Deeming the old A-B-C-D-F grading system to be unfairly subjective, school districts across the land are adopting a numbered 1 (lowest) to 4 (highest) scale for test and report card marks.
So at some point, the old “A for effort” and similar expressions will be antiquated. That’s F-ed up…
The new grades are supposed to be less confusing, although as deployed in suburban New York, that’s an iffy claim:
In Pelham, the second-grade report card includes 39 separate skill scores — 10 each in math and language arts, 2 each in science and social studies, and a total of 15 in art, music, physical education, technology and “learning behaviors” — engagement, respect, responsibility, organization. The report card itself is one page, but it comes with a 14-page guide explaining the different skills and the scoring.
A report card that comes with an owner’s manual-like rubric? Who’s being tested here, the kids or the parental units?
Actually, even accounting for the inevitable friction during the change and adjustment period, I don’t understand why K-12 doesn’t just install the college-style grade point average (GPA). This 1-4 system is almost the same thing, except that it’s unnecessarily imprecise by not allowing half-point gradations. Since the kids are being prepped for eventual college learning anyway, they might as well have a consistent rating structure for their entire schooling experience.
I never had letter grades until college. I knew of them, but thought it was just something they did on tv because that’s how it used to be done. Guess it’s moving towards that.
Comment by David — 03/27/2009 @ 01:18:09 AM