Maybe high grades, but are expectations high enough?

“What’s my grade?” This common question asked of educators by students, particularly near the end of the term, can represent much more than a numeric assessment of student progress. Imbedded within a student’s grade is essential qualitative information that reflects a sense of self worth for both the student and educator and a measure of ability and effort for both parties. Since I began my career in education, I have sought to construct a firmer philosophy on the essential essence of a grade as well as the process of grading, but often have found my feelings on the matter to be at odds with district policy.

In Baltimore City Public Schools, grades appear to be a constant source of anxiety, conflict, and confusion. Both teachers and students often lack autonomy in the measure of the grade and the grading process, as state curriculum, schools and departments standardize content and expectations for assessments. For teachers, this poses intense ethical questions about grading on effort versus mastery, progress versus completion of standards, the ability to prepare students to be successful academically but also to have the self esteem to be successful in other life endeavors. One particular example of this conundrum is the required 55% teachers must give students who are not passing their class, even if the student is truly earning far below that number (teachers also must give a 50% to no shows on their rosters). Pass/fail rates can be used as part of the evaluation process, and often teachers feel pressured to pass a certain number of students or to help students earn higher grades, even if this doesn’t necessarily reflect that students have truly mastered rigorous content and skills. With all this pressure on teachers, at what point are our high school students taking responsibility for their own learning? How does this low bar match up against what will be expected of them in their future schooling or careers?

Perhaps the most alarming element of this process is that many top performing students are still entering college feeling drastically unprepared. A recent article in the Washington Post illuminates how a student from a top performing D.C. charter school struggled immensely in his freshman year at Georgetown, despite always earning very high marks in his high school classes.

Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/i-went-to-one-of-dcs-best-high-schools-i-was-still-unprepared-for-college/2012/04/13/gIQAqQQAFT_story.html

Is it right for a student to earn an “A” if this doesn’t signify that their work is setting them up to handle college material? Ultimately whatever a grade may signify, we should be preparing our students to be independent learners that can handle college coursework and also to be armed with a plethora of strategies for when they encounter a challenging course. Additionally, high school teachers should move their students to more college style classes, at least in small doses. While sending students home with a dense chapter to read and then lecturing on a related topic the following day doesn’t necessarily incorporate the clear cut “I do-We do-You do” teachers are expected to employ, it does present students with the opportunity to practice learning at a college level . When planning, instructing and grading, teachers should not be afraid to push students to the expectations that they will likely encounter in their post-secondary institutions.