Way Forward with 50% Rule Remains Murky in MCPS as More Students Complain of Lack of College Readiness

[Anonymous]

Our issue has been that teachers unevenly applied getting rid of the 50% rule. Two of my sophomore's teachers eliminated it first quarter. One did not post any deadlines, and did not respond when we emailed to ask about deadlines and whether anything is accepted after deadline. The teacher was behind on grading so it was impossible to see what was really missing and what she just hadn't graded. My kid who usually gets all As and the occassional B wound up with a D and C. He's on an IEP and I found out after the quarter was over that the stricter deadlines should not have even applied to him since his IEP entitles him to extra time. Just a mess all around and now I'm worried that the D and C will mess up his college chances. The teacher that gave him a D had only positive feedback about him at conferences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our issue has been that teachers unevenly applied getting rid of the 50% rule. Two of my sophomore's teachers eliminated it first quarter. One did not post any deadlines, and did not respond when we emailed to ask about deadlines and whether anything is accepted after deadline. The teacher was behind on grading so it was impossible to see what was really missing and what she just hadn't graded. My kid who usually gets all As and the occassional B wound up with a D and C. He's on an IEP and I found out after the quarter was over that the stricter deadlines should not have even applied to him since his IEP entitles him to extra time. Just a mess all around and now I'm worried that the D and C will mess up his college chances. The teacher that gave him a D had only positive feedback about him at conferences.

Sounds like a reason to escalate things with the principal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You cannot talk about "overall degradation of student initiative" without speaking to the grade inflation that is the calculation of semester grades (the old A + B = A or B + C = B nonsense). Absurd. Teens are smart enough to game the system. Make the system make sense.

Would A + B = B make sense, though? They either round up or down.

They shouldn't combine quarter grades into whole semester grades at all. There's no point except loss of information.
If quarter grade are so important, then semester grades should be removed.

If it's important to make everyone have the same GPA because GPA is a trash concept, then get rid of overall grades entirely.

Or just keep the current system, where students who don't want to work harder don't have to work harder, and let it pressure colleges to find meaningful ways to evaluate admissions instead of GPA.

The semester grade is the final grade for the course, since all HS courses are semester-length.

[Anonymous]

Northwood HS still has the 50% rule in place. Admin refuse to let it go. Rules should not be different from high school to high school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Northwood HS still has the 50% rule in place. Admin refuse to let it go. Rules should not be different from high school to high school

Unfortunately, those variances by school are built into MCPS by design. They enshrine this with incredible autonomy for the principal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You cannot talk about "overall degradation of student initiative" without speaking to the grade inflation that is the calculation of semester grades (the old A + B = A or B + C = B nonsense). Absurd. Teens are smart enough to game the system. Make the system make sense.

I definitely agree with this! In the olden days, the tiebreak was the semester exam. If you had an A + B= you needed an A on the exam to earn the A for the semester. That made sense. If you had the same grade for both quarters, it was a little easier and you had more leeway on the exam, but it still mattered. You could go A + A, but if you got a D on your exam, you earned a B for the quarter.

Both my kids learned early that if they earned an A for the first quarter of the semester, they could slack off during the second semester. I can't even imagine how frustrating that must be for teachers!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Northwood HS still has the 50% rule in place. Admin refuse to let it go. Rules should not be different from high school to high school

Unfortunately, those variances by school are built into MCPS by design. They enshrine this with incredible autonomy for the principal.

Principal autonomy should not included how policy is implemented.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is BS. Create a Syllabus. Distribute it the first day of class and upload to Canvas. Include you due date/deadline rules and any retake rules. List the times teacher is available for support and other resources that may be helpful to students. Teach. If you notice that the greater majority of the class is clearly missing something, adjust. If you notice that a student is consistently failing or suddenly failing, inquire if there are any problems and suggest how to resolve. Give the appropriate grade. Administrators support the above.

Done.

No, actually, they do not. The administrators support the 50% rule.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There was already a thread about this, but yea, parents (like me) have been saying this for a few years now.

I swear, the so called experts in MCPS who come up with this stuff don't know anything about teens.

MCPs did not make up the policy.

It is based on someone's idea that the 4, 3, 2, 1, 0 grading policy is more fair than a 0-100% grading policy. If this is a true statement, then 50% should be the lowest grade. Anything lower is a "punishment." (see link below)

I would argue if the 4, 3, 2, 1, 0 grading policy is the best way to grade. Do students need to learn a certain amount or gain a certain proficiency in order to successfully move onto the next level? That might be a better question to discuss.

However, as stated above, it is correct that MCPS did not make up the policy. Instead, they decided to follow a policy that someone else made up based on what they thought would be best.

https://gradingforlearning.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/the_case_against_zero.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You cannot talk about "overall degradation of student initiative" without speaking to the grade inflation that is the calculation of semester grades (the old A + B = A or B + C = B nonsense). Absurd. Teens are smart enough to game the system. Make the system make sense.

Would A + B = B make sense, though? They either round up or down.

I think trend grading would be more fair.... A + B = B and B + A = A. This is assuming that we will never go to a percent system.


Another idea... What if the grade continued from the start of the semester until the end of the semester. Quarter 1 report card would be more of a "progress report." The overall final grade will be the overall percentage of all the work from the very start of the semester. I am sure there are negatives of this system too, but it might be overall more fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You cannot talk about "overall degradation of student initiative" without speaking to the grade inflation that is the calculation of semester grades (the old A + B = A or B + C = B nonsense). Absurd. Teens are smart enough to game the system. Make the system make sense.

Would A + B = B make sense, though? They either round up or down.

I think trend grading would be more fair.... A + B = B and B + A = A. This is assuming that we will never go to a percent system.


Another idea... What if the grade continued from the start of the semester until the end of the semester. Quarter 1 report card would be more of a "progress report." The overall final grade will be the overall percentage of all the work from the very start of the semester. I am sure there are negatives of this system too, but it might be overall more fair.

This sounds like rolling grade book.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our issue has been that teachers unevenly applied getting rid of the 50% rule. Two of my sophomore's teachers eliminated it first quarter. One did not post any deadlines, and did not respond when we emailed to ask about deadlines and whether anything is accepted after deadline. The teacher was behind on grading so it was impossible to see what was really missing and what she just hadn't graded. My kid who usually gets all As and the occassional B wound up with a D and C. He's on an IEP and I found out after the quarter was over that the stricter deadlines should not have even applied to him since his IEP entitles him to extra time. Just a mess all around and now I'm worried that the D and C will mess up his college chances. The teacher that gave him a D had only positive feedback about him at conferences.

Same experience here but my kid on 504. Has extra time but still ends up with a zero sometimes. Response from some teachers is have to ask for extra time ahead of time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You cannot talk about "overall degradation of student initiative" without speaking to the grade inflation that is the calculation of semester grades (the old A + B = A or B + C = B nonsense). Absurd. Teens are smart enough to game the system. Make the system make sense.

Would A + B = B make sense, though? They either round up or down.

I think trend grading would be more fair.... A + B = B and B + A = A. This is assuming that we will never go to a percent system.


Another idea... What if the grade continued from the start of the semester until the end of the semester. Quarter 1 report card would be more of a "progress report." The overall final grade will be the overall percentage of all the work from the very start of the semester. I am sure there are negatives of this system too, but it might be overall more fair.

This sounds like rolling grade book.

I did not know this had an official name. Thank you for replying.

Do you know any local systems using rolling grade book? What are the pros and cons?

[Anonymous]

This is a trash article. It is just a bunch of opinions with absolutely no data and one anecdote from a former MCPS student who got one bad grade in a lab class at a Cal Poly campus.

I've had 4 kids in MCPS schools. Two graduated from MCPS highschools, the other two went to private highschools. I know lots of MCPS kids who went on to college and graduated. Were they ready for college? I don't know, but, they were able to get a degree.

I do know a handful of kids who took longer to get their degree (or dropped out completely). These kids were in majors not suited to them OR the school was a bad fit period. People here are too quick to push kids into stem majors like engineering and to send kids far away who aren't really ready. I don't think any of these kids "failures" can be blamed on MCPS grading policies.

Show me the data that says MCPS students are not ready for college.

[Anonymous]

THIS POLICY DOES NOT EXIST ANYMORE.

But as usual, MCPS-bashing attracts a whole lot of people who just pile on, not caring one bit whether what they're saying is true or not.