From the Fact Checker blog >>
DeKalb Schools has changed their district wide Grading Protocol. A few weeks ago, the principals were sent the new grading system with the new categories and weights. Some of the old categories were combined and some new categories were created. I can’t find it online anywhere, so here it is:
| GRADING CATEGORIES | *GRADE PROTOCOL |
Formative Assessment – 0%
Assessment During Learning – 25%
Guided, Independent, or Group Practice – 45%
Summative Assessment or Assessment of Learning– 30%
|
A 90 – 100 B 80 – 89 C 71 – 79 D 70 F < 70 |
Notes: *English Learners (ELs) must not receive numerical or letter grades for the core content areas in elementary and middle school during their first year of language development. A grade of CS or CU must be assigned. This rule may be extended beyond the first year with approval from the EL Studies Program. English Learners must receive a grade for ESOL courses.
Related Links
- Grading Protocol
- Grading Protocol Definitions
- K-5 Pass/Fail Rubrics
- District Expectations For Success
Old Category and Grade Weights
| Cumulative Grade: | 100% |
| Class Participation & Classwork | 40% |
| Tests & Quizzes | 30% |
| Projects | 25% |
| Homework | 5% |
Forget grades, forget charter meetings, forget indictments, could someone please get a hold of an unaudited County credit card and hire some more air conditioning techs to fix the AC at our school and then repair the AC in the trailers that have students in them ALL DAY LONG with temperatures over 80 degrees.( I believe that legally I can break the windows in these trailers for the children’s protection) Incompetence should be an indictable offense in DeKalb County Schools. “You are not a priority” is not an acceptable answer.
Is this just for middle and elementary schools? What about the 20% for the End of Course Assessment (formerly known as EOCTs)? I thought the 20% was a state requirement. If this grade distribution is not for high school, what does it look like for high schools?
And while they were changing things, I wonder why they didn’t change the point range for a D. A single point seems silly, and even unhelpful in terms of signaling parents that their child’s passing grade is at risk.
The old category grade weights you’ve listed were not system-wide. At least at the high school level, the county-prescribed grade weights varied from class to class, even within departments.
For EOC classes, the categories above are multiplied by 80% and averaged with the EOC 20% to get the final grade.
Except for high school grades are fluff. If grades were real why would students need to take standardized test to show that they know what the grades are supposed to show?
Also, except for here, I have never seen formative assessment and preassessment called the same thing.
For those kids who don’t test well, this breakdown works. For those kids who can’t seem to do the homework…uh oh.
It is all nonsense anyway. Other than certain parents (and teachers know who they are), there are no county grading police (yet!) to check what teachers are grading, how they categorize the grades, and to what extent they may use their own judgement in assigning grades. HQ focuses on everything except what will actually fix our problem — smaller class sizes, an end to needless time-wasting testing, properly remunerated teachers, and a decrease in the number of non-teaching personnel receiving outrageous salaries to dream up more work for teachers.
This grading protocol does not apply to charter schools. It is also not part of Board Policy IHA: Grading Systems.
With the new grading scale and the new parent portal, has anyone experienced any problems with the paper vs electronic copy of the official transcript? I have a senior and we are applying for scholarships and to colleges. I have been informed that the school no longer sends the “Official Transcipt” via the mail but electronically. Make sure you check the GPA. There may be some discpencanies with the GPA on the paper copy vs the electronic copy. The GPA maybe lower.
@ d 8/30: Aha! That makes sense. So to translate those percentages into the real percentages at the end of the semester for EOC classes:
Assessment During Learning – 25% is really 20%
Guided, Independent, or Group Practice – 45% is really 36%
Summative Assessment or Assessment of Learning– 30% is really 24%
EOC (End of Course assessment) is 20%
This would apply to Biology, 9th grade English, 11th grade English, Econ, US History, and a bunch of other classes.
For non-EOC classes, unless a department decides to sub-divide the Summative category or double weight the final, the final exam has effectively been demoted to just another unit test.
And there are “projects” listed for each category. Just about anything can be a project, and thus the new grading policy leaves a lot up to a teacher’s discretion.
Bottom line, students who do an excellent job on their assignments will do fine. Students who don’t do their work will fail. I’m not sure what the reason for the category change was.
I found out today that EOCs won’t count this year since they are changing to the Milestones Assessments.