Despite her never making a grade below 96 on a report card, the new secondary schools grading policy has Denton High sophomore Gabriella Webster feeling her efforts aren’t good enough.
Prior to the school district’s new policy being implemented this fall, she said, the use of homework and quizzes were a way for her to gauge where she was in her learning experience leading up to a test. With assignments like homework no longer being graded, she said that with the exception of tests she’s not receiving the feedback to understand if she’s truly learned something. She said she’s had to retake every test and has turned to Khan Academy videos for understanding.
A busy extracurricular schedule leaves minimal time for tutorials, she said.
“At this point, with the assessments [tests] being the only thing we see, it’s kind of a shot in the dark in what we’re understanding as we go, and then we’re taking a test at the end hoping that we’ve taught ourselves enough,” Webster said. “There’s not any way to gauge what I’m learning anymore.”
A bad grade on a test, she said, is telling her “I’m not good enough.”
“My confidence is completely shot,” Webster said.
Webster shared her frustrations about the new grading policy before a room of several hundred people, with concerns regarding the impact the new system is having on education in Denton. On Wednesday, the Denton ISD conducted a discussion on secondary school grading practices in the Guyer High School auditorium.
DISD implemented the new grading system for secondary schools more than nine weeks ago.
Students receive grades for final drafts, tests and projects, known as major summatives, but their grades are not penalized for poor behavior or late, missing or incomplete homework. Students no longer receive grades for homework and other assignments deemed minor summatives. However, they have opportunities to redo tests and research papers if they say they’ve made improvement by going to a tutor, meeting with a teacher or doing alternative assignments.
The major summatives count 70 percent of an average student’s grade, according to DISD documents. A major summative is 80 percent of the grade for students enrolled in Pre-Advanced Placement, AP and International Baccalaureate classes. Per semester, the average of the two grading periods count 80 percent of the final semester grade, and the final exam counts 20 percent of the final semester grade. The district anticipates fully implementing the system for the 2015-16 school year, according to DISD documents.
“[It’s] not good. It’s just a nightmare,” Webster said. “It’s an endless cycle of feeling like I’m not worth the grades I’ve earned my entire life.”
She said she’s not alone, adding that many of her peers have given up and feel they’re in a battle that can’t be won.
“It just makes me feel like I’m the problem, and students shouldn’t be made to feel that way,” Webster said. “This program is [supposed] to instill confidence.
“None of us [students] want to go to school because we feel like we’re not learning. If the district’s purpose is to serve the students, then they’re failing miserably.”
Webster said she would like to see secondary schools return to the grading policy prior to the one implemented this fall. She said she also would like to see that not all grades for a student rest on a test. Webster said she intends to apply for the Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science at the University of North Texas this year, where numerical grades are closely reviewed during the application process. DISD’s new grading system, she said, has put her in an unfair position.
Tom Schimmer, an education author and consultant with expertise in the standards-based grading system Denton is in the process of implementing, gave a presentation on the research and history of the system during Wednesday night’s discussion. Schimmer said that he’s worked with DISD educators approximately six days over the course of the last two to three years. Ultimately, the goal of the practices is for students to be optimistic about their learning, he said.
Toward the end of his presentation, tensions boiled over among those in attendance.
Following a question-and-answer session with Schimmer, parents were able to hear about the implementation of the grading policy in middle schools and high schools through breakout sessions. Administrators and educators from the district’s seven middle schools and its three comprehensive high schools were present at each of the breakout sessions to discuss implementation of the policy on their campus, answer questions and to hear parent and student concerns.
It was more than five hours after the meeting’s initial start time that the last breakout session concluded.
Throughout some of the sessions, parents expressed concern about their children being overloaded with information. They also expressed concerns about overemphasis on testing, how the system is being implemented and how the nine-week grading system impacts University Interscholastic League eligibility.
Parents said that in some classes students are receiving “zero feedback,” and that some students who generally made straight A’s are now coming home with 30s and are distraught. Parents with students in the 11th and 12th grades expressed concern about how the policy could negatively impact children who are applying for college and scholarships or attempting to graduate.
One teacher during the Guyer session said that since implementation of the new grading policy, it’s the most stressed she’s seen students, teachers and herself, and it’s unfair.
Another educator said having a line of students standing outside her classroom for reassessment makes her feel like a failure.
Deborah Donley is the mother of a middle school student and a high school student. She said Schimmer’s presentation “clearly identified” what the district is implementing. She sat in on the Crownover Middle School breakout session afterward, she said. That’s where she has the most concern, she said.
Donley said her sixth-grader goes to school at 7:45 a.m. for tutorials and to retake tests. Having to redo tests over and over has been “very trying” on her son, she said.
“I do feel this is a little too much for an 11-year-old,” Donley said. “For me, I don’t enjoy coming home and listening to my son tell me that, ‘Mom, we took an assessment today and half the class failed it — they’re not getting it.’
“It’s heartbreaking when your kids come home and they say their grades are tanking. It’s heartbreaking as a parent.”
Donley said she knows teachers are doing their best, but implementation of the new grading system is “just not working.”
She said she would like to see students go back to doing homework and receiving daily grades. Donley said she feels students are not receiving the “ample ammunition to be successful on a test” because there’s no homework or assignments to practice at home.
One parent said the district had “great intentions,” but the system is not working.
When DISD officials were asked by a parent Wednesday why implementation of the secondary school grading system was made “with little or no collaboration with parents and students,” administrators admitted it was a mistake.
“Whenever we make decisions, we make changes, we chart a course and go in that direction or just change the course, we try to make the best decisions that we can,” said David Hicks, the district’s executive director for secondary academic programs. “Looking back in the conversations that I’ve had with our administrators, the teachers, with parents, with some kids, we should have done a better job with that communication.
“We should have had more conversation[s] with more people.”
Absent from Wednesday’s meeting was Denton ISD Superintendent Jamie Wilson. According to Hicks, Wilson was out of town at a previously scheduled engagement. Hicks said that rather than reschedule and “put off” the discussion, it was decided that it should continue as scheduled in Wilson’s absence.
“Where’s Dr. Wilson?” a parent called out during the Guyer session. “He should be here. Kids are suffering, and he should be here!”
Donley said she wished Wilson had been there to address parent concerns.
Via a Twitter response, parent Cheryl Hassell said she loved the grading practices for her children.
“All grades are academic,” she wrote. “Late work is penalized with non-academic consequences.”
Parents in the Guyer breakout session demanded a date for when they could hear a response from the district on changes.
Hicks said earlier in the evening that in the case where district officials see a “lack of clarity” and confidence, things will need adjusting.
Later, he said administrative officials intend to take the feedback received Wednesday back to the curriculum and instruction department and make adjustments to the grading system. He said they will meet quickly and send out a response to parents electronically and by phone on what action the district intends to take.
Hicks said in a comment on Thursday he and his team are working to address the issues brought up from the meeting.
“We began working last night to synthesize the information that was communicated by parents, teachers and students,” Hicks said. “Over the course of the next few days, we will be meeting to identify short and long-term action items that will best address the existing concerns and establish a process for ongoing communication.”
