Does everyone get all or mostly As at APS in HS?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe keep questions like this to yourself? Obviously there are kids out there getting bad grades and struggling in school.

Keep questions to yourself. Nice. I guess they should also come up with the answers themself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe keep questions like this to yourself? Obviously there are kids out there getting bad grades and struggling in school.

Keep questions to yourself. Nice. I guess they should also come up with the answers themself.

DP - The question really seems facetious. Of course not everyone gets As. Either OP was clueless or a troll (which kind of worked).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe keep questions like this to yourself? Obviously there are kids out there getting bad grades and struggling in school.

Keep questions to yourself. Nice. I guess they should also come up with the answers themself.

Sometimes to ask is to answer, so maybe that’s exactly what they should do.

[Anonymous]

Not everyone gets As. But a lot of kids get As. As someone said on here, it’s not like the Big 3 in DC where very smart kids (who could sail through APS) get Bs. Or TJ, where Bs are much more common among kids who would be too tier in APS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe keep questions like this to yourself? Obviously there are kids out there getting bad grades and struggling in school.

Keep questions to yourself. Nice. I guess they should also come up with the answers themself.

They already knew the answer. They were just being ridiculous or looking to start a fight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will never understand why people want their kids to have to work so hard. They are still kids! They have the rest of their life to work their fingers to the bone trying to be successful. It isn't like they need to learn this lesson now or they will fail at life. I promise.

First of all, instilling a strong work ethic when young is a lot more successful than trying to instill it after 20 years of not being held to giving best effort and working to meet challenges.

Second of all, it isn't about making them work so hard. It's about them LEARNING and being prepared for hard work later for the rest of their life's success.

I will never understand why so many people want their kids to do absolutely nothing difficult, not experience any bad feelings, never fail even in the smallest things to the smallest degree, never be expected to do anything they find unpleasant or hard, and then expect them to suddenly be fully responsible adults who appreciate ethe value of working or doing the necessary stuff that isn't exciting and fun in order to do what they really want to do.

I don't want my kid to do nothing difficult, but he is in school learning new stuff every day. I don't think he needs to study for hours each day in order to learn and be successful. Furthermore, school is not the only place to learn that life can be unpleasant or hard and I certainly don't expect school to be the one to turn my kid into a responsible adult. You can also always have your kid go above and beyond

And also, these questions bother me because as someone else mentioned they are all coming from a place is privileged. I mean you are shocked that your smart kid who has known the value of education their entire life and you have probably been educated from the moment they came out of the womb seems to have an easy time in school and learning come easy to them? Of course, there are plenty of people who don't get straight As in high school. There are plenty of people that graduate HS not being able to read on a HS level. There are plenty of people that drop out of HS. There are kids that are struggling each and every day for school and it is hard for them. I had one of those kids until I spent thousands of dollars fixing it.

So, yes, our kids with all the educational privileges in the world will probably have an easier time. That doesn't mean the school failed them and it doesn't mean they will be unprepared in life.

Thank you. It reminds me of the people who teach their preschoolers to read and do a bunch of math, then complain that they are bored in kindergarten.

Isn’t the purpose of giving our kids lots of resources and opportunities when they’re young (talking to them, reading to them, taking them to museums and historical sites, playing math games, etc) intended to give them a leg up? To facilitate their learning?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well if your daughter is in AP classes and comparing grades with just friends - who I assume are also in AP classes - then you’re looking at a data set of students who all strive for As.

As an APS HS sped teacher, I can say that no, not everybody gets A’s. 15 students across my 5 classes failed for the year, and that includes 1 senior who will not be able to graduate and a junior who had a baby earlier this year.

If you’re looking for an actual answer, I’d suggest you look outside of your bubble and ask the parents of struggling students if “everybody gets As.”

Yep, APS is and continues to be focused on the outside the bubble kids. Which is fine and a conscious choice of this community. It doesn’t help my kids, however, who are high achieving. And we as parents will do best for our own kids, that’s the deal. So I pulled them for private school. And I’m not the only one.

So this post doesn't even apply to you. Other bubble kids are doing just fine.

Confused. Do you mean other high achieving kids are doing fine? And, if by doing “fine,” you mean they feel good as they are easily earning As then I disagree. My kid could also be described as fine when s/he gets to eat cake all day and play video games. Just because it’s easy doesn’t make it alright for these kids. I don’t believe that that kind of “fine” is what is best in the long run for my kid or the other high achieving kids.

Yes. My high achieving kid, who is referred to as being a bubble in this chain, is getting As, scoring 4s and 5s and has high SAT scores. They are doing fine. They also don't mess around playing video games b/c they know how to behave in school.

Great for you. Sounds like your child may have a shot at UVA 🙄

I want my child to experience significant setback, failure and to learn grit while child is under my wing. So I challenged them by removing them from APS easy world of As. For us (and I think for a lot of others), its system of grade inflation is a huge downside. My children too were earning As with little to no effort and never experienced academic failure (not an F but I mean some suggestion that an A was something incredibly difficult to achieve and set their work apart). To each their own. Glad your kid is working hard for their As. My kids just didn’t have to and that wasn’t enough for me.

There’s a wide gulf between “requiring hard work” and “incredibly difficult to achieve.” Why would we ever need an A to be “incredibly difficult” to get? What purpose does that serve? That wasn’t even true in the vast majority of my college & (STEM) grad school classes.

Are you serious? Achieving an A grade should be "incredibly difficult". What exactly are you teaching your kid if everyone gets As for little to no work? How does that prepare your kid for life?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well if your daughter is in AP classes and comparing grades with just friends - who I assume are also in AP classes - then you’re looking at a data set of students who all strive for As.

As an APS HS sped teacher, I can say that no, not everybody gets A’s. 15 students across my 5 classes failed for the year, and that includes 1 senior who will not be able to graduate and a junior who had a baby earlier this year.

If you’re looking for an actual answer, I’d suggest you look outside of your bubble and ask the parents of struggling students if “everybody gets As.”

Yep, APS is and continues to be focused on the outside the bubble kids. Which is fine and a conscious choice of this community. It doesn’t help my kids, however, who are high achieving. And we as parents will do best for our own kids, that’s the deal. So I pulled them for private school. And I’m not the only one.

So this post doesn't even apply to you. Other bubble kids are doing just fine.

Confused. Do you mean other high achieving kids are doing fine? And, if by doing “fine,” you mean they feel good as they are easily earning As then I disagree. My kid could also be described as fine when s/he gets to eat cake all day and play video games. Just because it’s easy doesn’t make it alright for these kids. I don’t believe that that kind of “fine” is what is best in the long run for my kid or the other high achieving kids.

Yes. My high achieving kid, who is referred to as being a bubble in this chain, is getting As, scoring 4s and 5s and has high SAT scores. They are doing fine. They also don't mess around playing video games b/c they know how to behave in school.

Great for you. Sounds like your child may have a shot at UVA 🙄

I want my child to experience significant setback, failure and to learn grit while child is under my wing. So I challenged them by removing them from APS easy world of As. For us (and I think for a lot of others), its system of grade inflation is a huge downside. My children too were earning As with little to no effort and never experienced academic failure (not an F but I mean some suggestion that an A was something incredibly difficult to achieve and set their work apart). To each their own. Glad your kid is working hard for their As. My kids just didn’t have to and that wasn’t enough for me.

There’s a wide gulf between “requiring hard work” and “incredibly difficult to achieve.” Why would we ever need an A to be “incredibly difficult” to get? What purpose does that serve? That wasn’t even true in the vast majority of my college & (STEM) grad school classes.

Are you serious? Achieving an A grade should be "incredibly difficult". What exactly are you teaching your kid if everyone gets As for little to no work? How does that prepare your kid for life?

I disagree. Yes, it should require hard work, effort, and actual learning but does not need to be a Herculean task. An A should actually be attainable by most students, if the teacher teaches the material well and provides fair assessments.

[Anonymous]

If most students attain an A, then there is no way to differentiate between students and grades become meaningless.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If most students attain an A, then there is no way to differentiate between students and grades become meaningless.

I said most should be able to attain it. Whether they do or not depends on whether they put in the required effort. Many won’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If most students attain an A, then there is no way to differentiate between students and grades become meaningless.

I said most should be able to attain it. Whether they do or not depends on whether they put in the required effort. Many won’t.

"A" is supposed to be the top of the crop. "B" is still "above average" and "C" is "average." So, actually, MOST students should be getting D's - B's (covering the average range). That's just not how the grading system in this country is actually applied.
I had an 8th grade social studies teacher who actually used the Bell curve for grading. Every quiz, every test, he put the scores up on the board, drew the curve, and marked off where the A's, B's, C's, D's, and yes-believe-it-or-not-F's were. So theoretically, you could score a 70 and get an "A." Whether one agrees with this approach or not, theoretically, this is what an "A" should reflect - a top performing student.

While I think grades should reflect specific levels of achievement, I do also believe truly top and outstanding students should be distinguished somehow. Not all straight "A" students are equal, and not all 4.0's are the same. There are subjective aspects to just about any grading system and different factors reflected - ie, dropping a middle school grade for a high school class v. someone who did not; someone dropping band because the "A" was dragging down there GPA; a straight-A student whose interests and talents lean toward the arts and takes more of those classes of which there aren't AP options, instead of other APs as additional electives; etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If most students attain an A, then there is no way to differentiate between students and grades become meaningless.

I said most should be able to attain it. Whether they do or not depends on whether they put in the required effort. Many won’t.

"A" is supposed to be the top of the crop. "B" is still "above average" and "C" is "average." So, actually, MOST students should be getting D's - B's (covering the average range). That's just not how the grading system in this country is actually applied.
I had an 8th grade social studies teacher who actually used the Bell curve for grading. Every quiz, every test, he put the scores up on the board, drew the curve, and marked off where the A's, B's, C's, D's, and yes-believe-it-or-not-F's were. So theoretically, you could score a 70 and get an "A." Whether one agrees with this approach or not, theoretically, this is what an "A" should reflect - a top performing student.

While I think grades should reflect specific levels of achievement, I do also believe truly top and outstanding students should be distinguished somehow. Not all straight "A" students are equal, and not all 4.0's are the same. There are subjective aspects to just about any grading system and different factors reflected - ie, dropping a middle school grade for a high school class v. someone who did not; someone dropping band because the "A" was dragging down there GPA; a straight-A student whose interests and talents lean toward the arts and takes more of those classes of which there aren't AP options, instead of other APs as additional electives; etc.

As you say, a bell curve isn’t how grades have been applied in the US (in most cases) for decades. Why are you clinging to that? And to be honest, it was kind of a crappy system assuming an even distribution of talent & effort in every class. That’s silly. The goal these days is for every kid to learn, not to weed out most of the kids in each class.

An A should mean that you put in all the work, learned the material, and thus scored well on the assessments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If most students attain an A, then there is no way to differentiate between students and grades become meaningless.

I said most should be able to attain it. Whether they do or not depends on whether they put in the required effort. Many won’t.

"A" is supposed to be the top of the crop. "B" is still "above average" and "C" is "average." So, actually, MOST students should be getting D's - B's (covering the average range). That's just not how the grading system in this country is actually applied.
I had an 8th grade social studies teacher who actually used the Bell curve for grading. Every quiz, every test, he put the scores up on the board, drew the curve, and marked off where the A's, B's, C's, D's, and yes-believe-it-or-not-F's were. So theoretically, you could score a 70 and get an "A." Whether one agrees with this approach or not, theoretically, this is what an "A" should reflect - a top performing student.

While I think grades should reflect specific levels of achievement, I do also believe truly top and outstanding students should be distinguished somehow. Not all straight "A" students are equal, and not all 4.0's are the same. There are subjective aspects to just about any grading system and different factors reflected - ie, dropping a middle school grade for a high school class v. someone who did not; someone dropping band because the "A" was dragging down there GPA; a straight-A student whose interests and talents lean toward the arts and takes more of those classes of which there aren't AP options, instead of other APs as additional electives; etc.

As you say, a bell curve isn’t how grades have been applied in the US (in most cases) for decades. Why are you clinging to that? And to be honest, it was kind of a crappy system assuming an even distribution of talent & effort in every class. That’s silly. The goal these days is for every kid to learn, not to weed out most of the kids in each class.

An A should mean that you put in all the work, learned the material, and thus scored well on the assessments.

I'm not clinging. I was just sharing an anecdote and expressing my opinion that an "A" should mean something particularly noteworthy and outstanding.
And I disagree that the goal today is for every kid to learn. The goal today is for every kid to reach a minimum standard, not a particularly high one at that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If most students attain an A, then there is no way to differentiate between students and grades become meaningless.

I said most should be able to attain it. Whether they do or not depends on whether they put in the required effort. Many won’t.

"A" is supposed to be the top of the crop. "B" is still "above average" and "C" is "average." So, actually, MOST students should be getting D's - B's (covering the average range). That's just not how the grading system in this country is actually applied.
I had an 8th grade social studies teacher who actually used the Bell curve for grading. Every quiz, every test, he put the scores up on the board, drew the curve, and marked off where the A's, B's, C's, D's, and yes-believe-it-or-not-F's were. So theoretically, you could score a 70 and get an "A." Whether one agrees with this approach or not, theoretically, this is what an "A" should reflect - a top performing student.

While I think grades should reflect specific levels of achievement, I do also believe truly top and outstanding students should be distinguished somehow. Not all straight "A" students are equal, and not all 4.0's are the same. There are subjective aspects to just about any grading system and different factors reflected - ie, dropping a middle school grade for a high school class v. someone who did not; someone dropping band because the "A" was dragging down there GPA; a straight-A student whose interests and talents lean toward the arts and takes more of those classes of which there aren't AP options, instead of other APs as additional electives; etc.

As you say, a bell curve isn’t how grades have been applied in the US (in most cases) for decades. Why are you clinging to that? And to be honest, it was kind of a crappy system assuming an even distribution of talent & effort in every class. That’s silly. The goal these days is for every kid to learn, not to weed out most of the kids in each class.

An A should mean that you put in all the work, learned the material, and thus scored well on the assessments.

I'm not clinging. I was just sharing an anecdote and expressing my opinion that an "A" should mean something particularly noteworthy and outstanding.
And I disagree that the goal today is for every kid to learn. The goal today is for every kid to reach a minimum standard, not a particularly high one at that.

+1