We’ve had 13 days of school. How’s the new grading policy going?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This thread is so depressing. Nobody wants their taxes to go up, but without more money, how do we prevent schools from being overcrowded and class sizes from being too big to be manageable and teachers’ workloads from being twice as many hours as they’re paid for?

I don’t want my taxes to go up. The county has the money, but they mismanage and spend on unnecessary pet projects instead of paying teachers.

And this continues to be why we can’t have nice things. How much do people think should be allocated per student in average. Multiply that by 165k and that will give you the minimum amount the county needs.

Montgomery County sees its citizens as an endless piggy bank. No, I do not want my taxes to go up when the money is already there. Read what I wrote. The county has the money but does not prioritize teachers pay. Rather they spend it on pet projects for feel good headlines.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Blame the teachers. Business as usual. Pay no mind for the fact that they need like 80 hours to do a proper job. It's a churn and burn profession with no respect.

Exactly. I spent most of my weekend grading. My family was out enjoying the fall weather while I sat at my dining room table for two days.

My morale is in the basement and I’m extremely worried about my health, but my grades are up to date.

Then, if something is going on quit or take a leave of absense.

Should all of us quit or take a leave of absence? Because this isn’t merely MY problem. When you have 150 students and no time to grade, it becomes your weekend work. Every weekend. Most of my colleagues were working, too. And the health issues? It’s chronic stress and many of us deal with it.

Who do you think is replacing the teachers who take your advice?

You make it sound like real health issues. Stress is not. Some of us have real health issues. I wish it were only stress.

There are always new teachers.

1. Stress leads to: cardiovascular disease, gastrointestinal diseases, tension, weakened immune systems, hormonal imbalances, anxiety, sleep disturbances, etc. I’m seeing specialists right now because of stress-induced trauma on my body. So don’t discredit stress. It’s extremely disrespectful to those of us who deal with a lot of it.

2. Who are these new teachers? Can you send them our way? Also, you’ll accept a revolving door of teachers for your child? Do you want skill and experience, or just any random body? For all that’s demanded of teachers, I find it fascinating that you find us so disposable and replaceable.

MCPS is mostly staffed.

You are disrespectful as many of us have equally hard jobs and REAL health issues. I've been seeing specialists for years and my issues are far worse than yours and genetic so I was born with them. I'm lucky I'm not dead yet. Want to trade?

Wow. I merely asked you not to be dismissive and disrespectful. You have no idea what REAL and chronic health issues I have that are exacerbated by my job. You fired back with disrespect, mockery and rudeness.

I’m sorry your life is rough. Sincerely. It must be to warrant that type of response.

Stress is not a serious health issue. Yes, some of us have real life long health issues so don’t tell us we don’t know when we do. Stress can be managed. Find a new profession.

I really hope you aren’t a medical professional because stress 100% can lead to death if not treated. Please find another forum to troll. Thanks.

Thank you. I’m the Pp who mentioned the extremely serious health issue I’m facing that is exacerbating by my work stress. I decided not to comment back to that PP because of how hateful his/her responses have been.

I can’t imagine belittling others about their health issues. It’s just so… wrong.

Thank you for your support.

[Anonymous]

It looks fine from my end, as the parent of a HS sophomore and an 8th grader.

The high schooler has a lot of work, but it appears to be posted/graded on a normal cadence. The middle schooler has less, obviously.

If there's any difference at all from last year, it might be a few additional gimme assignments. These aren't difficult, but they do provide a chance for motivated kids to build a "buffer" against one bad score.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Blame the teachers. Business as usual. Pay no mind for the fact that they need like 80 hours to do a proper job. It's a churn and burn profession with no respect.

Exactly. I spent most of my weekend grading. My family was out enjoying the fall weather while I sat at my dining room table for two days.

My morale is in the basement and I’m extremely worried about my health, but my grades are up to date.

Then, if something is going on quit or take a leave of absense.

I did quit. The job is impossible to do. It really is unsustainable.

I’m joining you. It really is impossible.

And the more you give, the more that’s expected of you. The entire system is built on teachers’ extra labor. And they know we’ll put in 5 extra hours on a Thursday and 8 on a Saturday because we have to.

Meanwhile, there’s a thread in the Jobs and Career section of this site about off-hour meetings, and it’s filled with people posting that they won’t work off hours without pay. And that idea is supported by others.

But we demand off-hours work of our teachers. Heck, teachers are “bad” and “hurting kids” if we don’t.

Most jobs are not 8 hours a day. Mine never has been and I often do paperwork and reports and notes in the evening and weekends although I get paid less by the county and worse benefits.

So, become a teacher!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a professor and I've also taught at the high school level.

Ten day turnaround is entirely reasonable. You have to grade them at some point. Why not grade them in a timely fashion so that the student can benefit from the feedback?

Can you recommend a way to do that?

Let’s say you have 150 essays. Each will take 15 minutes to score. That’s 37.5 sustained hours of grading for that assignment alone.

If you divide the work by 10 days, including weekends, you are adding 3.75 hours of work to each day. If you give yourself the weekend off, you’re adding 4.7 hours of work to each work day.

You have one planning period. Maybe you can get 40 minutes of grading in.

And that’s just for that one assignment. That doesn’t include emails, data, meetings, planning lessons, meeting with students, running clubs, other assignments, or other duties as assigned.

So, considering the circumstances, can you offer a recommendation? How did you get this done in 10 days?

English assignments should be evaluated and marked first by peers as a class activity, then by students 3 grades higher for SSL hours or part-time job paying half of what teachers earn, then finalized by teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a professor and I've also taught at the high school level.

Ten day turnaround is entirely reasonable. You have to grade them at some point. Why not grade them in a timely fashion so that the student can benefit from the feedback?

Can you recommend a way to do that?

Let’s say you have 150 essays. Each will take 15 minutes to score. That’s 37.5 sustained hours of grading for that assignment alone.

If you divide the work by 10 days, including weekends, you are adding 3.75 hours of work to each day. If you give yourself the weekend off, you’re adding 4.7 hours of work to each work day.

You have one planning period. Maybe you can get 40 minutes of grading in.

And that’s just for that one assignment. That doesn’t include emails, data, meetings, planning lessons, meeting with students, running clubs, other assignments, or other duties as assigned.

So, considering the circumstances, can you offer a recommendation? How did you get this done in 10 days?

English assignments should be evaluated and marked first by peers as a class activity, then by students 3 grades higher for SSL hours or part-time job paying half of what teachers earn, then finalized by teachers.

This is not a pedagogically sound approach. Research shows that peer evaluation by adolescents helps the evaluator considerably more than the evaluated student.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I put aside 30 minutes each night to grade assignments as they are submitted. I know that means I'm "working for free" but it helps me keep things at a manageable level so I can get everything done in compliance with the new grading policy.

What subject and grade level?

I would be thrilled if it was just 30 min a night for seven nights.

It usually 2.5 to 3 hours a night for 4-5 nights to grade a single secondary writing assignment with comments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I put aside 30 minutes each night to grade assignments as they are submitted. I know that means I'm "working for free" but it helps me keep things at a manageable level so I can get everything done in compliance with the new grading policy.

What subject and grade level?

I would be thrilled if it was just 30 min a night for seven nights.

It usually 2.5 to 3 hours a night for 4-5 nights to grade a single secondary writing assignment with comments.

Hon. English 9.

I'm sure the grading responsibility will increase as the year progresses but so far through 3 weeks we have not done any large scale assignments. Each one takes 2-3 minutes to review and grade. When we get to larger written assignments, we have two staff members who work in the writing center who can assist with the heavy lifting of evaluating papers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I put aside 30 minutes each night to grade assignments as they are submitted. I know that means I'm "working for free" but it helps me keep things at a manageable level so I can get everything done in compliance with the new grading policy.

What subject and grade level?

I would be thrilled if it was just 30 min a night for seven nights.

It usually 2.5 to 3 hours a night for 4-5 nights to grade a single secondary writing assignment with comments.

Hon. English 9.

I'm sure the grading responsibility will increase as the year progresses but so far through 3 weeks we have not done any large scale assignments. Each one takes 2-3 minutes to review and grade. When we get to larger written assignments, we have two staff members who work in the writing center who can assist with the heavy lifting of evaluating papers.

That’s great!

The grading load is why our school has difficulty keeping English teachers. It’s usually the cited reason when people quit. If we had someone to help with essay comments, we may be able to grow some veteran department members!