

lol

Given the limitations of the system, this is part of why my rising senior and I oppose this policy change. If all else is equal, higher grades likely support learning better than lower grades—not because the grade itself teaches anything, but because lower grades are demotivating and discourage continued engagement, especially if they are not paired with useful feedback or pathways to success.

Even slightly higher or lower grades can have meaningful ripple effects on a student’s life trajectory, self-concept, and on future opportunities, independent of actual learning. Higher grades reduce arbitrary, class-based gatekeeping effects; increase motivation, engagement, and perceived competence; and reduce stress and negative mental health impacts.

Y'all imagine there is something magical about the way it was done when you were kids, but those systems essentially reproduce social stratification based on income and other class markers rather than enhancing *learning.*

As ever, the students most harmed by the changes will be first-gen, low-income, or other under-served students navigating systems that weren’t designed with their strengths or needs in mind.

Y'all will shout until you're blue in the face that grades are important to learning, but there's little to no truth in that claim. You're just very attached to your carrots and sticks and people sorters. But let's not pretend that learning has anything to do with it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, the purpose of grading is to measure how well a student understands the material and how well they can complete the skill under a time constraint. For the teacher, grading should be looked at individually and as a whole. If the entire class is missing one question or section then the teacher needs to course correction as they didn’t word or present the material adequately. For the student, grading is part of the learning cycle where they learn more by seeing what they got wrong, understanding why and should be in a position to course correction and do better the next time.

Of course none of this happens because students drop assignments and tests into a black box where the teacher doesn’t return them until the day before quarter ends or much later or maybe never. Tests may be quickly reviewed in class but they are snatched back so the teacher isn’t bothered to create more than one test. This deprives students of an excellent end of year study guide but god forbid the teacher do anything pedagogical.

This is all true but I wouldn’t frame it as a knock on the teachers. McPS doesn’t give them the time to give the feedback or get grading done timely. Also, in college if a prof realizes a test was bad because one or more questions were poorly phrased or too hard, they can adjust the grades or give extra credit or something. I remember in my HS physics cclass, the teacher gave an army assignment that was impossible and almost everyone failed it, so the teacher assigned an additional assignment as “extra credit” to account for it. McPS doesn’t allow extra credit or grading on a carve. I do think people are gojng to complain more about unfair grading or violations of the grading policy — that currently happens a lot but parents let it go because it so rarely makes a difference under the current grading policy.

Good news! The new policy requires teachers to return graded school work within 10 school days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My rising senior is super pissed that they can change the way the game is played 3/4 of the way through for some kids. Of course they can’t just phase in changes; MCPS is gonna MCPS.

Yes, I'm sure kids are sad that A grades will become harder to attain. But that's life and policies change. My university started publishing the % of students who got an A in each class my senior year. People complained about that too, but eventually they became used to it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, the purpose of grading is to measure how well a student understands the material and how well they can complete the skill under a time constraint. For the teacher, grading should be looked at individually and as a whole. If the entire class is missing one question or section then the teacher needs to course correction as they didn’t word or present the material adequately. For the student, grading is part of the learning cycle where they learn more by seeing what they got wrong, understanding why and should be in a position to course correction and do better the next time.

Of course none of this happens because students drop assignments and tests into a black box where the teacher doesn’t return them until the day before quarter ends or much later or maybe never. Tests may be quickly reviewed in class but they are snatched back so the teacher isn’t bothered to create more than one test. This deprives students of an excellent end of year study guide but god forbid the teacher do anything pedagogical.

This is all true but I wouldn’t frame it as a knock on the teachers. McPS doesn’t give them the time to give the feedback or get grading done timely. Also, in college if a prof realizes a test was bad because one or more questions were poorly phrased or too hard, they can adjust the grades or give extra credit or something. I remember in my HS physics cclass, the teacher gave an army assignment that was impossible and almost everyone failed it, so the teacher assigned an additional assignment as “extra credit” to account for it. McPS doesn’t allow extra credit or grading on a carve. I do think people are gojng to complain more about unfair grading or violations of the grading policy — that currently happens a lot but parents let it go because it so rarely makes a difference under the current grading policy.

Good news! The new policy requires teachers to return graded school work within 10 school days.

DP. And I assume the county isn’t giving teachers any additional time to get this done, right? Just more demands on teachers’ home lives?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems that OP is the only one opposed, lol. I’m strongly for these immediate changes.

What grade is your kid in? I’m fine with this for my 7th grader when she starts HS, but not okay with it for my 10th grader. It’s just not fair to these kids to change the rule on how semester grades are calculated halfway through HS.

But isn't it better to change it now to prepare them for college? Otherwise they will just get thrown into college without experience with real grading.

Real grading? I thought it was about real leaning.

Please tell me how real learning can happen when little Johnny doesn’t show up for 10 weeks because he knows he got a C during MP3…

If grades weren’t important for learning, we wouldn’t have them. But they absolutely are necessary, at least for students whose minds are not fully developed, and would not be intrinsically motivated to learn algebraic equations. Also, teachers cannot adequately measure a students learning without grades. If you would like to keep living in La La Land, go ahead…

I am absolutely baffled that people here care about the kid who doesn’t show up for 10 weeks and gets a C. What does that have to do with my kid? Teachers keep moving the lessons along. Some of you are absolutely nuts. Set standards for your own kid.

Um, excuse me, but your privilege is showing.

You are forgetting that us teachers have to deal with ALL kids. We can’t just pick and choose. When the kid who is absent for 10 weeks and randomly shows up one day, we are the ones who have to try to catch them up. We can’t just move the lessons along—so yeah that disruptive kid also affects your kid.

Also—these kids who skip are not just staying home. They are wandering the halls in droves and causing disruptions for all classes and students. Hall sweeps? We are told they don’t work and admin refuses. ISS? Now that’s not “equitable” and is no longer allowed.

What other recourse do we have to keep these kids engaged and attending if they won’t implement an attendance policy or bring back truancy court.

Must be nice to sit in your little house on the hill and not have to worry about what we deal with DAILY in the classroom. I have kids right now who have missed a good 75% of the quarter and admin is breathing down my neck to have me give them make-up work to pass.

Some stakeholders, other than privilege parents, have a lot more to worry about. That’s not nuts that doing our f-ing job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some of the responses on here are very harsh toward students. Do you really think final semester tests or projects are going to encourage better school attendance? What evidence based foundation is that hypothesis resting on?

Bs at High performing MCPS high schools knock kids out of UMD. We're not just talking about Princeton here. Kids who have to work rather than spend time with Tutors are going to suffer most.

MCPS has a presentation that shows that attendance drops a lot in MP2 and MP4 due to the current grading policy. You might try reading it. There is actual data behind this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of the responses on here are very harsh toward students. Do you really think final semester tests or projects are going to encourage better school attendance? What evidence based foundation is that hypothesis resting on?

Bs at High performing MCPS high schools knock kids out of UMD. We're not just talking about Princeton here. Kids who have to work rather than spend time with Tutors are going to suffer most.

MCPS has a presentation that shows that attendance drops a lot in MP2 and MP4 due to the current grading policy. You might try reading it. There is actual data behind this.

Correlation is not causation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I disagree with not rounding X9.5 ti 10. Isn’t it a very basic rule of math?

I also do not get why all four grading periods are equal. This is still screwy as was the previous way. Why not simply count all grades earned within the semester toward the final grade?

NP here.

If someone wishes to have a strict view of "at least X%", then "at least X%" means you have to be at X.0, Not (X-0.5). For example, an A is at least 90% would mean an A is at least 90.0, not 89.5.

I am fine with that, quite honestly. Not all college profs allow 0.5 bump.

I am 51 years old and had a numerical grading system. Even in the olden days, when someone was ended up with an 89.5, it was rounded to a 90. Of all of MCPS’s policies, rounding is the least controversial/probelmatic.

A lot of school districts still have a numerical grading system. My friend in NY was shocked when I told her that anything between 89.5 and 100 in our school system was simply listed as "A." For her kids, they don't get too stuck on the concept of A or B, because their transcript will say 91 or 86. That is far more granular than what is being proposed even with these changes that the OP is whining about.

I support these changes but hope that in the next set of changes they at least add plus/minus grades in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, the purpose of grading is to measure how well a student understands the material and how well they can complete the skill under a time constraint. For the teacher, grading should be looked at individually and as a whole. If the entire class is missing one question or section then the teacher needs to course correction as they didn’t word or present the material adequately. For the student, grading is part of the learning cycle where they learn more by seeing what they got wrong, understanding why and should be in a position to course correction and do better the next time.

Of course none of this happens because students drop assignments and tests into a black box where the teacher doesn’t return them until the day before quarter ends or much later or maybe never. Tests may be quickly reviewed in class but they are snatched back so the teacher isn’t bothered to create more than one test. This deprives students of an excellent end of year study guide but god forbid the teacher do anything pedagogical.

This is all true but I wouldn’t frame it as a knock on the teachers. McPS doesn’t give them the time to give the feedback or get grading done timely. Also, in college if a prof realizes a test was bad because one or more questions were poorly phrased or too hard, they can adjust the grades or give extra credit or something. I remember in my HS physics cclass, the teacher gave an army assignment that was impossible and almost everyone failed it, so the teacher assigned an additional assignment as “extra credit” to account for it. McPS doesn’t allow extra credit or grading on a carve. I do think people are gojng to complain more about unfair grading or violations of the grading policy — that currently happens a lot but parents let it go because it so rarely makes a difference under the current grading policy.

Good news! The new policy requires teachers to return graded school work within 10 school days.

DP. And I assume the county isn’t giving teachers any additional time to get this done, right? Just more demands on teachers’ home lives?

DP. It will just change the variety of assessments and amount of individualized feedback I give. My course is almost exclusively writing currently and I provide unique comments to every student. Next year will be 45% quizzes and written assignments will get canned comments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This isn't something the BOE votes on. It's a regulation, not a policy, so it's up to Taylor and CO to rewrite it.

True, but when they informed the BOE about it maybe a month ago, and said they planned to do a phased roll-out, the BOE pushed back. That's why it's 6-12 now.

Really unhappy with the BOE on this one. My rising current high schooler is in tears over the anticipated additional stress next year. She could manage with the one quarter on, next quarter relax pace, but constant pressure to perform all year will be felt. Especially when there are 4 tests on the same day. Ugh, Ugh, Ugh

I'm sorry she and others in this situation are stressed, but you can't do one on/one off in college. This is good preparation for what she (and others) will face after MCPS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, the purpose of grading is to measure how well a student understands the material and how well they can complete the skill under a time constraint. For the teacher, grading should be looked at individually and as a whole. If the entire class is missing one question or section then the teacher needs to course correction as they didn’t word or present the material adequately. For the student, grading is part of the learning cycle where they learn more by seeing what they got wrong, understanding why and should be in a position to course correction and do better the next time.

Of course none of this happens because students drop assignments and tests into a black box where the teacher doesn’t return them until the day before quarter ends or much later or maybe never. Tests may be quickly reviewed in class but they are snatched back so the teacher isn’t bothered to create more than one test. This deprives students of an excellent end of year study guide but god forbid the teacher do anything pedagogical.

This is all true but I wouldn’t frame it as a knock on the teachers. McPS doesn’t give them the time to give the feedback or get grading done timely. Also, in college if a prof realizes a test was bad because one or more questions were poorly phrased or too hard, they can adjust the grades or give extra credit or something. I remember in my HS physics cclass, the teacher gave an army assignment that was impossible and almost everyone failed it, so the teacher assigned an additional assignment as “extra credit” to account for it. McPS doesn’t allow extra credit or grading on a carve. I do think people are gojng to complain more about unfair grading or violations of the grading policy — that currently happens a lot but parents let it go because it so rarely makes a difference under the current grading policy.

Good news! The new policy requires teachers to return graded school work within 10 school days.

The current policy also requires stuff to be turned back promptly but there’s zero enforcement of it. What are the principals going to do — fire teachers? They can’t even fire the truly terrible teachers because there’s such a shortage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems that OP is the only one opposed, lol. I’m strongly for these immediate changes.

What grade is your kid in? I’m fine with this for my 7th grader when she starts HS, but not okay with it for my 10th grader. It’s just not fair to these kids to change the rule on how semester grades are calculated halfway through HS.

But isn't it better to change it now to prepare them for college? Otherwise they will just get thrown into college without experience with real grading.

Real grading? I thought it was about real leaning.

Please tell me how real learning can happen when little Johnny doesn’t show up for 10 weeks because he knows he got a C during MP3…

If grades weren’t important for learning, we wouldn’t have them. But they absolutely are necessary, at least for students whose minds are not fully developed, and would not be intrinsically motivated to learn algebraic equations. Also, teachers cannot adequately measure a students learning without grades. If you would like to keep living in La La Land, go ahead…

I am absolutely baffled that people here care about the kid who doesn’t show up for 10 weeks and gets a C. What does that have to do with my kid? Teachers keep moving the lessons along. Some of you are absolutely nuts. Set standards for your own kid.

Um, excuse me, but your privilege is showing.

You are forgetting that us teachers have to deal with ALL kids. We can’t just pick and choose. When the kid who is absent for 10 weeks and randomly shows up one day, we are the ones who have to try to catch them up. We can’t just move the lessons along—so yeah that disruptive kid also affects your kid.

Also—these kids who skip are not just staying home. They are wandering the halls in droves and causing disruptions for all classes and students. Hall sweeps? We are told they don’t work and admin refuses. ISS? Now that’s not “equitable” and is no longer allowed.

What other recourse do we have to keep these kids engaged and attending if they won’t implement an attendance policy or bring back truancy court.

Must be nice to sit in your little house on the hill and not have to worry about what we deal with DAILY in the classroom. I have kids right now who have missed a good 75% of the quarter and admin is breathing down my neck to have me give them make-up work to pass.

Some stakeholders, other than privilege parents, have a lot more to worry about. That’s not nuts that doing our f-ing job.

I’m not that poster and I totally feel for the teachers here but let’s not pretend that the kids who are ditching class and roaming the hall all day care about their grades. I just don’t think it will move the needle for them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of the responses on here are very harsh toward students. Do you really think final semester tests or projects are going to encourage better school attendance? What evidence based foundation is that hypothesis resting on?

Bs at High performing MCPS high schools knock kids out of UMD. We're not just talking about Princeton here. Kids who have to work rather than spend time with Tutors are going to suffer most.

MCPS has a presentation that shows that attendance drops a lot in MP2 and MP4 due to the current grading policy. You might try reading it. There is actual data behind this.

Correlation is not causation.

Q2 has winter break when a lot of families take a long break to see family, and also I think Thanksgiving plus cold and flu season.
q4 has a lot of ditching because many of the AP teachers don’t teach anything the last few weeks and basically tell the kids it’s okay to skip as they’ll just be watching a movie or signignvyearbooks or whatever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This isn't something the BOE votes on. It's a regulation, not a policy, so it's up to Taylor and CO to rewrite it.

True, but when they informed the BOE about it maybe a month ago, and said they planned to do a phased roll-out, the BOE pushed back. That's why it's 6-12 now.

Really unhappy with the BOE on this one. My rising current high schooler is in tears over the anticipated additional stress next year. She could manage with the one quarter on, next quarter relax pace, but constant pressure to perform all year will be felt. Especially when there are 4 tests on the same day. Ugh, Ugh, Ugh

I'm sorry she and others in this situation are stressed, but you can't do one on/one off in college. This is good preparation for what she (and others) will face after MCPS.

College is so much LESS stressful than the current HS insanity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of the responses on here are very harsh toward students. Do you really think final semester tests or projects are going to encourage better school attendance? What evidence based foundation is that hypothesis resting on?

Bs at High performing MCPS high schools knock kids out of UMD. We're not just talking about Princeton here. Kids who have to work rather than spend time with Tutors are going to suffer most.

MCPS has a presentation that shows that attendance drops a lot in MP2 and MP4 due to the current grading policy. You might try reading it. There is actual data behind this.

Correlation is not causation.

Correlation doesn't imply causation, but it does waggle its eyebrows suggestively and gesture furtively while mouthing 'look over there'.