Has Anyone Been Able to See Their Child's Mid-Term Exams?

[Anonymous]

PP here, not a teacher, but mom of a child with a disability. You are fighting so hard to see a test, when the information you want, ways to help your child develop test taking strategies and better prepare, can be accomplished through other means. You're in the middle of a pissing contest with the school and your daughter is never going to win unless you end it and move on. Ask to talk with the teachers about your specific questions. They can help you understand without without your seeing the tests. You can accomplish this through a series of emails so you will not have to take even a minute off work.

I really disagree with this. The test and where she struggles provides very valuable information in managing disabilities and coming up with strategies to deal with this in the future. My DD's learning disability was identified when she was getting things wrong on unit tests that she understood.

Two other things. The PPs are right about teaching your daughter to self advocate. She can have these same conversations with her teachers and you can follow up.

Yes and no but as a teenage student she has to be deferential to the teachers. She can't really advocate for herself as if she was an adult.

Finally, you're credibility is starting to be questionable. I have never seen a MCPS teacher refuse to meet with a student during lunch. In fact, the teachers in our MS initiate the meetings whenever a kid is not performing to the expected level. And, kids don't want to miss PE either because that's tested and graded just like other classes.

I can see this happening. We've had wonderful and amazing teachers but we've also had teachers who only do what their union contract requires of them. We seen teachers in MCPS with amazing abilities but we have seen a few that should be managed out or fired.

[Anonymous]

I do not have the same situation as the OP but I did request a meeting with my child's Math teacher in 5th grade to review some unit assessments. I was shown my child's unit assessment and also shown an analysis of the kind of questions dc got wrong. I did not get to keep dc's test because the unit assessments are kept by MCPS. This seems reasonable to me - I imagine it would be very difficult to produce new unit assessments every year. Based on the meeting, I learned that my child might have trouble with a couple of key concepts and that dc might also have to work on test strategies. I don't think I need to review the exact questions dc got wrong to help dc work on these concepts.
I think if my child was in high school, I might expect dc to review the test with the teacher on his own and tell me what he learned from the meeting. i might then follow up with an email to the teacher to make sure everyone is on the same page - do Johnny and the teacher agree on what the problems were and do they agree on the best way forward.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do not have the same situation as the OP but I did request a meeting with my child's Math teacher in 5th grade to review some unit assessments. I was shown my child's unit assessment and also shown an analysis of the kind of questions dc got wrong. I did not get to keep dc's test because the unit assessments are kept by MCPS. This seems reasonable to me - I imagine it would be very difficult to produce new unit assessments every year. Based on the meeting, I learned that my child might have trouble with a couple of key concepts and that dc might also have to work on test strategies. I don't think I need to review the exact questions dc got wrong to help dc work on these concepts.
I think if my child was in high school, I might expect dc to review the test with the teacher on his own and tell me what he learned from the meeting. i might then follow up with an email to the teacher to make sure everyone is on the same page - do Johnny and the teacher agree on what the problems were and do they agree on the best way forward.

Well stated! Hopefully you'll do what you say when your child reaches HS; let him review tests with his teachers himself. Let him self-advocate. Allow him to grow up, unlike the OP. She could take a lesson or two from you!

[Anonymous]

Parent of LD child here. While I agree that learning self-advocacy is important, there is a middle ground on the journey to learning this -- not the parent doing it, not the child doing it. IME, it takes many years for the LD child to learn complete self-advocacy -- it comes at different times for different subjects and set-backs may occur with different teachers.

It has also been our experience that most of the teachers our LD child has encountered don't really know very much about LDs in general, and certainly not much about the specific LDs our DC has. This makes self-advocacy very difficult. We have been in situations where DC has come to the teacher and specifically discussed problems related to the LD and asked for help and the teacher has been demeaning, unhelpful or just punished DC. When the teacher is LD-knowledgeable, of course, we work with the teacher to have DC self-advocate.

Another complication is, since DC is quite bright, DC can compensate for the LD in a number of ways, but this might not be completely effective. So, DC ends up flailing in something, but the teacher often doesn't realize at all the underlying cause of the problems, or brushes them off as lack of motivation because DC is "smart". This is a classic problem LD kids face (LD being misinterpreted as lack of motivation), and it pains me to read the jaded words of some teacher PPs above.

OP, please try to continue to advocate with your child. That is what is best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent of LD child here. While I agree that learning self-advocacy is important, there is a middle ground on the journey to learning this -- not the parent doing it, not the child doing it. IME, it takes many years for the LD child to learn complete self-advocacy -- it comes at different times for different subjects and set-backs may occur with different teachers.

It has also been our experience that most of the teachers our LD child has encountered don't really know very much about LDs in general, and certainly not much about the specific LDs our DC has. This makes self-advocacy very difficult. We have been in situations where DC has come to the teacher and specifically discussed problems related to the LD and asked for help and the teacher has been demeaning, unhelpful or just punished DC. When the teacher is LD-knowledgeable, of course, we work with the teacher to have DC self-advocate.

Another complication is, since DC is quite bright, DC can compensate for the LD in a number of ways, but this might not be completely effective. So, DC ends up flailing in something, but the teacher often doesn't realize at all the underlying cause of the problems, or brushes them off as lack of motivation because DC is "smart". This is a classic problem LD kids face (LD being misinterpreted as lack of motivation), and it pains me to read the jaded words of some teacher PPs above.

OP, please try to continue to advocate with your child. That is what is best.

+ 1000. Thanks to the PP above. It takes someone who has walked the road you are on to understand your journey. Not the OP but another parent with a LD child.

When trying to advocate, my daughter has often been accused of being disrespectful or out right ignored by the teacher. Her disability is often misunderstood even by the special educators at the school.

If my daughter asks for my help when she has hit a brick wall, I gladly lend a hand. Too bad there is often no one at the school level that offers her the same type of support.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

PP here, not a teacher, but mom of a child with a disability. You are fighting so hard to see a test, when the information you want, ways to help your child develop test taking strategies and better prepare, can be accomplished through other means. You're in the middle of a pissing contest with the school and your daughter is never going to win unless you end it and move on. Ask to talk with the teachers about your specific questions. They can help you understand without without your seeing the tests. You can accomplish this through a series of emails so you will not have to take even a minute off work.

I really disagree with this. The test and where she struggles provides very valuable information in managing disabilities and coming up with strategies to deal with this in the future. My DD's learning disability was identified when she was getting things wrong on unit tests that she understood.

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You don't need the actual test to get good and even great feedback as to how she performs. Examples from teachers will be just as good. Again, as a parent of amSN middle schooler, I have never had to see the actual test to get this feedback. Teachers have always been able to tell me with specificity what my child is doing and what is going wrong with the thinking process. It really seems that you are in a pissing contest and should consider alternatives. I say this because you reject all suggestions for gathering the information you want in favor of only seeing the test.

[Anonymous]

Getting back to the title of the thread -

After about 50 posts it seems that the answer is no. Parents have not been able to see their child's mid-term exams.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Getting back to the title of the thread -

After about 50 posts it seems that the answer is no. Parents have not been able to see their child's mid-term exams.

No, actually OP has said that school agrees that she can see the mid-terms, but they are just jerking her around about how to schedule. They are probably hoping she will give up and go away.

Other PPs share how a school has refused them and they have, presumably not pursued in writing referencing FERPA, or a school has made it difficult, or a school has offered an alternative like meeting with a teacher to discuss exam performance instead of seeing the test.

Some PPs have either accepted the alternatives proposed by the school or have given up.

Again, under FERPA, you have an absolute right to see the mid-term exam itself along with any answer sheet. No exceptions. You may have to sign a non-disclosure agreement, but that's it.

[Anonymous]

Let the haters hate, but I was going through my child's report card from last year and realized her Science final exam grade in June was never posted. She took it but got an X. What is an X? She took it. Oh well. Guess I should have looked closer at the report cards that came home while we were on vacation. Didn't matter much anyway. Wouldn't have changed her final grade at all. But definitely someone screwed up in the data entry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Let the haters hate, but I was going through my child's report card from last year and realized her Science final exam grade in June was never posted. She took it but got an X. What is an X? She took it. Oh well. Guess I should have looked closer at the report cards that came home while we were on vacation. Didn't matter much anyway. Wouldn't have changed her final grade at all. But definitely someone screwed up in the data entry.

How does it not affect the final grade? Even if the 2 quarter grades are As she still needs at least a C on the final right? Or does x just not count at all? Even when my DCs in AP classes and they don't have a final during exam week in the 2nd semester they still seem to have some project that counts as the final.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Let the haters hate, but I was going through my child's report card from last year and realized her Science final exam grade in June was never posted. She took it but got an X. What is an X? She took it. Oh well. Guess I should have looked closer at the report cards that came home while we were on vacation. Didn't matter much anyway. Wouldn't have changed her final grade at all. But definitely someone screwed up in the data entry.

X means the student was excused from the final. I believe that the Principal is the only one who can authorize this. If your daughter took her final and an X was posted on her report card, it does indeed sound like a data entry error.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let the haters hate, but I was going through my child's report card from last year and realized her Science final exam grade in June was never posted. She took it but got an X. What is an X? She took it. Oh well. Guess I should have looked closer at the report cards that came home while we were on vacation. Didn't matter much anyway. Wouldn't have changed her final grade at all. But definitely someone screwed up in the data entry.

How does it not affect the final grade? Even if the 2 quarter grades are As she still needs at least a C on the final right? Or does x just not count at all? Even when my DCs in AP classes and they don't have a final during exam week in the 2nd semester they still seem to have some project that counts as the final.

She got the same grade on her report card for all four quarters. I think the exam only counts if you have different grades for the 1st or 2nd quarters or the 3rd or 4th quarters.

It was a middle school grade, so not too much weighted on it. Just a note to watch these things closer in the future. Mistakes do happen.

Which brings up the question, if kids and parents are not reviewing exams grades, say a B is posted instead of the earned A, are these data entry mistakes ever caught? I might request to look at exams just to ensure the correct grade is posted particularly in high school where grades go on a child's transcript.

[Anonymous]

What's up with the "secure location" for these "secured documents"? Anyone know where all the paper goes and how long it is kept. I wonder if the secure location is the trash dumpster outside the school since my school cannot tell me where the exams went to and who to contact to schedule an appointment.

Can the school retrieve the exams after they go off site?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's up with the "secure location" for these "secured documents"? Anyone know where all the paper goes and how long it is kept. I wonder if the secure location is the trash dumpster outside the school since my school cannot tell me where the exams went to and who to contact to schedule an appointment.

Can the school retrieve the exams after they go off site?

From the first page of this thread:

Midterms and finals are held on-site in a secure location (a special closet in the office, for example) until all tests are graded and accounted for. Some students may be making up an exam, thus the difference in how long they are held on-site, and perhaps some staff members have received different information about when the tests would be sent. Don't think it's a big secret, it's just mixed messages that are being passed on to you. The tests are eventually processed by a testing coordinator and shipped out... to wherever secure materials hang out until they're allowed to be shredded.

At one point, they were taken to the Dept of Materials Management, and are held for five years. Then they get shredded.