Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This notion that grades should be a bell curve is archaic and dumb.

School is intended to help kids learn. It's OK if there are a lot of As handed out if they learn. It's not like they should be rationed.

Especially if you have already screened admissions for high performers. If you are accepting kids who always got all As, why would you expect 75% of the them suddenly become poor students? And if your A students are also performing at the top of other standardized tests like APs or SATs, then you are not inflating. When your average SAT scores is above 1400, you should expect half the class to have A averages.

Except for the fact that their teachers- faculty that have seen excellent students come and go for decades- are the one's deciding who's work is truly " A" work. Unless its a math test or a science subject, that is.

Look at it this way: the Medici founded an Art studio and invited certain artists to join, but not others. At one time they had Michaelangelo and Botticelli along side each other in the same studio garden with a Medici deciding for himself who's work was worthy of his patronage. I am , of course, pushing the argument to an extreme example, but when faculty become accustomed to really, really bright kids AND very hard workers then who gets an " A" becomes rarified.

Still, the kids who benefit most from an STA education are the middle of the pack who might never get A's but just learn to work really , really hard while being humbled- the kind of self-discipline that serves them well for their lifetime.

I think an A at NCS is 94 or 95 and with high standards this is not easy.
I know one private school that has actually changed the bands of grades so that what used to be a B+ is now an A.
This is in direct response to grade inflation elsewhere.
I listened to a college counseling session yesterday that noted that 45% of high school graduates in the US have straight A’s.
That means literally not one B. Covid has made a mockery of grading.
The reason people care is what everyone keeps telling these kids is that the only thing that really matters in college applications is grades. They make good grades impossible to achieve and then wonder why the kids are demoralized.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This notion that grades should be a bell curve is archaic and dumb.

School is intended to help kids learn. It's OK if there are a lot of As handed out if they learn. It's not like they should be rationed.

Especially if you have already screened admissions for high performers. If you are accepting kids who always got all As, why would you expect 75% of the them suddenly become poor students? And if your A students are also performing at the top of other standardized tests like APs or SATs, then you are not inflating. When your average SAT scores is above 1400, you should expect half the class to have A averages.

This “screening” occurs mostly at ninth grade - a little at MS. The lifers drag it down.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This notion that grades should be a bell curve is archaic and dumb.

School is intended to help kids learn. It's OK if there are a lot of As handed out if they learn. It's not like they should be rationed.

Especially if you have already screened admissions for high performers. If you are accepting kids who always got all As, why would you expect 75% of the them suddenly become poor students? And if your A students are also performing at the top of other standardized tests like APs or SATs, then you are not inflating. When your average SAT scores is above 1400, you should expect half the class to have A averages.

I could not agree with you more. I would expect more As at a some of these really competitive schools because of the students that attend.

Anonymous wrote:This notion that grades should be a bell curve is archaic and dumb.

School is intended to help kids learn. It's OK if there are a lot of As handed out if they learn. It's not like they should be rationed.

Especially if you have already screened admissions for high performers. If you are accepting kids who always got all As, why would you expect 75% of the them suddenly become poor students? And if your A students are also performing at the top of other standardized tests like APs or SATs, then you are not inflating. When your average SAT scores is above 1400, you should expect half the class to have A averages.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This notion that grades should be a bell curve is archaic and dumb.

School is intended to help kids learn. It's OK if there are a lot of As handed out if they learn. It's not like they should be rationed.

Real life is a bell curve. Everybody doesn't belong at the high end. There are a few exceptional people and there are a few who are below average. Most people are in the middle.

That's not actually true.

Like the cherry blossoms at the Tidal Basin so is the grade deflation thread on the private school forum a most perfect herald of spring.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This notion that grades should be a bell curve is archaic and dumb.

School is intended to help kids learn. It's OK if there are a lot of As handed out if they learn. It's not like they should be rationed.

Real life is a bell curve. Everybody doesn't belong at the high end. There are a few exceptional people and there are a few who are below average. Most people are in the middle.

The problem with this (to the extent it is true at all) is that no one is at either tail end for all aspects of “real life”. You are above average or exceptional in only very few narrow aspects of life. For everything else, you are average or worse. Think about your area of expertise, and then think of how little the average person knows about that. You are that second person for the vast majority of “real life”. So am I, and so is everyone else.

At places like Sidwell, NCS and StA the kids who get lots of As are really, really smart.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps parents should stop stressing the importance of earning As and, instead, emphasize the importance of doing your best?

Will college admissions offices do the same?

Isn’t it all about the journey?

LOL deep learning

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps parents should stop stressing the importance of earning As and, instead, emphasize the importance of doing your best?

Will college admissions offices do the same?

Isn’t it all about the journey?

LOL. As soon as I saw the subject title, i knew this was on Private school forum... And I was right!! OP, no grade deflation. Just tell your kiddo to study.

Anonymous wrote:This notion that grades should be a bell curve is archaic and dumb.

School is intended to help kids learn. It's OK if there are a lot of As handed out if they learn. It's not like they should be rationed.

Real life is a bell curve. Everybody doesn't belong at the high end. There are a few exceptional people and there are a few who are below average. Most people are in the middle.

Anonymous wrote:Which has more grade deflation for the same work/same level of performance on an exam or an essay (at the high school level):

NCS
STA
Potomac
Sidwell

What percent of the class gets As, A-s, B+, B on average in classes at each school?

Most Northeast (Boston) private schools give 25% full As, and center around A-/high B+ so that if you do the work you are in the A/A- range.

Is that true of the 4 schools above? (I am not including GDS, or MCPS, or FCPS because these have different distributions).

I think DC's class at STA had about 85 students. Of that, I think about 15 graduated cum laude, which based on DC's average at graduation ( 94 ) are the subset who graduated with an A average while simultaneously taking all AP/honors level classes for their last 3 years of HS.

The rest of the 85 or so, I would assume graduated with an average less than a 90 % and/or had that average but achieved it taking non- AP or non-honors tract.

As far as " grade deflation" at STA/NCS, I don't think this intentionally happens, but what does happen over time is that when a school admits, year after year, only the very brightest students and the teachers have been teaching there for decades a certain expectation becomes part of the culture. I'd add that that is a very good thing because every one being taught there is challenged, and has the opportunity to work very hard and get a GREAT education .

Learning to work your A** off and be very disciplined in your formative years is just about the most effective way to increase your chances for success in life. Of course, you might get mostly B+'s and you might not end up at Harvard or Princeton, but it is very likely that for the rest of your life you will kick the pants off of those who do.

That can be said for all graduates of STA/NCS.

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps parents should stop stressing the importance of earning As and, instead, emphasize the importance of doing your best?

Will college admissions offices do the same?