Five Poudre Valley Middles Schools Changing Grading System

by Logan Martinez

FORT COLLINS COLO.– School boards meetings can be long and difficult to follow, but when the board is listening intently about nutrition in the cafeteria, a bigger change in the classrooms is going unnoticed. Five Poudre Valley District middle schools are planning to change the grading system for fall of 2012.

At the Poudre Valley School Board meeting Feb. 28 the application of the standards-based grading system alongside the traditional grading system for Boltz, Cache la Poudre, Lescher, Lincoln, and Kinard middle schools was only mentioned before the meeting moved swiftly into cafeteria nutrition spiels for the remainder of the night.

Through the grading system, students receive two types of grades, Content Knowledge and Work Habits, which assess students on their demonstration of academic achievement through exams and the behaviors related to work completion and their preparedness for learning.

Blevins, Preston, Webber and Wellington middles schools all implemented the standards-based grading system back in 2009 when it was originally proposed. The remaining five middle schools were planning to follow in 2010, but Assistant Superintendent of Secondary Schools Edie Eckle explained how there were complications.

 “Part of that was due to some staffing turn over at the principal level,” Eckle said. “Some of the schools are international baccalaureate schools and they have been trying to figure out how to fulfill international baccalaureate requirements with the Colorado standards, which was a little more difficult. But they did indicate that they are going [to implement the system].”

According to a press release on the Cache La Poudre Middle School web site, Principal Skip Caddoo explained how the standards-based grading system will be implemented along side the traditional grading system; however, The addition of the grading system may be evident on report cards because he explains, “Report Cards will reflect an A, B, C, D, and F ‘letter grade’ reported to parents and students because this is what our current Gradebook/PIV technology will allow.”

Eckle followed this up by explaining how the system coincides with the traditional system.

“Standards-based grading is really an outgrowth of teaching to a standard and it is just really reporting the student’s progress on mastering a particular academic content standard,” Eckle said. “So we think of it more as progress reporting to the parents, they still get a traditional letter grade, A, B, C, D, but then they also get a report of where they are on learning the standards.”

Kim Redd, the chair of the District Advisory Board and mother of a Kinard Middle School student, explained how the implementation will reap its benefits, but would be better suited for students in younger grades.

“I think for elementary and middle schools it is good. Our concern has been whether or not that translates up into high school, and at this time they are not looking at this going into high schools,” Redd said. “Our (the DAB's) concern with it going into high schools is whether or not that will translate in going to college. How if you don’t have letter grades and you don’t have that type of system, how do kids transfer their grade point and things like that into a college setting?”

In the standards-based grading system, Eckle explained how students have the options to retake unit tests, evaluating students progress on each subject as they go along, as many times as necessary until they show they understand the material, though the final tests do not have this option. Redd spoke to how this can be a disadvantage for preparing the students for both high school and college.

“My son is still getting grades, so he still understands, but he is still allowed to retake tests, so I have been trying as a parent to say ‘you need to study the first time and not count on retaking the test,’ and that is the major concern I have,” Redd said. “Will he get into high school and then really not do well because he is assuming that he can retake these?”

Though the implementation is firmly planned to go through in fall of 2012, Redd explained how she hasn’t seen enough communication to the parents about the change.

“I am a very involved parent, so for me not to know (about the grade system change), then I am absolutely certain that most of the parents out there with kids in middles schools are unaware in the schools that haven’t made the transition yet.”

Eckle and Redd look forward to the changes the schools will see over time from the grade systems coinciding.

“It gives them the content knowledge that they need to succeed,” Eckle said. “When they leave middle school parents should have a real clear indication of ‘have they learned the content’ so you don’t go and take a course that you aren’t ready for. Because we have separated out the work habits – yeah you used to get extra credit points for bringing in a box of Kleenex, well now we know that their grade truly is a measure of what they can do academically.”