More skills based grading at madison hs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Multiple teachers at back to school night openly acknowledged how confusing/ridiculous this new grading scheme was. It seemed over the top confusing to me as an adult, I can’t imagine how teens are supposed to understand it. Doesn’t seem like there is any recourse for parents/students if even the teachers are powerless to change the system. One potential idea to fix things at least for this year might be to just go with the highest score of the multiple tests on a skill, rather than this weird replacement strategy of the most recent test only.

Parent of an average, not high achieving, Oakton student here. Same with our back to school night--teachers were reluctant to embrace this grading.
I think this is here to stay, at least for the duration of my remaining time in FCPS.
Not optimistic for my child's GPA, that's for sure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Next year it’ll he back to regular grading. Chill.

that's what I thought last year. I contacted Reid's office and was told it will take years to get consistent grading in FCPS and that Madison had worked hard on this.

Why are things not consistent between school to school in the same district on something as basic as grading? Did Gatehouse force Madison, Irving MS, and whoever else is doing this type of grading into it or did the principals and school administration decide on it? I think it’s so odd how not every school in the district does things the same way, hell my kids are at 2 different ES due to one being at the base school and the other in the enhanced autism classroom at a different school and they don’t even have the same school picture providers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
that's what I thought last year. I contacted Reid's office and was told it will take years to get consistent grading in FCPS and that Madison had worked hard on this.

That's sounds like Gatehouse-speak for the Madison administration agreed to pilot SBG so they'll let Madison flounder for a while before deciding how broadly to extend it.

[Anonymous]

You will see SBG spread quickly across FCPS. Sure they will use the 100 point system for final grade conversion. Schools will have mostly Bs and Cs but that’s how you achieve equity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You will see SBG spread quickly across FCPS. Sure they will use the 100 point system for final grade conversion. Schools will have mostly Bs and Cs but that’s how you achieve equity.

Do you want your child to get a grade they didn't earn? My Madison HS student, junior, just got his report cards and it is all As and one A-. All AP and honors. My guess is his friends did just as well.

He achieved those grades because he learned the material and did the work.

[Anonymous]

Grading didn't need to be changed. This type of grading does not solve any problem. Just creates more problems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You will see SBG spread quickly across FCPS. Sure they will use the 100 point system for final grade conversion. Schools will have mostly Bs and Cs but that’s how you achieve equity.

Do you want your child to get a grade they didn't earn? My Madison HS student, junior, just got his report cards and it is all As and one A-. All AP and honors. My guess is his friends did just as well.

He achieved those grades because he learned the material and did the work.

The weird poster is back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You will see SBG spread quickly across FCPS. Sure they will use the 100 point system for final grade conversion. Schools will have mostly Bs and Cs but that’s how you achieve equity.

Correct. This movement toward SBG / “equity grading” is part of the movement to “close the racial achievement gap, from the top down.”

If you cannot lift up the lowest performing students, you can still close the gap by limiting the learning opportunities for top performing students, until they are not longer top performers.

Mission accomplished.

[Anonymous]

More on “equity grading” / achievement-gap here:

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1066612.page

Democrats in FFX just approved more of this in FCPS, with their votes for an all-dem school board.

[Anonymous]

Does Herndon High have SBG? How is it going there? That's where Rick is from. I assume his kids went there and this was the first high school they piloted this SBG with?

[Anonymous]

I teach in FCPS and worked at a school with this grading but moved to an IB school.

There is no way, whatsoever an IB can adopt this approach to assessments -- these schools have to align their grading practices to the IB standard, which do not align whatsoever with standards based grading as used in FCPS. I actually asked about this when I joined this school and they made it very, very clear it would be impossible to run two different grading systems in the school, so they are going to stick with IB assessment protocols.

So, net-net, if you want to avoid this, I would recommend considering an IB school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is how Madison explains it. It is insanity! However, it seems more like grade inflation than a detriment.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNvfPlr3YKI&t=715s

It is grade inflation for the students who would previously had failed. But it is also grade deflation at the top, which teachers confirmed at back to school night. Much harder to get an A.

Is this a way of fudging the numbers to show they've closed the achievement gap?

[Anonymous]

I want to know from Rick Wormeli how this rollout is going at Herndon High. Doesn't that school have more underperforming students that this program is trying to target?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You will see SBG spread quickly across FCPS. Sure they will use the 100 point system for final grade conversion. Schools will have mostly Bs and Cs but that’s how you achieve equity.

Do you want your child to get a grade they didn't earn? My Madison HS student, junior, just got his report cards and it is all As and one A-. All AP and honors. My guess is his friends did just as well.

He achieved those grades because he learned the material and did the work.

The weird poster is back.

Uh, this is my first post on this thread (I think--I guess I could have posted back in August when it started?).

I am just trying to look at this rationally and as a college professor. My students are expected to do all of their work, graded or not. If they skip non-graded assessments, their overall grade MAY suffer if they don't master a skill before a test or an essay. Or--they may excel on the essay and their grade isn't lowered or elevated by homework that they did or didn't to. Sometimes, they have to make decisions because of time and commitments and that is all part of learning.

I certainly wish students learned this BEFORE getting into my classroom. Right now, many of them think my job is to puff up grades with completion assignments. My job is to teach them the course content.

[Anonymous]

What exactly is wrong with students continuing to work on and be assessed on skills they haven't yet mastered throughout the year, rather than one-test-and-done?

What is wrong with grades reflecting the end of the year accomplishment?