This is also frustrating, ho can parents be responsive when grades are entered at the last minute???

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"Teachers don’t have any options for comments except the generic ones. Which I find not helpful."

This not true actually. Each grade a teacher gives offer a tiny comment box next to it if teachers want to give comments on a particular grade or offer teacher notes. Many choose not to. But there absolutely is the option.

As for the "WS" grade, be happy about it. It is intended as a grade that by definition will change when the work is submitted. Aspen is one thing but Canvas is the program that actually shows when a student submits work. The teacher is likely is trying to send you a message about productivity. Take it for what it is. Frankly the option other than WS is an F, which teachers are not allowed even give anymore. WS is a covid-era "do better and it can change but if it were a different time you would have failed" grade

Yes, teachers can write a note on each Aspen assignment that is individual. However, we do not have the option of writing notes on the actual progress report or report card. There’s a list of about 10 statements that either say your kid is wonderful or awful. Most teachers default to wonderful because very few deserve the awful ones. It would be nice to have some that were in between.

I’m curious what the comment options are. 2 of my kids’ teachers took the time to click one of the comment options, but none of the others did.

NP but I don’t write comments on many kids because the comments are all very blunt and many are not helpful. The comments are either positive ‘Good participation’ , ‘Good initiative’ or very negative ‘Does not do class work’ ‘Does not participate’ . There is no nuance. It sounds like your kid does nothing if you click the comments that are constructive criticism.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"Teachers don’t have any options for comments except the generic ones. Which I find not helpful."

This not true actually. Each grade a teacher gives offer a tiny comment box next to it if teachers want to give comments on a particular grade or offer teacher notes. Many choose not to. But there absolutely is the option.

As for the "WS" grade, be happy about it. It is intended as a grade that by definition will change when the work is submitted. Aspen is one thing but Canvas is the program that actually shows when a student submits work. The teacher is likely is trying to send you a message about productivity. Take it for what it is. Frankly the option other than WS is an F, which teachers are not allowed even give anymore. WS is a covid-era "do better and it can change but if it were a different time you would have failed" grade

Yes, teachers can write a note on each Aspen assignment that is individual. However, we do not have the option of writing notes on the actual progress report or report card. There’s a list of about 10 statements that either say your kid is wonderful or awful. Most teachers default to wonderful because very few deserve the awful ones. It would be nice to have some that were in between.

I’m curious what the comment options are. 2 of my kids’ teachers took the time to click one of the comment options, but none of the others did.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With progress reports due out soon, my kid's teachers are posting a lot of last minute grades, including one teacher who posted two 50% percent grades that say "WS" (waiting submittal). The thing is, I know for a fact that my kid submitted these assignments.

Does anyone have any advice for how to minimize the stress involved with following up to get those grades changed, or even better, how to avoid them from being graded wrong in the first place?

I know that it is annoying and I have experienced this for the past three years with my 8th grader in one way or another, but try not to stress. These are only progress reports, not the report card. When this has happened, I monitor for the next couple of days to a week and then follow up with the teacher myself. If the teacher won't respond, I follow up with the Assistant Principal and so on. Hopefully it won't come to all that though.

You are NUTS.
You (the parent) are emailing teachers and then bothering the assistant principal? Why is your kid not asking the teacher and then following up by email?
I can see why the teachers are not responding: they are likely waiting for your 8TH GRADER to learn to self advocate.

This is exactly the attitude of so many at Deal. However, not all kids can do that themselves. Kids with ADHD, anxiety, and other neuro divergence are routinely overlooked in Deal. The school DOES NOT support these students with the types of interventions known to assist students and families to ensure the students can grow to take on these responsibilities. In fact, our kid (who also falls in this group) got almost no support in 6th grade (due to pandemic and no school all year) and in 7th grade there was NO COUNSELLOR for 7th grade for more than half the school year (so our kid got no where near the support required in their 504 plan). under these conditions, parents are left to support the only way they know how.

This is NOT insane- it is NOT hovering- it is NOT "NUTS". If your kiddo can do all of that work themselves and self-advocate, that is great. STFU about how others have to approach supporting their kids to get to the same spot. Understand this is a huge struggle for many of us and we are trying to encourage and help our kids navigate a huge school with poor parent communication and very little in the way of special education services/supports.

To the OP and PPs, I feel you. We have to do the same and encourage you to reach out to the counselling team if this is a constant issue for you. We were able to work with them to finally get teachers the right 504 plan (because Deal hadn't done that by themselves) and create a system for checking in about homework assignments/quizzes/etc. instead of waiting for progress reports to highlight all they were missing.

Good luck

Anonymous wrote:So the progress report is not the end of term grade, right? When is the end of the term? Thanks!

Progress reports don’t mean anything. They’re literally a print out of what the Aspen letter grade are as a snapshot in that moment in time. Usually WS just mean the kid didn’t turn it before due date and maybe the next day. Teachers will update them before end of term. I wouldn’t worry about hounding them u til 2-3 weeks before end of term. It’s a sad reality but it is what it is. Only way to avoid it is to ensure kid doesn’t turn in anything late.

Anonymous wrote:I was told that a WS will stay in place if the student did not submit in a timely way. For example my child submitted an assignment 2 weeks late, and it still read WS and the teacher said it was because it was supposed to be done within 2 days not 2 weeks. But because it is grade 6 teacher adjusted the WS, but only because i asked about it. And hopefully my child will get on top of things. I have set up an alert in Aspen so I get notified of future WS grades.

I wish this were the case but this teacher isn’t actually following Dcps policy…

Has anyone had an experience where a WS was visible under a sub-category of assignments like "student engagement", but not visible (either as a WS or even as an assigment) when you view all assignments? I'm trying to figure out why that is the case on my kid's Aspen page.

So the progress report is not the end of term grade, right? When is the end of the term? Thanks!

I was told that a WS will stay in place if the student did not submit in a timely way. For example my child submitted an assignment 2 weeks late, and it still read WS and the teacher said it was because it was supposed to be done within 2 days not 2 weeks. But because it is grade 6 teacher adjusted the WS, but only because i asked about it. And hopefully my child will get on top of things. I have set up an alert in Aspen so I get notified of future WS grades.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was told we’d get “progress reports” for the purposes of discussion at the PT meeting and that the report would be in ASPEN. When I looked in ASPEN, there isn’t a report but just a notice of progress grade. Is there an actual report that we will be given?

Yes there will be a progress report and written comments (it is kind of generic though) and teachers are only required to give comments for C,Ds and Fs from what I heard. Likely will be posted tomorrow (and whenever it is actually posted) if you email is connected, you will get an email that the progress report is there.

I've had 3 students go through Deal and there have never been any written comments (on the progress report or report cards) besides the teachers pressing options like "does good work" or "participates in class". There is no free form or personalized text or anything like that.

There is no option for teachers to include personalized messages in Aspen.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"Teachers don’t have any options for comments except the generic ones. Which I find not helpful."

This not true actually. Each grade a teacher gives offer a tiny comment box next to it if teachers want to give comments on a particular grade or offer teacher notes. Many choose not to. But there absolutely is the option.

As for the "WS" grade, be happy about it. It is intended as a grade that by definition will change when the work is submitted. Aspen is one thing but Canvas is the program that actually shows when a student submits work. The teacher is likely is trying to send you a message about productivity. Take it for what it is. Frankly the option other than WS is an F, which teachers are not allowed even give anymore. WS is a covid-era "do better and it can change but if it were a different time you would have failed" grade

Yes, teachers can write a note on each Aspen assignment that is individual. However, we do not have the option of writing notes on the actual progress report or report card. There’s a list of about 10 statements that either say your kid is wonderful or awful. Most teachers default to wonderful because very few deserve the awful ones. It would be nice to have some that were in between.

+1

I am one of the PPs and my response was to the comment about comments on progress reports. I know Aspen has comments next to assignments, I use it quite often. As this PP stated the PROGRESS REPORT comments are useless and generic.

Anonymous wrote:"Teachers don’t have any options for comments except the generic ones. Which I find not helpful."

This not true actually. Each grade a teacher gives offer a tiny comment box next to it if teachers want to give comments on a particular grade or offer teacher notes. Many choose not to. But there absolutely is the option.

As for the "WS" grade, be happy about it. It is intended as a grade that by definition will change when the work is submitted. Aspen is one thing but Canvas is the program that actually shows when a student submits work. The teacher is likely is trying to send you a message about productivity. Take it for what it is. Frankly the option other than WS is an F, which teachers are not allowed even give anymore. WS is a covid-era "do better and it can change but if it were a different time you would have failed" grade

Yes, teachers can write a note on each Aspen assignment that is individual. However, we do not have the option of writing notes on the actual progress report or report card. There’s a list of about 10 statements that either say your kid is wonderful or awful. Most teachers default to wonderful because very few deserve the awful ones. It would be nice to have some that were in between.

Anonymous wrote:"Teachers don’t have any options for comments except the generic ones. Which I find not helpful."

This not true actually. Each grade a teacher gives offer a tiny comment box next to it if teachers want to give comments on a particular grade or offer teacher notes. Many choose not to. But there absolutely is the option.

As for the "WS" grade, be happy about it. It is intended as a grade that by definition will change when the work is submitted. Aspen is one thing but Canvas is the program that actually shows when a student submits work. The teacher is likely is trying to send you a message about productivity. Take it for what it is. Frankly the option other than WS is an F, which teachers are not allowed even give anymore. WS is a covid-era "do better and it can change but if it were a different time you would have failed" grade

They may have it but I've never seen it used (3 kids who went through Deal--last one is in 8th grade).
I don't blame them (there's no time for this when you have 100+ students!)

"Teachers don’t have any options for comments except the generic ones. Which I find not helpful."

This not true actually. Each grade a teacher gives offer a tiny comment box next to it if teachers want to give comments on a particular grade or offer teacher notes. Many choose not to. But there absolutely is the option.

As for the "WS" grade, be happy about it. It is intended as a grade that by definition will change when the work is submitted. Aspen is one thing but Canvas is the program that actually shows when a student submits work. The teacher is likely is trying to send you a message about productivity. Take it for what it is. Frankly the option other than WS is an F, which teachers are not allowed even give anymore. WS is a covid-era "do better and it can change but if it were a different time you would have failed" grade

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was told we’d get “progress reports” for the purposes of discussion at the PT meeting and that the report would be in ASPEN. When I looked in ASPEN, there isn’t a report but just a notice of progress grade. Is there an actual report that we will be given?

Yes there will be a progress report and written comments (it is kind of generic though) and teachers are only required to give comments for C,Ds and Fs from what I heard. Likely will be posted tomorrow (and whenever it is actually posted) if you email is connected, you will get an email that the progress report is there.

I've had 3 students go through Deal and there have never been any written comments (on the progress report or report cards) besides the teachers pressing options like "does good work" or "participates in class". There is no free form or personalized text or anything like that.

Teachers don’t have any options for comments except the generic ones. Which I find not helpful.