Anonymous wrote:What a stupid policy. So unless you’re a fool, everyone will just re-take or re-do assignments until they get an A?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2024/07/01/fairfax-county-schools-grading-policy-changes/

You'd be surprised how many fools there are. I teach HS honors and maybe kid do not do retakes, even the ones who should (below 80).

Anonymous wrote:What a stupid policy. So unless you’re a fool, everyone will just re-take or re-do assignments until they get an A?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2024/07/01/fairfax-county-schools-grading-policy-changes/

Why have grades these days? Have a more inclusive approach Fairfax county.

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Anonymous wrote:By Definition, standards base grading means that only summative assessments are graded. So whatever Madison’s calling it or not calling it it’s definitely not standards based Grading. The 70/30 (summative/formative) is uniform in FCPS now.

The jmhs principal ends by saying not much changed, but it’s big changes- including allowing retakes for prior assessments.

She said that students will continue to be afforded opportunities on reassessments on skills throughout the school year - that sounds like skilled based grading and if it’s not she should just say it’s over

No, she didn’t. She said under reassessments, retakes are allowed up to 100% AND that includes retake attempts from prior quarters for rolling grade book schools. Reassessment meals retake here.

I think this sounds like the current policy where a reassessment of a skill (ie data analysis) can happen in q3 for a grade in q1. This doesn’t really meet the spirit of a retake, but I worry will be allowed if skills based grading continues.

This is better. This shows long term mastery/understanding instead of short term memorization. I wish every school did this!

But the other schools don’t do this! The whole point of this exercise was to standardize grading. Which seems to be happening for every school other than Madison. I think the parents, teachers, and students are not going to be satisfied with Madison being the special snowflake. The kids have already been the guinea pigs for long enough. It needs to end now.

It does. It is uniform now. The prior posters do not understand the new policy.

Are you affiliated with the school? This would helpful to know. If it is no longer skills-based grading then I don’t know why the email did not say the pilot had ended. “Giving kids multiple chances to demonstrate mastery” is exactly the language they used before and was code that retakes were just on any random thing at some point later in the year that vaguely addressed the same “skill”. Faith in Madison’s administration needs to be earned at this point and I have zero confidence they won’t try and game their way into claiming the old grading process conforms to the new requirements.

I was a teacher with the county.

Hopefully someone from the current administration will weigh in, but I’m betting the vague wording in the email is how they plan to continue skills-based grading.

I don’t understand what you are saying. SBG is based on grading only summative assessments. The email says formative assessments will count for 30% of the grade, so it can’t be SBG. What do you mean by what I bolded?

This isn’t the only issue with SBG. And she uses the words skills in her email so I’m pretty sure it will continue.

In the email, Calvert states she is on the grading committee. I assume the email is from her; it doesn’t appear to be signed by anyone.

Interestingly, she told a group of complaining students last year that she couldn’t do anything about SBG. Guess that wasn’t true.

Anonymous wrote:DP - I think that Madison will keep using skills, so we will still have teachers using 1 assessment as 5 grades.

This is a huge issue with SBG and one that parents were unanimously against. Have to wonder who was on that committee to recommend leas grades for students when the issue was too few. It's one of the worst parts about SBG to only be grades on a couple of assignments a year.

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Anonymous wrote:By Definition, standards base grading means that only summative assessments are graded. So whatever Madison’s calling it or not calling it it’s definitely not standards based Grading. The 70/30 (summative/formative) is uniform in FCPS now.

The jmhs principal ends by saying not much changed, but it’s big changes- including allowing retakes for prior assessments.

She said that students will continue to be afforded opportunities on reassessments on skills throughout the school year - that sounds like skilled based grading and if it’s not she should just say it’s over

No, she didn’t. She said under reassessments, retakes are allowed up to 100% AND that includes retake attempts from prior quarters for rolling grade book schools. Reassessment meals retake here.

I think this sounds like the current policy where a reassessment of a skill (ie data analysis) can happen in q3 for a grade in q1. This doesn’t really meet the spirit of a retake, but I worry will be allowed if skills based grading continues.

This is better. This shows long term mastery/understanding instead of short term memorization. I wish every school did this!

But the other schools don’t do this! The whole point of this exercise was to standardize grading. Which seems to be happening for every school other than Madison. I think the parents, teachers, and students are not going to be satisfied with Madison being the special snowflake. The kids have already been the guinea pigs for long enough. It needs to end now.

It does. It is uniform now. The prior posters do not understand the new policy.

Are you affiliated with the school? This would helpful to know. If it is no longer skills-based grading then I don’t know why the email did not say the pilot had ended. “Giving kids multiple chances to demonstrate mastery” is exactly the language they used before and was code that retakes were just on any random thing at some point later in the year that vaguely addressed the same “skill”. Faith in Madison’s administration needs to be earned at this point and I have zero confidence they won’t try and game their way into claiming the old grading process conforms to the new requirements.

I was a teacher with the county.

Hopefully someone from the current administration will weigh in, but I’m betting the vague wording in the email is how they plan to continue skills-based grading.

I don’t understand what you are saying. SBG is based on grading only summative assessments. The email says formative assessments will count for 30% of the grade, so it can’t be SBG. What do you mean by what I bolded?

The wording that says students will have “multiple chances for reassessment” is vague. I am interpreting this to mean students may not have a traditional retake opportunity, ie they can retake an English vocab test within two weeks. Instead, I presume the school will say that a reassessment of the skill of english “language” done in quarter two can replace a bad grade on the same “skill” from quarter 1. It is hard to explain because the process is confusing as heck, which is partly why so many people hated it. There is often little correlation between supposed skills from one quarter to the next, which is why I just wish they’d go back to the old system. Some skills aren’t reassessed every quarter, making kids wait for a reassessment opportunity.

DP - I think that Madison will keep using skills, so we will still have teachers using 1 assessment as 5 grades.

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Anonymous wrote:By Definition, standards base grading means that only summative assessments are graded. So whatever Madison’s calling it or not calling it it’s definitely not standards based Grading. The 70/30 (summative/formative) is uniform in FCPS now.

The jmhs principal ends by saying not much changed, but it’s big changes- including allowing retakes for prior assessments.

She said that students will continue to be afforded opportunities on reassessments on skills throughout the school year - that sounds like skilled based grading and if it’s not she should just say it’s over

No, she didn’t. She said under reassessments, retakes are allowed up to 100% AND that includes retake attempts from prior quarters for rolling grade book schools. Reassessment meals retake here.

I think this sounds like the current policy where a reassessment of a skill (ie data analysis) can happen in q3 for a grade in q1. This doesn’t really meet the spirit of a retake, but I worry will be allowed if skills based grading continues.

This is better. This shows long term mastery/understanding instead of short term memorization. I wish every school did this!

But the other schools don’t do this! The whole point of this exercise was to standardize grading. Which seems to be happening for every school other than Madison. I think the parents, teachers, and students are not going to be satisfied with Madison being the special snowflake. The kids have already been the guinea pigs for long enough. It needs to end now.

It does. It is uniform now. The prior posters do not understand the new policy.

Are you affiliated with the school? This would helpful to know. If it is no longer skills-based grading then I don’t know why the email did not say the pilot had ended. “Giving kids multiple chances to demonstrate mastery” is exactly the language they used before and was code that retakes were just on any random thing at some point later in the year that vaguely addressed the same “skill”. Faith in Madison’s administration needs to be earned at this point and I have zero confidence they won’t try and game their way into claiming the old grading process conforms to the new requirements.

I was a teacher with the county.

Hopefully someone from the current administration will weigh in, but I’m betting the vague wording in the email is how they plan to continue skills-based grading.

I don’t understand what you are saying. SBG is based on grading only summative assessments. The email says formative assessments will count for 30% of the grade, so it can’t be SBG. What do you mean by what I bolded?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Received an email from Madison today - it looks like skills based grading is continuing into next year - did others read it that way as well?

Deliberate that they didn't mention these words.

It looks that way to me. Madison is setting a record for making changes to their grading policy. Every year for as long as we've had kids at this school, it changes. Disappointing that FCPS is allowing Madison to continue to do its own thing.

Anonymous wrote:Received an email from Madison today - it looks like skills based grading is continuing into next year - did others read it that way as well?

Deliberate that they didn't mention these words.

Anyone know what Herndon is planning? Will we also be stuck with SBG?

Yeah that’s what I’m thinking . . .

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Anonymous wrote:By Definition, standards base grading means that only summative assessments are graded. So whatever Madison’s calling it or not calling it it’s definitely not standards based Grading. The 70/30 (summative/formative) is uniform in FCPS now.

The jmhs principal ends by saying not much changed, but it’s big changes- including allowing retakes for prior assessments.

She said that students will continue to be afforded opportunities on reassessments on skills throughout the school year - that sounds like skilled based grading and if it’s not she should just say it’s over

No, she didn’t. She said under reassessments, retakes are allowed up to 100% AND that includes retake attempts from prior quarters for rolling grade book schools. Reassessment meals retake here.

I think this sounds like the current policy where a reassessment of a skill (ie data analysis) can happen in q3 for a grade in q1. This doesn’t really meet the spirit of a retake, but I worry will be allowed if skills based grading continues.

This is better. This shows long term mastery/understanding instead of short term memorization. I wish every school did this!

But the other schools don’t do this! The whole point of this exercise was to standardize grading. Which seems to be happening for every school other than Madison. I think the parents, teachers, and students are not going to be satisfied with Madison being the special snowflake. The kids have already been the guinea pigs for long enough. It needs to end now.

It does. It is uniform now. The prior posters do not understand the new policy.

Are you affiliated with the school? This would helpful to know. If it is no longer skills-based grading then I don’t know why the email did not say the pilot had ended. “Giving kids multiple chances to demonstrate mastery” is exactly the language they used before and was code that retakes were just on any random thing at some point later in the year that vaguely addressed the same “skill”. Faith in Madison’s administration needs to be earned at this point and I have zero confidence they won’t try and game their way into claiming the old grading process conforms to the new requirements.

I was a teacher with the county.

Hopefully someone from the current administration will weigh in, but I’m betting the vague wording in the email is how they plan to continue skills-based grading.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:By Definition, standards base grading means that only summative assessments are graded. So whatever Madison’s calling it or not calling it it’s definitely not standards based Grading. The 70/30 (summative/formative) is uniform in FCPS now.

The jmhs principal ends by saying not much changed, but it’s big changes- including allowing retakes for prior assessments.

She said that students will continue to be afforded opportunities on reassessments on skills throughout the school year - that sounds like skilled based grading and if it’s not she should just say it’s over

No, she didn’t. She said under reassessments, retakes are allowed up to 100% AND that includes retake attempts from prior quarters for rolling grade book schools. Reassessment meals retake here.

I think this sounds like the current policy where a reassessment of a skill (ie data analysis) can happen in q3 for a grade in q1. This doesn’t really meet the spirit of a retake, but I worry will be allowed if skills based grading continues.

This is better. This shows long term mastery/understanding instead of short term memorization. I wish every school did this!

But the other schools don’t do this! The whole point of this exercise was to standardize grading. Which seems to be happening for every school other than Madison. I think the parents, teachers, and students are not going to be satisfied with Madison being the special snowflake. The kids have already been the guinea pigs for long enough. It needs to end now.

It does. It is uniform now. The prior posters do not understand the new policy.

Are you affiliated with the school? This would helpful to know. If it is no longer skills-based grading then I don’t know why the email did not say the pilot had ended. “Giving kids multiple chances to demonstrate mastery” is exactly the language they used before and was code that retakes were just on any random thing at some point later in the year that vaguely addressed the same “skill”. Faith in Madison’s administration needs to be earned at this point and I have zero confidence they won’t try and game their way into claiming the old grading process conforms to the new requirements.

I was a teacher with the county.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:By Definition, standards base grading means that only summative assessments are graded. So whatever Madison’s calling it or not calling it it’s definitely not standards based Grading. The 70/30 (summative/formative) is uniform in FCPS now.

The jmhs principal ends by saying not much changed, but it’s big changes- including allowing retakes for prior assessments.

She said that students will continue to be afforded opportunities on reassessments on skills throughout the school year - that sounds like skilled based grading and if it’s not she should just say it’s over

No, she didn’t. She said under reassessments, retakes are allowed up to 100% AND that includes retake attempts from prior quarters for rolling grade book schools. Reassessment meals retake here.

I think this sounds like the current policy where a reassessment of a skill (ie data analysis) can happen in q3 for a grade in q1. This doesn’t really meet the spirit of a retake, but I worry will be allowed if skills based grading continues.

This is better. This shows long term mastery/understanding instead of short term memorization. I wish every school did this!

But the other schools don’t do this! The whole point of this exercise was to standardize grading. Which seems to be happening for every school other than Madison. I think the parents, teachers, and students are not going to be satisfied with Madison being the special snowflake. The kids have already been the guinea pigs for long enough. It needs to end now.

It does. It is uniform now. The prior posters do not understand the new policy.

Are you affiliated with the school? This would helpful to know. If it is no longer skills-based grading then I don’t know why the email did not say the pilot had ended. “Giving kids multiple chances to demonstrate mastery” is exactly the language they used before and was code that retakes were just on any random thing at some point later in the year that vaguely addressed the same “skill”. Faith in Madison’s administration needs to be earned at this point and I have zero confidence they won’t try and game their way into claiming the old grading process conforms to the new requirements.