This high school test retake policy is wild

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There should be a maximum B grade after a retake.

Last year's retake policy made sense. Retakes on major assessments only. Max retake score= 80%.

This year is crazy.

My kid said her teacher had to use the lecture hall to offer retakes on the most recent test because over 50 students wanted to retake the test.

Talking to her friends, almost all of them said they had gotten 85%-95% on the original test.

The teacher said the class average (in my daughter's class) was an 89%.

Now that teacher has to re-grade over 50 essay-based assessments because those students wanted to get an extra 5%-10%, and the overall impact on their grade will be less than 0.1%.

That's ridiculous.

If you game it out, the kids with an 89 retaking are making the logical decision. If you can retake for an A, you have to assume kids will. That bumps up the number of As and makes having As that much more important because colleges compare you to your peers for admissions. Blame gatehouse. A retake for half the points back up to a maximum of 80% would cut down on the number of retakes and help kids who bombed a test pass the class

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So my kids have told me that some kids will retake even if they get a decent grade like A-. Is there a point where you would make your kid retake a test? A B? A D?

< 90

Wow ok. And this is why the private school parents make fun of public school grade inflation.

We don't care.

[Anonymous]

Question: The official FCPS policy states "students will have at least one opportunity to retake each summative assignment and earn up to 100%."

So does the number of retakes offered vary by school? This statement would mean that a teacher only has to offer one opportunity? Do any of you have kids being offered retakes multiple times for the same assessment?

I'm confused by the way this statement is written, because it seems like retakes are still a possibility but you may not be able to earn up to 100.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son said he knew who all of the public schools kids were in his college classes because they always went up to the professors after a test to ask for a retake. He said many of them now put "no retakes" in the syllabus.

And all the public school kids know who the smug spoiled tattle take private school kids are too!I bet he had a ton of friends with this awful attitude.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son said he knew who all of the public schools kids were in his college classes because they always went up to the professors after a test to ask for a retake. He said many of them now put "no retakes" in the syllabus.

And all the public school kids know who the smug spoiled tattle take private school kids are too!I bet he had a ton of friends with this awful attitude.

Tattle tale? That not what that means. Nobody needs to tattle when then kids do it in front of the entire class. It’s sad that public schools have conditioned students to things that don’t exist in college. But what do they care? They don’t. They can brag about their high graduation rate and GPAs but they are setting students up for failure if they’re are asking their college professors for retakes. How pathetic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How many retakes are you doing per test?

Anonymous wrote:I think the question was how many retakes are you doing as in how many kids are you administering retakes to per test?

For a recent AP Physics test, we had about 130 students out of 185 attempt the retake. While this was the greatest number we've seen, it was not the first time we've had over 100 retakers.

[Anonymous]

It’s the worst policy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How many retakes are you doing per test?

Anonymous wrote:I think the question was how many retakes are you doing as in how many kids are you administering retakes to per test?

For a recent AP Physics test, we had about 130 students out of 185 attempt the retake. While this was the greatest number we've seen, it was not the first time we've had over 100 retakers.

There should be gatekeepering in AP classes. Nobody should be taking AP Physics unless they’ve proven they are an A student in previous science classes. That will cut down on the retakes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How many retakes are you doing per test?

Anonymous wrote:I think the question was how many retakes are you doing as in how many kids are you administering retakes to per test?

For a recent AP Physics test, we had about 130 students out of 185 attempt the retake. While this was the greatest number we've seen, it was not the first time we've had over 100 retakers.

There should be gatekeepering in AP classes. Nobody should be taking AP Physics unless they’ve proven they are an A student in previous science classes. That will cut down on the retakes.

I agree that AP classes should not be open enrollment but that is not going to change kids who get Bs or A-s in an AP class wanting to take a retake. Those are the kids who are looking at their grades closely. I kid in AP Physics is most likely a STEM kid looking at Stem majors at the best school that they can get into. You can bet that kid is going to take a retake to get to an A if it is available.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How many retakes are you doing per test?

Anonymous wrote:I think the question was how many retakes are you doing as in how many kids are you administering retakes to per test?

For a recent AP Physics test, we had about 130 students out of 185 attempt the retake. While this was the greatest number we've seen, it was not the first time we've had over 100 retakers.

There should be gatekeepering in AP classes. Nobody should be taking AP Physics unless they’ve proven they are an A student in previous science classes. That will cut down on the retakes.

I agree that AP classes should not be open enrollment but that is not going to change kids who get Bs or A-s in an AP class wanting to take a retake. Those are the kids who are looking at their grades closely. I kid in AP Physics is most likely a STEM kid looking at Stem majors at the best school that they can get into. You can bet that kid is going to take a retake to get to an A if it is available.

FCPS thankfully doesn’t set AP policy and a condition of participating in the AP program is that there is no gate keeping.

And BTW, that gpa bump from honors and AP means nothing in college admissions. Colleges unweight GPAs during file review.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How many retakes are you doing per test?

Anonymous wrote:I think the question was how many retakes are you doing as in how many kids are you administering retakes to per test?

For a recent AP Physics test, we had about 130 students out of 185 attempt the retake. While this was the greatest number we've seen, it was not the first time we've had over 100 retakers.

There should be gatekeepering in AP classes. Nobody should be taking AP Physics unless they’ve proven they are an A student in previous science classes. That will cut down on the retakes.

I agree that AP classes should not be open enrollment but that is not going to change kids who get Bs or A-s in an AP class wanting to take a retake. Those are the kids who are looking at their grades closely. I kid in AP Physics is most likely a STEM kid looking at Stem majors at the best school that they can get into. You can bet that kid is going to take a retake to get to an A if it is available.

FCPS thankfully doesn’t set AP policy and a condition of participating in the AP program is that there is no gate keeping.

And BTW, that gpa bump from honors and AP means nothing in college admissions. Colleges unweight GPAs during file review.

There should be conditions for AP classes. It does kids no good to be in a class that moves to fast and that they struggle in. The requirements shouldn’t be onerous but there should be a bar that needs to be meet. Honors English before AP English, Honors math before AP Math.

Yes, colleges unweight GPAs but they are also looking for rigor, which translates to honors and AP/IB classes where possible. Not to mention the possibility of college credit for kids who score high enough on the exams. I know kids who graduated from college in 3 years because of AP classes, that saved the families/student a lot of money.

[Anonymous]

Feel free to speak with the College Board about your plan for gate keeping AP.

I’m sure they’ll be interested in the input of a bored government contractor in Burke.

[Anonymous]

The policy is silly. So many students trying to turn their 93% into a 96%. It's frustrating for teachers and patently unfair for students who need true remediation.

[Anonymous]

Please write your school board members and Reid about this instead of just complaining here where it will do nothing. We need them to listen before Standards Based Grading gets forced on all f the schools, not just a few.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Please write your school board members and Reid about this instead of just complaining here where it will do nothing. We need them to listen before Standards Based Grading gets forced on all f the schools, not just a few.

Why on earth would they bother listening or considering anything you have to say?