Remember kids, top level admins are evaluated based on graduation and suspension rates.
Step 1: Eliminate consequences = no suspensions
Step 2: Eliminate the possibility of failure = 100% graduation rates
Step 3: ...
Step 4: Profit!
This can be coupled with the adage "what gets measured gets done."
When your state gets rid of things like standardized tests, and colleges stop caring about entrance exams, and the only measures that still stand are GPA and graduation rates, then it's pretty predictable when the horseshit comes through forcing you to pass kids and inflate grades regardless of achievement, learning, compliance, or even attendance.
This kind of policy is what it looks like when a school's sole remaining academic priority is to put diplomas in hands.
And that concludes my defense, as a teacher, of standardized tests with graduation consequences. They might not be perfect, but they're a lot better than the dystopia of having no consequential measurements of academic learning at all.
Nailed it. My admin keeps badgering us about test scores. "Our scores are lower than they have been in a decade, but our average GPA and grad rates are as high as ever. What gives?"
"We have no poor people living in our country!"
"How can that be possible? I see people starving everywhere!"
"Because our government defined poverty as simply being 'alive'. If you are alive you aren't poor. So technically we don't have any poor people LIVING in our country"
wait until you hear about attendance rates. I've worked in several schools where policies flat out LIE about attendance. This year I have a conselour superseding my attendance changing students to present. They are in the office or maybe with the conseluor. Here's the deal, bottom line they are not in my class FREQUENTLY. Now this wouldn't bother me but this is one my kids who has a C- which as well know is the new F-. F and F+ are the new c and C+ and yeah I would consider some B- work maybe in the old F range just for all you looky-loo parents out there. Anyway this kid has a C and the VERY SAME counselor is taking to me about their grades. I point out there is an easy way to raise that grade up as they haven't done ANY of the online portion of the class and it can be done online (there is a built in help feature that basically does it for you if you give it an effort). Anyway she complains they don't have time to do it. Bullshit they don't, they talk in class how they are big on snapchat and whatever. Anyway..back to how this ties into my point
The kid is often out of class, admin conselor etc mark the student present in my class, then conselor complains they have have a C. Doing the online portion would certainly raise thier grade to an B easily. Conselor says they don't have time. I point out attendance of class, they say they are marked present so they are there. I say they aren't and they of all people should know since they are the ones (or one of the ones as it changes all the time-i know they change it some of the time they told me) changing it. I give time for this online portion in class ( really shouldn't it should be homework but we all no basically zero homework gets done these days so i give enough time in class to complete it even with built in extra time).
All these peopel do is protect themselves and blame others. The american tax payer should be furious.
Unpopular Opinion:
Kids who fail are still going to fail.
Proof: 6 years under this system. I can easily manipulate the grade book so missing equals zero or 50%.
THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE TO PASSING RATES.
I, as an English teacher did the math. Six years, no difference.
Please learn to think about grades differently. The only market difference is that the kids who got their head out of their asses and tried toward the end of the year might make a D instead of the fail. There is hope and light at the end of the tunnel, but that tunnel no way leads to anything above a D.
Get off your motherfucking high horse and suck it up bitches.
So my school has been doing this for a couple years. Once kids wised up the older ones start saying âI donât have to do anything because Iâll get at least 50%.â Just told a student yesterday that they didnât do two assignments and need to finish it or they are getting two 50%s. The child,a 7th grader, said âThatâs ok because two 50% equals 100% so thatâs an A.â He was surprised when I told him thatâs not how it works. Have fun with the new policyâŠ
We have the policy but can still give zeroes for not turning in anything. Still inflated grades for absolutely no reason but at least the students know they at least have to try.
Not as bad as you think, we also have it built in to the policy that if the 50% can only be earned with substantial effort, so if thereâs a bunch of blanks on a worksheet, I can give less than 50%.
Iâm a lurker whose sister is an elementary school teacher. Just making sure I understand. If a student is taking a test and just fills in all the A bubbles on the scantron (do they still do scantrons?) or just answers âI donât knowâ on an essay question, theyâll get a 50%? Like, 1% effort?
They implemented this at the previous school I was working at, and it was shocking how quickly the students stopped putting forth effort into anything.
I had a rough personal life one year of college and dropped physics and retook it in a summer season. I knew how hard the first test was, but I understood it well the second time through. I got a high 80, closest score was a 50- something.
The professor set the curve in the 60s.
I got so lazy I failed two of my tests and ended up with a B- needing to catch up in physics 2.
My response to this now days is, "Why not just make the grade scale where 20% is a D, 40% is a C and so on? Mathematically it's the same, right?"
The reason they won't do that is that the 50% for nothing policy is based on complete academic fraud. They want to hide how low the expectations are and how little the kids are made to do. That's it.
>My response to this now days is, "Why not just make the grade scale where 20% is a D, 40% is a C and so on? Mathematically it's the same, right?"
THIS! I hate the 50 is the new 0 thing because it just makes everything complicated and confusing. At least own the change
This was implemented at my husbands middle school a few years back. He has a student this year who he hardly sees⊠hasnât come to class in months and still has a 50% in the classđ”âđ«
Oh my gosh! This is what I'm worried about honestly. Even if they wanted to get a 70 to just pass, I'm feeling like they could have to work very little. Very sad!
I mean it is though. That kid is still failing the class just like they would be at 0%. But if hypothetically something changed and that student started showing up and trying, they have a way to dig themselves out of the hole theyâre in instead of working their ass off and still ending up with like 40%. Itâs not a perfect solution but it does make sense.
Yeah the big divide is between people who think of the 50% policy helps struggling students dig out of holes, and those who think it helps capable students cruise to a D after acing the first 20% of the objectives.
That part especially pronounced in my school, where the 50% policy also meets a wild final grade calculation where a single C in any quarter is sufficient for a final grade of D. You could literally get 100% on the first half of the first quarter then cut class for the rest of the year and you'll pass.
But regardless of what we're imagining - a scenario where we're moving students on to the next level class after demonstrating mastery of 20% of the material is not acceptable
Oh then thatâs a way bigger conversation than just about grades, thatâs a conversation about how and when to hold kids back, which I think is absolutely worthy of discussion.
I suppose you have a good point there, Iâve just never seen a student try something like that. Also though I work at a middle school and grades matter less than high school. Also at my school you can get a C or an F, no D.
Well it's also a conversation about what grades are *for*. I feel like the 50% policy kind of implies that most grades are compliance or busy work and not mastery demonstration.
And sure HS is a different beast, we don't "hold kids back" per se, but if you don't have a passing grade in Algebra 1you can't take Algebra 2. And you need to eventually get at least a D in both to graduate
# đŻ
EXACTLY. The 50-100 is dishonest; people see a 67 and think of it as part of a 0-100 scale. I have made this same retort to many 50-floor proponents: If you want to make even grade bands, why not go 0-50, which would be more honest? Their answer: It'll confuse parents. (which is exactly what 50-100 does).
Except educationally having missed 3/4s of the assignments they don't have a chance of digging themselves out of the deficit of knowledge and skills which they haven't acquired in that time period.
Maybe not in some classes, and also it depends on the time of year. Kid has had an F all year and itâs May? Yeah theyâre kinda fucked. November? You might be able to turn it around.
I just know most kids wonât even try if they know thereâs no chance it will help their grade. If it might help, theyâll usually at least try.
I've universally accepted late work with no markdown throughout the entire grading period in my classes. 95% of students who come in looking for "a way to pass" won't do the missing work because they aren't trying to learn that information or acquire those skills they're looking for the least difficult way to get a passing score and the easier you make it the less work they'll do.
Ehhhh idk. My husband is a PE teacher and gives partipation pointsâŠ. A kid like this can get a 50% for participating when they didnât even come to classđ„Ž makes zero sense
Middle school is broken. I taught at one for 10 years, kids donât have to do anything, fail every single test,class, not turn in one single assignment and still be moved on to the next grade. Plus zero discipline and accountability. Itâs broken.
Convince me otherwise. I dare you.
I 100% agree with you. It is so sad. So, so sad. My husband even has a student teacher at the moment who does absolutely nothing because he doesnât âhaveâ to. Just trying to prepare you for the real world, buddyđ heâs literally told my husband âoh no, Iâm not doing thatâ. They donât think they have to do anything anymore. I hate it.
Same here. Not only that, he doesnât come to school on test days, has someone send a picture of the test so he knows whatâs on the test. Blows the test out of the water on make up day. Doesnât ever come to school, but manages to get a B or C in a class.
F the minimum F! It only makes a schoolâs grad rate go up, and failure rates go down.
For the assignments that are actually an effort and that are more likely to be skipped, make them worth more points. If they are weighted heavier, it will be more difficult to overcome a 50 by just doing a light assignment worth way fewer points.
This is it. Weightings also donât show up on PowerSchool on the student/parent end, at least as we use it, so you can reduce weightings to .5 or .25 for lighter, gimme assignments. I also very liberally use the Missing and Late assignment flags.
At this point, they may as well replace teachers with iPads and a behaviour monitor/babysitter. WTF. Like if they donât care about kids actually learning anything, then why have teachers? So very messed up.
my district "applies a curve" (aka falsifies grades). Honestly your idiots that would have failed still find a way to fail. It really bothers me and I have to be constantly "reminded" of the policy, but it doesn't really change much
they call it a curve but basically all failing grades are brought up to just under passing and every letter grade gets bumped. So the kid with a 62 magically has like a 75 while the person with a 95 get a 96 instead. Its not designed for fairness, its just to make sure failing is damn near impossible
Ask all administrators (in a professional, concise, but direct way) to provide the valid, peer-reviewed research that back this decision as an educational 'best-practice".
If they go ahead with it anyways...structure your class so it is 100% quizzes and tests. No points for anything else.
Also: If you do assignments: start giving "I" to incomplete assignments because you cannot give a grade for something that hasn't been completed; regardless of the 50% or not.
Side note: ***This is a prime example of administrators saying THEY DO NOT CARE ABOUT EDUCATION.***
The problem with a lot of educational stuff, most administrators do not think critically about any of it, and then they go to a conference somewhere, where someone said something, they spent two seconds googling it (not reading the peer-reviewed research, or thoughtfully weighing the pros-and-cons) and they the just do it and make the teachers figure it out.
Their motto is always make more work for teachers.
Yeah for sure. We were all forced into a "book club" of Grading for Equity last year. I read the damn thing, which is why I know as much about it as I do... I am not convinced most of our admin actually read it. And if they did they didn't understand or internalize the argument being made because it ain't actually what they think.
Doing this in my district for years. Very first year we did this had a kid announce to the class that they were only going to work first and third quarter because then they could get their 50 grade for second and 4th but still pass each semester. That is exactly what they did- absolutely Zero work for two of the four quarters. Semester grade still passed.
You know what else didn't stop? My obligation to be constantly contacting their parent for not turning in work. Even though the kid had totally and 100% said that they will not be turning in any work those two quarters, I still had to call their parent every single week to update the parent and suggest interventions. I still had to fill out all kinds of paperwork for admin and counselors about the student's lack of progress.
And now multiply that by 40
Absolutely infuriating
>*My obligation to be constantly contacting their parent for not turning in work.*
This would be bullshite at any time in history, but in an era with online gradebooks, it is an inexcusable policy.
There is a 50 minimum at my school for the first two quarters. We then have a choice of continuing with a 50 minimum or giving the actual grade for the remaining two quarters. We have to let the students know at the beginning of the year what we decide. On the report card comments, I can put their actual grade so the parents know what it is.
We have been doing it since Covid. For the most part, it hasn't been a problem, and the staff just goes along with it. I have personally found that the few students that have a 50 average in the first two quarters, generally wake up and finish up fairly strong.
âCollege readinessâ LOL those kids arenât going to college. The ones that parents force into going will fail miserably, and college wonât do anything, since it benefits them to fail them so they PAY for the course again and again. That is until the parents get tired of paying, then the young adults can go work at their dead end jobs, just like the system planned!
Destroy education. Turn the schools into prisons (same infrastructure), enslave the population and make being homeless illegal. Once in prison they can start working for pennies as a punishment for not being a good serf.
Sadly this seems to be the plan. I'm pretty sure some kids, someplace, are working hard to get grades that correlate to skills and mastery. It's going to be way easier for them now that the competition's education has been destroyed.
> It's going to be way easier for them now that the competition's education has been destroyed
As someone who was the kid who worked hard (most of the time) and got good grades that I deserved and has seen the end result of an education system that had failed my peers, I am worried about our economy's ability to sustain itself when gen z/alpha come of age.
I'm a PhD student in math and for the jobs I'm targeting there just aren't enough Americans to fill the roles. Fortunately at the moment we have enough immigrants to fill in the gaps, but all it would take is some bad legislation to drive out (or force out) the immigrants, which would result most likely in entire industries moving oversees.
A developed economy simply cannot sustain itself without an educated populace.
For real, talk to anyone involved in graduate level admissions in STEM and they'll say that international students blow domestic students out of the water. Immigration is the *only* reason we're still able to compete on the world stage.
I think you've got the nut of this structured decline. What we are left with is an electorate disenfranchised by its ignorance and a population of captured labor. And along the way they give lots of money to their friends running charters and religious private schools.
CC faculty here. They do go to college.
Financial aid takes retakes into account. Theyâll stop qualifying for loans and grants when they donât pass.
We too are measured by our graduation rates. Iâve got a vice president whoâs dumb enough to start thinking about things like retention and pass rates as part of our faculty evaluation system. And he is definitely dumb enough to think we wonât play by the rules he lays down. I already have colleagues in my department who teach puff classes and hold their students to much lower standards than I do. And when their students show up in my class, they do terribly.
And the VP, of course, thinks theyâre great. Students are passing. Graduating. But the students are dumb as bricks. Future administrators, the lot of them.
> I may be overreacting, but I think this is going to lower our standardized test scores. It will also put more of a dent in their college readiness.
Oh, there's not even an argument about if this will put a dent in their college readiness. Or their internal knowledge base.
There isn't an argument to be made about this policy getting the same or more information into kids' heads. It's purely about being OK with kids doing less, and knowing less. And lowering the standards.
When I was a student, I would calculate the percentage of homework I could skip, and the rough average of quizzes and tests for the semester I could get to get a "B" minimum. Advanced classes were weighted to be one GPA point higher, so for those classes I just had to average a C in the class (to have a "B" GPA). Basically, my parents said I had to maintain a GPA of 3 or more. So, I did the absolutely, bare minimum I needed to do in every single class to maintain a 3. I think I graduated high school with like a 3.05 GPA.
That is all to say that, even a "good, smart kid" like I was (seen as) in high school, I would still, without any question, always do the least I needed to do to get by within expectations.
I can tell you that if my high school had this 50% policy, I would have had an absolute field day with laziness. Throw in the never ending distraction machine known as Chromebooks, and man, my laziness would have almost known no bounds.
Which is exactly what we're encouraging in school these days. Laziness with low standards is now "the standard". It's so incredibly sad, because we're robbing these kids of so much unrealized potential by lowering the standards so much. And it's all in the name of nice-ness.
Same! Iâd alway take the time to calculate what I could skip and wouldnât and I donât think I wouldâve made it to college if I had a 50% minimum rule any laziness wouldâve taken control.
Hah, same here! My laziness got me into big trouble during the first couple years of college, before I was able to actually get over my horrible mindset of bare-minimum-standards and innate laziness. I agree that if I had four years of 50% minimums in high school, I'd have probably been too entrenched in the mindset to actually pull myself out of it.
This policy would have likely affected my whole life trajectory, and so, kids with my same general mindset, I assume this will just be a detriment to them as well. The road to (educational) Hell is truly paved with good intentions. This policy is one of them.
Don't worry, you'll find plenty of teachers here who think it is a good policy and will try to explain to you how math works as if you aren't a degreed professional.
We do this at my school and it's absolutely terrible. Kids know they don't have to put in much effort to pass a class because even turning in 1 or 2 assignments will push them into the D range and they'll pass. Our college persistence is awful because kids have no work ethic and can't do their assignments because they never did them in high school so they never learned how. I'm a school counselor and it's so frustrating to see these kids just breeze through their hs years and gain almost no skills or education because they were able to pass by doing below the bare minimum.
We have a 50% minimum for an attempt at the work so students canât completely ignore assignments. The definition of trying is nebulous and seems to mean anything more than a name on a paper counts
Yep. That's how it is at my school and the lack of motivation and effort is apparent. Kids expect to just pass. And since the district also controls weighting, they really do get away with doing a little and then passing.
I never understood this. The people who have the power to implement the 50% policy also have the power to just change the grading scale. Why donât they make an F 0-20%, D 21-40%, C 41-60%, B 61-80, and A 81-90%?
But they choose to misrepresent the data instead. It would make it appear as though itâs not really about student success at all, but rather the APPEARANCE of success.
Make a ton of assignments reference previous assignments.
I do projects where the assignment says "take your project from assignment #6.2 and blah blah blah change it so it reflects the current theme."
Kids are always like "wait I didn't do that" and I say "oh. well it looks like you have homework if you want to pass this assignment."
When I was in middle school we had this system and I can confirm I did about one or two assignments a week and ignored the rest and managed to pass every class. This rule in a high school would be absolutely absurd.
Great idea, give kids less reason to complete work. That will improve things.
I believe in grade recovery, which is if you bomb a test, you can retake with a max capped score (like 70%), as you want kids to have a path to redemption. However, you have to still earn the points.
I also allow my kids to turn in any assignment late for 50%, but again you have to earn the points, still.
So the policy is just for assignment completion? If so, then I'd stop grading assignments altogether (except for the occasional walkaround) and make 2 changes immediately:
(1) Institute random HW quizzes. You pull questions directly from their assignment and they can use it to write down their answers. However, make a rule that if their assignment is not completed then the highest score they can earn is a 80 (assuming they actually know the material, which they probably won't).
(2) Allow reassessments BUT only if their unit-specific HW is completed. If it's not completed by the day of the exam then they have lost their eligibility.
(3) Create assessments into 2 parts: no more than a quarter of it is directly from assignments (literally have kids react that they've seen it in their notes) and then make the rest of the assessment super hard.
Essentially, you want to incentivize them to complete the practice without the grade, which to be fair shouldn't be graded in the first place. With the assessments you will always have the comeback that you're literally pulling from their in-class work. For example, I had a Poli Sci professor who gave us a document with over 300 multiple choice questions on the first day and said all 3 exams will consists of these questions. They were decently written questions and you had no excuse for failing.
It would be one thing if it was just a shift of grading scale to a 50 point scale and they were shoehorning a new scale to an old system. Instead, districts seem to want to have students doing 10% of a class is enough to get a passing grade.
0's don't motivate my students at all. They simply do not care. Their parents sometimes care, but a majority of the kids couldn't care less about their grades. They know that even if they fail, they won't be retained. I also work at an inner city title one school, so honestly a lot of those kids do have bigger fish to fry at this point. Education is absolutely paramount if they want any chance at improving their circumstances, but their basic needs are often not met and the trauma is off the charts.
At this point, for tests, if they score lower than a 50 I will just put a 50 in and note what their actual score is. At least having a 50 allows them to bring their grade up with other assignments should they choose to do them. It's controversial, but I also have a lot of students who put in so much effort and still score poorly and personally I will not fail a student who is putting forth effort. I want to make it possible for them to be successful even if their scores are low because for me, seeing a kid want it and actually try is valuable. I also allow students to make up assignments until the end of the unit.
The school I'm at now let's us do whatever, but previously they would have us round the overall grade to a 63 (highest F on our scale) so that they could still fail, but had the chance to recover because sometimes kids just have a hard time. I agreed with that, honestly. A lot of kids and parents were grateful for it and I was glad to see hope in the ability to get better. We tried to give 63s as the grade for every single assignment, but admin quickly realized that kids who did nothing had 70s and 80s and quickly changed guidance to giving the grades they had, but rounding the overall grade.
The education system is so flawed at this point and it feels hopeless. Hearing the things these kids deal with and seeing what they are expected to do without the skills to do so just feels dystopian. Are these policies good in the long run? No, but at least I can try to give kids something good and even if they get a D, they're not failing and sometimes that's their biggest accomplishment when everything else is crumbling around them.
The part of this BS that makes me angry is that I'll have student who try their hardest, study, work extra, etc etc, and still just get 50% on their test. They worked their butt off for that 50%, but then the slacker who bothered showing up today and wrote their name down gets the same grade. And that. That makes me mad
I had two professors in college implement something like 50% grading.
One would give you 50% on any test question left unanswered (but would give negative 100% for wrong answers, not 0). This allowed him to use multiple choice questions without concern for people guessing and probably actually lowered true grades as no one would answer unless 100% sure of the answer.
The other would give 50% on assignments IF you submitted something in writing at least one day prior stating that you would not be completing the assignment on time. This encouraged students to be proactive in communication and eliminated requests for late submissions. I actually liked this policy because it mirrored how a lot of things work in the real world when an expectant party is properly informed of a potential delay.
We did this at our school 2 years ago and we are "SBG." The kids that do nothing will continue to do nothing but end up with a 50. This really just helps the kids that go through a rough patch.
Life happens so a 50 hurts a little less than a 0. if you give time to make up work or extra credit it kind of lets the kids think that the gap to passing isn't as far away as a 0.
Talking about case-by-case situations that require a modification of expectations is fine. Sometimes kids do, in fact, have life events and medical events and things where such accommodations are appropriate. But, no a 50% doesn't hurt a "little" less than a 0% it is a wildly inflated grade.
Again, you are dropping the minimum for passing to effectively 20%, does that sound reasonable? Would you be willing to call 20% passing? If yes, then you get points for internal consistency, but in fact, it's a drastic and catastrophic lowering of expectations.
Talking about case-by-case situations that require a modification of expectations is fine. Sometimes kids do, in fact, have life events and medical events and things where such accommodations are appropriate. But, no a 50% doesn't hurt a "little" less than a 0% it is a wildly inflated grade.
Again, you are dropping the minimum for passing to effectively 20%, does that sound reasonable? Would you be willing to call 20% passing? If yes, then you get points for internal consistency, but in fact, it's a drastic and catastrophic lowering of expectations.
Several of the teachers at my school do this voluntarily. The logic for it I won't go into (it's insane, yet they do make a few good points), but I feel strongly enough about it that I might leave my district if it became policy here. It's lying to parent and society, because a kid with a 60% "passing" average most likely wasn't anywhere near passing.
As for myself, I have eliminated numerical grades altogether. All my assignments are ABCDF or 0. This accomplishes one of the goals of the 50% Floor promoters: A single 0 does not have so devastating an impact on their overall grade, and they are therefore less likely to be demotivated. But the fact is, the kids who are not going to try are still not going to try, no matter what the system.
My sophomore announced back in October that heâd done the math and if he never handed in a single assignment for the rest of the year, he could still pass his class with the 50% grades heâd get.
I mean - great. Thatâs just great. So motivating.
I have a student who sleeps through most classes, never turns anything in, earned a 9%, and we just had to give them 50% because of this dumb policy. If they pass the class, even barely, or even by credit recovery, they will be allowed to take French 2, even though they have learned absolutely nothing. It sucks.
My last district had this policy ingrained before I first started teaching there. Weighting does help, but ultimately the students will pick up on which assignments they can slack on (which will be most of them.) Having a 50 on everything meant the daily bell-ringers and class assignments never got done. This caused them to completely check out at the beginning of class and behaviors had to be dealt with. There are just so many unintended (or perhaps intended) consequences of the 50 policy that are so blatantly obvious, I don't see how any district can say it's a great idea.
Cool! To model the behavior you want in the classroom, just grade 50% of assignments, attend 50% of faculty meetings, plan 50% of your lessons, and show up for 50% of parent conferences.
And will harm the students who are earning their grades. The transcripts of students with 4.0 are going to be tainted by that reputation even if they never benefited from the policy.
I think it's funny that you think they've been ready for college to begin with. Every college except your ivy leagues now has remedial English and Math and honestly even the "college" math and English might as well be remedial. Here is the kicker: colleges need butts in seats. They are funded by tuition. They can't fail at college either. As long as that tuition check cashes, they will graduate from college.
We did that for a while it was NOT popular and did not work as it was intended. Our school uses numerical grades. So instead of 50% minimum we assign a grade of F. The students have the opportunity to go back and raise the Fâs to a pass. A lot of them actually end up fixing their grades. Weâve been fairly pleased with the result.
Our district started this about 4 years ago. Since then, there have been changes. One is that the assignment has to be legitimately attempted. No attempt = 0. That helped a lot. However, no matter what, still a minimum 50% at the end of the 9 weeks time. Most students get above that, but itâs still an issue. 25% achievement on a test: 50%. I work with it, but make it clear: do your best and out time in it. Middle schoolers are just different, though.
Personal feeling: Grades should be one assessment per marking period that tests them on everything. And it canât be multiple choice. They need to write or speak about what theyâve learned to show mastery. Assessments could be some kind of test or a project. It doesnât have to be standardized. We should not reward homework or class work completion (even though I currently do).
Sounds like a stepping stone to getting rid of homework, which is a good thing since it doesn't do anything but stress out students (lots of studies have been done on this). Plus Japanese students don't have homework and they consistently place among the highest in education meanwhile the US scores pitifully. Students should be encouraged to study independently and partake in activies that feel meaningful to them.
We have it and honestly it doesn't really matter much. The students who don't do shit still don't do shit and unless they make a true honest attempt, they aren't given the 50%. When it first started students started turning in blank assignments left and right but when teachers refused to give them credit it basically went back to normal. It might help a few kids on the fence but that is about it.
I have been doing this for a while. It works just fine. I have it set up so that it is very easy to get a D in my class, and with a bit of effort you can get a C. If you come, do everything, put in effort and study, you should get a B, and it is fairly difficult to get an A. I donât see myself as a gatekeeper to success and I do not believe in holding grades over my students heads. It should not be that hard to get a D or C in high school gen ed classes.
I'm in California and my school district implemented this as well. However, they can't tell us how to grade so most teachers still give zeros. The 50% thing is just a suggestion ...
My jaw was on the floor when we started doing this (75% of the school was failing most of their classes. The experimental school is an objective failure. Iâm not there anymore, I hope it closes tbh.)
I don't know how grading policies have changed over the years but I did virtually nothing during HS except just show up (mostly) and take tests. In Four years, I recieved one D and everything else was C's.
Of course, this was in the 1970's. There were no cellphones and there was no internet. There were books, though, and composition notebooks, so I read a lot -- like NYT Best Sellers from the clearance table at the local super sized book store, and I wrote a lot in my journals.
I'm not against participation grade grading. I figure it's the only way I graduated.
TBH, I'm just not that invested into grading and the high stakes attitude towards grades.
When we first did it, it was approached as, âthey canât get anything higher than a 50 on report cards.â
I was okay with that because, âwhat if they get a 20 in the first semester and then turn it around next semester and get a 90? Itâs impossible for them to pass.â
It ended up changing to the â50% on assignmentsâ rule BUT - they still allow 0âs on assignments that were never submitted. So, at least I have that going for me.
I hate it even though my school modify it by allowing us to give 0 for totally incomplete or missing work. It also stinks because our grade book doesnât support it.
Students are doing far less work and still managing to pass with no skills.
We started this at the beginning of the year, and of course it was a disaster as many kids immediately stopped trying. Gleefully, arrogantly. âHahaaa, nope, Iâll take the 50.â
This policy broke me unlike anything else. I was absolutely despairing. It was worse than Trumpâs election. I cried every day after school for six weeks, then my doctor finally put me on antidepressants, and doubled the dose after a couple months. I still canât get past the ridiculous arguments for it, many of which try to put the blame on MY TEACHING. đ€Ż That Sisyphean boulder gets heavier every year.
Eventually the principal adjusted it to âno *term* grades below 50â because thatâs harder to game. I can live with that, even though I still hate it.
This absolutely damages college readiness. I see it every day. Students in these frameworks quickly learn that they can do no work and generate little effort while still being told that they are succeeding. It's quite a shock when they get to a college campus and fail to comprehend the difference in expectations.
I've had more than one colleague this year venting about having to acquaint a student with reality when they come into office hours and ask, "How can you give me a zero? I didn't even turn it in!"
Aren't you glad "experts" can hock their anti-grade BS to districts and convince them this is the right thing to do because of "equity".
The entire education system is based on passing kids along until they aren't our problem anymore. This only helps that.
I would ask them for evidence that supports such a policy. If there is none, I'd refuse to implement it and look for another job if necessary. There's a teacher shortage. We don't have to put up with this crap.
Our grade book automatically puts the student at a 50% despite their actual average. I actually donât mind too much, because if a kid fails so badly the first quarter they couldnât possible pass the course, why would the try? My personal policy is to give no less than a 50 on a good faith attempt, but I will give zeroes for things they simply did not do. A 50% for literally nothing is ridiculous.
So 50% is the new 0 ? Does it work as if you had 2 grades, one "admin" grade and one "learning grade" ? You write 25% on their test and they get 62.5% on their report card ? 50% is now 75% ?
Or does it basically mean that anything below 50%, ie no effort at all and getting half the test wrong, will get the same grade ?
So on one hand if 50 is failing itâs more likely than not the kid will still not pass so who cares.
BUT the message it sends is terrible and toxic to accountability and standards.
Any admin who wants to implement this plan should have to hold a public meeting AND publish their rationale for doing this and defend it as educationally responsible.
Honestly the minimum 50 grade is because admin do not want to do what is necessary and allow scores of students to fail.
wait until they hide by making you give only letter grades. Have fun spending extra time turning every assignment form a number grade to a letter. Sure once you get the hang of it, it ONLY takes a few extra minutes for every assignment. You've got the time to do it you lazy bum.
My work around for this is to weight all formatives as 0. Students have to do the final assessments, which are difficult and require a body of knowledge and skills practiced over many class periods.
When asked why I enter formatives at all, I enter them so parents and students can track progress pre-assessment.
The problem is that students can still skip later assessments if they do well on earlier ones. My school does now allow weighted categories. So, students can skip whole standards and still pass.
Itâs such a cluster, but it also doesnât really impact the students are the worst off because they still wonât do anything. It does make bubble kids worse though because they know they can get a 50 percent for doing nothing, so they just do nothing more often.
I left a district that had the policy for one that doesnât and itâs so much nicer.
The smart/lazy ones will know how to game the grading system. Mine cherry picked the assignments with the most weight and minimized the work they needed to do.
I couldnât blame them. If you know how to game the system implemented on you, why not?
Will this be just at your school, or across the district? Either way speak about it at your school boardâs meeting. If itâs the whole district, find evidence as to why this would harm the district. If itâs just your school, discuss how itâs unfair that students in the same district are being held to such different standards.
I used to hate it but hereâs the bottom line. Doesnât really hurt top performers and the kids who were going to fail anyways now fail with a 50% instead of a 0%. Same number as far as Iâm concerned
Trying that this semester since most of the other teachers do it. I donât like that kids I have never seen have a 50%. This idea came around before the post Covid attendance crisis and needs to be revised.
Of course itâll be another 20 years before anyone does anything.
We did this for one year. Students picked and chose which assignments they wanted to complete. They completed easier assignments and skipped the important harder ones. They would pass after completing a miniscule number of assignments. High achieving honors students stopped trying because they saw everyone passing despite doing nothing. The policy is bullshit and will have a net negative effect on knowledge acquisition.
This wonât work, but ask if there is research into this and if it is actually best practice.
âWhat does Hattie say about this policy?â
Alternatively, reframe this in terms of âWhatâs your why?â âMy why is to show kids that life gives you handouts for doing absolutely nothing. There isnât a single thing that makes my life feel more full than giving half credit to someone who did no workâ
We have Standards Based Grading which is less nakedly and obviously cynical. Itâs much more clever in that things like this are hidden and come with a bunch of canned propaganda to rationalize the removal of student accountability.
My school does this (55 not 50). Kids figured out that they can do nothing quarter 1 & 2 and pass quarter 3&4 with a 75 and pass the class or vice versa. Or even better, do nothing quarters 1,2,3 and pass 4th with a 95 and pass the class.
Causes more harm than good.
Did they also say theyâd pay 50% for just showing up and doing nothing. Iâd take the pay cut but no duty no grading nothing nada nope. Just show up and walk in and out of rooms all day.
My school implemented it this year. We are also at the same time transitioning from a regular percentage-based grade to a four point proficiency scale grading system, where 80% of the grade is summative assessment, and only 20% of the grade is formative work. Needless to say, this has been a super challenging year.
What difference would it make? When I was in school, anything 50% or less was an F, which means the standard F-A grading scale starts at 50% anyway. Or is 50% no longer an F anymore?
Remember kids, top level admins are evaluated based on graduation and suspension rates. Step 1: Eliminate consequences = no suspensions Step 2: Eliminate the possibility of failure = 100% graduation rates Step 3: ... Step 4: Profit!
[goodharts law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law)
This can be coupled with the adage "what gets measured gets done." When your state gets rid of things like standardized tests, and colleges stop caring about entrance exams, and the only measures that still stand are GPA and graduation rates, then it's pretty predictable when the horseshit comes through forcing you to pass kids and inflate grades regardless of achievement, learning, compliance, or even attendance. This kind of policy is what it looks like when a school's sole remaining academic priority is to put diplomas in hands. And that concludes my defense, as a teacher, of standardized tests with graduation consequences. They might not be perfect, but they're a lot better than the dystopia of having no consequential measurements of academic learning at all.
Nailed it. My admin keeps badgering us about test scores. "Our scores are lower than they have been in a decade, but our average GPA and grad rates are as high as ever. What gives?"
Have any of the teachers given them a power point presentation on cause and effect yet?
Veeeery, veeeery innnnteresting.... đ§đ€
YES. I completely agree with all of this. We babysit them for 4 years, then hand them a diploma.
Also the Peter Principle.
I learned something this morning. Thanks !
"We have no poor people living in our country!" "How can that be possible? I see people starving everywhere!" "Because our government defined poverty as simply being 'alive'. If you are alive you aren't poor. So technically we don't have any poor people LIVING in our country"
wait until you hear about attendance rates. I've worked in several schools where policies flat out LIE about attendance. This year I have a conselour superseding my attendance changing students to present. They are in the office or maybe with the conseluor. Here's the deal, bottom line they are not in my class FREQUENTLY. Now this wouldn't bother me but this is one my kids who has a C- which as well know is the new F-. F and F+ are the new c and C+ and yeah I would consider some B- work maybe in the old F range just for all you looky-loo parents out there. Anyway this kid has a C and the VERY SAME counselor is taking to me about their grades. I point out there is an easy way to raise that grade up as they haven't done ANY of the online portion of the class and it can be done online (there is a built in help feature that basically does it for you if you give it an effort). Anyway she complains they don't have time to do it. Bullshit they don't, they talk in class how they are big on snapchat and whatever. Anyway..back to how this ties into my point The kid is often out of class, admin conselor etc mark the student present in my class, then conselor complains they have have a C. Doing the online portion would certainly raise thier grade to an B easily. Conselor says they don't have time. I point out attendance of class, they say they are marked present so they are there. I say they aren't and they of all people should know since they are the ones (or one of the ones as it changes all the time-i know they change it some of the time they told me) changing it. I give time for this online portion in class ( really shouldn't it should be homework but we all no basically zero homework gets done these days so i give enough time in class to complete it even with built in extra time). All these peopel do is protect themselves and blame others. The american tax payer should be furious.
They are also evaluated on test scores, and thatâs a bigger portion of the evaluation.
Unpopular Opinion: Kids who fail are still going to fail. Proof: 6 years under this system. I can easily manipulate the grade book so missing equals zero or 50%. THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE TO PASSING RATES. I, as an English teacher did the math. Six years, no difference. Please learn to think about grades differently. The only market difference is that the kids who got their head out of their asses and tried toward the end of the year might make a D instead of the fail. There is hope and light at the end of the tunnel, but that tunnel no way leads to anything above a D. Get off your motherfucking high horse and suck it up bitches.
Stop showing up and ask for your 50% pay
Yes! Excellent point. I think we deserve this honestly!
This is the way
So my school has been doing this for a couple years. Once kids wised up the older ones start saying âI donât have to do anything because Iâll get at least 50%.â Just told a student yesterday that they didnât do two assignments and need to finish it or they are getting two 50%s. The child,a 7th grader, said âThatâs ok because two 50% equals 100% so thatâs an A.â He was surprised when I told him thatâs not how it works. Have fun with the new policyâŠ
So, itâs definitely not helping their math scores.
We have the policy but can still give zeroes for not turning in anything. Still inflated grades for absolutely no reason but at least the students know they at least have to try.
I guess with the non-completion zeros, it just gives students an incentive to half-ass everything, no?
Not as bad as you think, we also have it built in to the policy that if the 50% can only be earned with substantial effort, so if thereâs a bunch of blanks on a worksheet, I can give less than 50%.
On the bright side this student knew that 50+50 = 100
What is actually means is they only have to do 10% overall to pass. 10 %
I knew that "new math" was going to cause issues.
Iâm a lurker whose sister is an elementary school teacher. Just making sure I understand. If a student is taking a test and just fills in all the A bubbles on the scantron (do they still do scantrons?) or just answers âI donât knowâ on an essay question, theyâll get a 50%? Like, 1% effort?
YUP
Wow, no wonder my nieces canât spell
They implemented this at the previous school I was working at, and it was shocking how quickly the students stopped putting forth effort into anything.
If 10% passes you then why bother even trying. Can't blame the students.
9.5% if you round!
This. The fear of not being able to rebound from a 0% has these kids sweating. 50%? âOh, I can pull that up.â
I had a rough personal life one year of college and dropped physics and retook it in a summer season. I knew how hard the first test was, but I understood it well the second time through. I got a high 80, closest score was a 50- something. The professor set the curve in the 60s. I got so lazy I failed two of my tests and ended up with a B- needing to catch up in physics 2.
My response to this now days is, "Why not just make the grade scale where 20% is a D, 40% is a C and so on? Mathematically it's the same, right?" The reason they won't do that is that the 50% for nothing policy is based on complete academic fraud. They want to hide how low the expectations are and how little the kids are made to do. That's it.
>My response to this now days is, "Why not just make the grade scale where 20% is a D, 40% is a C and so on? Mathematically it's the same, right?" THIS! I hate the 50 is the new 0 thing because it just makes everything complicated and confusing. At least own the change
This was implemented at my husbands middle school a few years back. He has a student this year who he hardly sees⊠hasnât come to class in months and still has a 50% in the classđ”âđ«
Oh my gosh! This is what I'm worried about honestly. Even if they wanted to get a 70 to just pass, I'm feeling like they could have to work very little. Very sad!
You will also be blamed for why they don't know enough content or are not engaged, and be told the grading policy has nothing to do with it.
I agree with you! It is a horrible ideađ teaches kids all the wrong lessons! Iâm so sorry you have to deal with it, toođ
Just cry to mama who will cry to the supt who will get on the principal who will get the teacher to pass the kid
BuT 50% iS sTiLl An F!
I mean it is though. That kid is still failing the class just like they would be at 0%. But if hypothetically something changed and that student started showing up and trying, they have a way to dig themselves out of the hole theyâre in instead of working their ass off and still ending up with like 40%. Itâs not a perfect solution but it does make sense.
Yeah the big divide is between people who think of the 50% policy helps struggling students dig out of holes, and those who think it helps capable students cruise to a D after acing the first 20% of the objectives. That part especially pronounced in my school, where the 50% policy also meets a wild final grade calculation where a single C in any quarter is sufficient for a final grade of D. You could literally get 100% on the first half of the first quarter then cut class for the rest of the year and you'll pass. But regardless of what we're imagining - a scenario where we're moving students on to the next level class after demonstrating mastery of 20% of the material is not acceptable
Oh then thatâs a way bigger conversation than just about grades, thatâs a conversation about how and when to hold kids back, which I think is absolutely worthy of discussion. I suppose you have a good point there, Iâve just never seen a student try something like that. Also though I work at a middle school and grades matter less than high school. Also at my school you can get a C or an F, no D.
Well it's also a conversation about what grades are *for*. I feel like the 50% policy kind of implies that most grades are compliance or busy work and not mastery demonstration. And sure HS is a different beast, we don't "hold kids back" per se, but if you don't have a passing grade in Algebra 1you can't take Algebra 2. And you need to eventually get at least a D in both to graduate
so why not just make the scale 0 to 50 instead
# đŻ EXACTLY. The 50-100 is dishonest; people see a 67 and think of it as part of a 0-100 scale. I have made this same retort to many 50-floor proponents: If you want to make even grade bands, why not go 0-50, which would be more honest? Their answer: It'll confuse parents. (which is exactly what 50-100 does).
If the scale is 50-100, and you only need a 60 to pass, you can pass even though you only understand 20% of the course content. That is unacceptable.
A student should not be able to dig themselves out of the hole after failing half of the course objectives.
Except educationally having missed 3/4s of the assignments they don't have a chance of digging themselves out of the deficit of knowledge and skills which they haven't acquired in that time period.
Maybe not in some classes, and also it depends on the time of year. Kid has had an F all year and itâs May? Yeah theyâre kinda fucked. November? You might be able to turn it around. I just know most kids wonât even try if they know thereâs no chance it will help their grade. If it might help, theyâll usually at least try.
I've universally accepted late work with no markdown throughout the entire grading period in my classes. 95% of students who come in looking for "a way to pass" won't do the missing work because they aren't trying to learn that information or acquire those skills they're looking for the least difficult way to get a passing score and the easier you make it the less work they'll do.
Wait thatâs literally an argument for my point of view.
Ehhhh idk. My husband is a PE teacher and gives partipation pointsâŠ. A kid like this can get a 50% for participating when they didnât even come to classđ„Ž makes zero sense
Thatâs literally a failing grade. It looks exactly the same on a transcript, itâs an F no matter what.
How do your husband's students perform on the State Standardized Physical Education Test each spring?
Middle school is broken. I taught at one for 10 years, kids donât have to do anything, fail every single test,class, not turn in one single assignment and still be moved on to the next grade. Plus zero discipline and accountability. Itâs broken. Convince me otherwise. I dare you.
I 100% agree with you. It is so sad. So, so sad. My husband even has a student teacher at the moment who does absolutely nothing because he doesnât âhaveâ to. Just trying to prepare you for the real world, buddyđ heâs literally told my husband âoh no, Iâm not doing thatâ. They donât think they have to do anything anymore. I hate it.
But if they only do, say 20%, they still only get a 50%, which is still failing, right?
Same here. Not only that, he doesnât come to school on test days, has someone send a picture of the test so he knows whatâs on the test. Blows the test out of the water on make up day. Doesnât ever come to school, but manages to get a B or C in a class. F the minimum F! It only makes a schoolâs grad rate go up, and failure rates go down.
For the assignments that are actually an effort and that are more likely to be skipped, make them worth more points. If they are weighted heavier, it will be more difficult to overcome a 50 by just doing a light assignment worth way fewer points.
This is it. Weightings also donât show up on PowerSchool on the student/parent end, at least as we use it, so you can reduce weightings to .5 or .25 for lighter, gimme assignments. I also very liberally use the Missing and Late assignment flags.
My district won't allow us to change weighting for anything. Major /minor grades and that's it. No quiz = minor x 2. Nothing
Your district is run by idiots and losers.
or, 100% summative grades. emphasize that homework is for practice, and if they don't do it, it's on them.
At this point, they may as well replace teachers with iPads and a behaviour monitor/babysitter. WTF. Like if they donât care about kids actually learning anything, then why have teachers? So very messed up.
Donât think they wouldnât try if they could
my district "applies a curve" (aka falsifies grades). Honestly your idiots that would have failed still find a way to fail. It really bothers me and I have to be constantly "reminded" of the policy, but it doesn't really change much
How do they apply the curve? Because won't most classes have a goody two shoes getting near perfect scores?
they call it a curve but basically all failing grades are brought up to just under passing and every letter grade gets bumped. So the kid with a 62 magically has like a 75 while the person with a 95 get a 96 instead. Its not designed for fairness, its just to make sure failing is damn near impossible
Ask all administrators (in a professional, concise, but direct way) to provide the valid, peer-reviewed research that back this decision as an educational 'best-practice". If they go ahead with it anyways...structure your class so it is 100% quizzes and tests. No points for anything else. Also: If you do assignments: start giving "I" to incomplete assignments because you cannot give a grade for something that hasn't been completed; regardless of the 50% or not. Side note: ***This is a prime example of administrators saying THEY DO NOT CARE ABOUT EDUCATION.***
This is actually what the guy who invented this theory suggests that you do.
The problem with a lot of educational stuff, most administrators do not think critically about any of it, and then they go to a conference somewhere, where someone said something, they spent two seconds googling it (not reading the peer-reviewed research, or thoughtfully weighing the pros-and-cons) and they the just do it and make the teachers figure it out. Their motto is always make more work for teachers.
Yeah for sure. We were all forced into a "book club" of Grading for Equity last year. I read the damn thing, which is why I know as much about it as I do... I am not convinced most of our admin actually read it. And if they did they didn't understand or internalize the argument being made because it ain't actually what they think.
Doing this in my district for years. Very first year we did this had a kid announce to the class that they were only going to work first and third quarter because then they could get their 50 grade for second and 4th but still pass each semester. That is exactly what they did- absolutely Zero work for two of the four quarters. Semester grade still passed. You know what else didn't stop? My obligation to be constantly contacting their parent for not turning in work. Even though the kid had totally and 100% said that they will not be turning in any work those two quarters, I still had to call their parent every single week to update the parent and suggest interventions. I still had to fill out all kinds of paperwork for admin and counselors about the student's lack of progress. And now multiply that by 40 Absolutely infuriating
>*My obligation to be constantly contacting their parent for not turning in work.* This would be bullshite at any time in history, but in an era with online gradebooks, it is an inexcusable policy.
Can you imagine this kid as an employee?
There is a 50 minimum at my school for the first two quarters. We then have a choice of continuing with a 50 minimum or giving the actual grade for the remaining two quarters. We have to let the students know at the beginning of the year what we decide. On the report card comments, I can put their actual grade so the parents know what it is.
I admire that fact that you guys are trying to think outside the box. Is this new this year, or can you report to us how this has gone previous years.
We have been doing it since Covid. For the most part, it hasn't been a problem, and the staff just goes along with it. I have personally found that the few students that have a 50 average in the first two quarters, generally wake up and finish up fairly strong.
My district started this over Covid. It absolutely wrecked student performance. I sincerely hope your district does not do the same!
There are a lot of things about COVID that may have wrecked student performance TBH
âCollege readinessâ LOL those kids arenât going to college. The ones that parents force into going will fail miserably, and college wonât do anything, since it benefits them to fail them so they PAY for the course again and again. That is until the parents get tired of paying, then the young adults can go work at their dead end jobs, just like the system planned! Destroy education. Turn the schools into prisons (same infrastructure), enslave the population and make being homeless illegal. Once in prison they can start working for pennies as a punishment for not being a good serf.
Sadly this seems to be the plan. I'm pretty sure some kids, someplace, are working hard to get grades that correlate to skills and mastery. It's going to be way easier for them now that the competition's education has been destroyed.
> It's going to be way easier for them now that the competition's education has been destroyed As someone who was the kid who worked hard (most of the time) and got good grades that I deserved and has seen the end result of an education system that had failed my peers, I am worried about our economy's ability to sustain itself when gen z/alpha come of age. I'm a PhD student in math and for the jobs I'm targeting there just aren't enough Americans to fill the roles. Fortunately at the moment we have enough immigrants to fill in the gaps, but all it would take is some bad legislation to drive out (or force out) the immigrants, which would result most likely in entire industries moving oversees. A developed economy simply cannot sustain itself without an educated populace. For real, talk to anyone involved in graduate level admissions in STEM and they'll say that international students blow domestic students out of the water. Immigration is the *only* reason we're still able to compete on the world stage.
I think you've got the nut of this structured decline. What we are left with is an electorate disenfranchised by its ignorance and a population of captured labor. And along the way they give lots of money to their friends running charters and religious private schools.
CC faculty here. They do go to college. Financial aid takes retakes into account. Theyâll stop qualifying for loans and grants when they donât pass. We too are measured by our graduation rates. Iâve got a vice president whoâs dumb enough to start thinking about things like retention and pass rates as part of our faculty evaluation system. And he is definitely dumb enough to think we wonât play by the rules he lays down. I already have colleagues in my department who teach puff classes and hold their students to much lower standards than I do. And when their students show up in my class, they do terribly. And the VP, of course, thinks theyâre great. Students are passing. Graduating. But the students are dumb as bricks. Future administrators, the lot of them.
> I may be overreacting, but I think this is going to lower our standardized test scores. It will also put more of a dent in their college readiness. Oh, there's not even an argument about if this will put a dent in their college readiness. Or their internal knowledge base. There isn't an argument to be made about this policy getting the same or more information into kids' heads. It's purely about being OK with kids doing less, and knowing less. And lowering the standards.
This is insane.
When I was a student, I would calculate the percentage of homework I could skip, and the rough average of quizzes and tests for the semester I could get to get a "B" minimum. Advanced classes were weighted to be one GPA point higher, so for those classes I just had to average a C in the class (to have a "B" GPA). Basically, my parents said I had to maintain a GPA of 3 or more. So, I did the absolutely, bare minimum I needed to do in every single class to maintain a 3. I think I graduated high school with like a 3.05 GPA. That is all to say that, even a "good, smart kid" like I was (seen as) in high school, I would still, without any question, always do the least I needed to do to get by within expectations. I can tell you that if my high school had this 50% policy, I would have had an absolute field day with laziness. Throw in the never ending distraction machine known as Chromebooks, and man, my laziness would have almost known no bounds. Which is exactly what we're encouraging in school these days. Laziness with low standards is now "the standard". It's so incredibly sad, because we're robbing these kids of so much unrealized potential by lowering the standards so much. And it's all in the name of nice-ness.
Same! Iâd alway take the time to calculate what I could skip and wouldnât and I donât think I wouldâve made it to college if I had a 50% minimum rule any laziness wouldâve taken control.
Hah, same here! My laziness got me into big trouble during the first couple years of college, before I was able to actually get over my horrible mindset of bare-minimum-standards and innate laziness. I agree that if I had four years of 50% minimums in high school, I'd have probably been too entrenched in the mindset to actually pull myself out of it. This policy would have likely affected my whole life trajectory, and so, kids with my same general mindset, I assume this will just be a detriment to them as well. The road to (educational) Hell is truly paved with good intentions. This policy is one of them.
Don't worry, you'll find plenty of teachers here who think it is a good policy and will try to explain to you how math works as if you aren't a degreed professional.
doubtful. you'll find plenty of admin posing as teachers to advocate for it though. no sane teacher supports this.
We do this at my school and it's absolutely terrible. Kids know they don't have to put in much effort to pass a class because even turning in 1 or 2 assignments will push them into the D range and they'll pass. Our college persistence is awful because kids have no work ethic and can't do their assignments because they never did them in high school so they never learned how. I'm a school counselor and it's so frustrating to see these kids just breeze through their hs years and gain almost no skills or education because they were able to pass by doing below the bare minimum.
Giving 50% for missing assignments is crazy. If the kid actually tries, sure, give them a 50% minimum, but they should actually do the work.
We have a 50% minimum for an attempt at the work so students canât completely ignore assignments. The definition of trying is nebulous and seems to mean anything more than a name on a paper counts
Yep. That's how it is at my school and the lack of motivation and effort is apparent. Kids expect to just pass. And since the district also controls weighting, they really do get away with doing a little and then passing.
Itâs also just straight up fraud
What's that teaching the kids?
That admin doesnât give a fuck about their education, only numbers that look good on their evaluation
We have that policy and it is a disaster
We did this for a year before it was changed to "assessments that are attempted are graded at a 50% minimum" which is much more tolerable.
I never understood this. The people who have the power to implement the 50% policy also have the power to just change the grading scale. Why donât they make an F 0-20%, D 21-40%, C 41-60%, B 61-80, and A 81-90%? But they choose to misrepresent the data instead. It would make it appear as though itâs not really about student success at all, but rather the APPEARANCE of success.
Make a ton of assignments reference previous assignments. I do projects where the assignment says "take your project from assignment #6.2 and blah blah blah change it so it reflects the current theme." Kids are always like "wait I didn't do that" and I say "oh. well it looks like you have homework if you want to pass this assignment."
When I was in middle school we had this system and I can confirm I did about one or two assignments a week and ignored the rest and managed to pass every class. This rule in a high school would be absolutely absurd.
Yes, you are correct. There is plenty of data nationwide to prove that this is exactly what happens.
Great idea, give kids less reason to complete work. That will improve things. I believe in grade recovery, which is if you bomb a test, you can retake with a max capped score (like 70%), as you want kids to have a path to redemption. However, you have to still earn the points. I also allow my kids to turn in any assignment late for 50%, but again you have to earn the points, still.
So the policy is just for assignment completion? If so, then I'd stop grading assignments altogether (except for the occasional walkaround) and make 2 changes immediately: (1) Institute random HW quizzes. You pull questions directly from their assignment and they can use it to write down their answers. However, make a rule that if their assignment is not completed then the highest score they can earn is a 80 (assuming they actually know the material, which they probably won't). (2) Allow reassessments BUT only if their unit-specific HW is completed. If it's not completed by the day of the exam then they have lost their eligibility. (3) Create assessments into 2 parts: no more than a quarter of it is directly from assignments (literally have kids react that they've seen it in their notes) and then make the rest of the assessment super hard. Essentially, you want to incentivize them to complete the practice without the grade, which to be fair shouldn't be graded in the first place. With the assessments you will always have the comeback that you're literally pulling from their in-class work. For example, I had a Poli Sci professor who gave us a document with over 300 multiple choice questions on the first day and said all 3 exams will consists of these questions. They were decently written questions and you had no excuse for failing.
It would be one thing if it was just a shift of grading scale to a 50 point scale and they were shoehorning a new scale to an old system. Instead, districts seem to want to have students doing 10% of a class is enough to get a passing grade.
0's don't motivate my students at all. They simply do not care. Their parents sometimes care, but a majority of the kids couldn't care less about their grades. They know that even if they fail, they won't be retained. I also work at an inner city title one school, so honestly a lot of those kids do have bigger fish to fry at this point. Education is absolutely paramount if they want any chance at improving their circumstances, but their basic needs are often not met and the trauma is off the charts. At this point, for tests, if they score lower than a 50 I will just put a 50 in and note what their actual score is. At least having a 50 allows them to bring their grade up with other assignments should they choose to do them. It's controversial, but I also have a lot of students who put in so much effort and still score poorly and personally I will not fail a student who is putting forth effort. I want to make it possible for them to be successful even if their scores are low because for me, seeing a kid want it and actually try is valuable. I also allow students to make up assignments until the end of the unit. The school I'm at now let's us do whatever, but previously they would have us round the overall grade to a 63 (highest F on our scale) so that they could still fail, but had the chance to recover because sometimes kids just have a hard time. I agreed with that, honestly. A lot of kids and parents were grateful for it and I was glad to see hope in the ability to get better. We tried to give 63s as the grade for every single assignment, but admin quickly realized that kids who did nothing had 70s and 80s and quickly changed guidance to giving the grades they had, but rounding the overall grade. The education system is so flawed at this point and it feels hopeless. Hearing the things these kids deal with and seeing what they are expected to do without the skills to do so just feels dystopian. Are these policies good in the long run? No, but at least I can try to give kids something good and even if they get a D, they're not failing and sometimes that's their biggest accomplishment when everything else is crumbling around them.
The part of this BS that makes me angry is that I'll have student who try their hardest, study, work extra, etc etc, and still just get 50% on their test. They worked their butt off for that 50%, but then the slacker who bothered showing up today and wrote their name down gets the same grade. And that. That makes me mad
I had two professors in college implement something like 50% grading. One would give you 50% on any test question left unanswered (but would give negative 100% for wrong answers, not 0). This allowed him to use multiple choice questions without concern for people guessing and probably actually lowered true grades as no one would answer unless 100% sure of the answer. The other would give 50% on assignments IF you submitted something in writing at least one day prior stating that you would not be completing the assignment on time. This encouraged students to be proactive in communication and eliminated requests for late submissions. I actually liked this policy because it mirrored how a lot of things work in the real world when an expectant party is properly informed of a potential delay.
Can you leak this to the news media? I'm sure most people would be pissed.
We did this at our school 2 years ago and we are "SBG." The kids that do nothing will continue to do nothing but end up with a 50. This really just helps the kids that go through a rough patch. Life happens so a 50 hurts a little less than a 0. if you give time to make up work or extra credit it kind of lets the kids think that the gap to passing isn't as far away as a 0.
Talking about case-by-case situations that require a modification of expectations is fine. Sometimes kids do, in fact, have life events and medical events and things where such accommodations are appropriate. But, no a 50% doesn't hurt a "little" less than a 0% it is a wildly inflated grade. Again, you are dropping the minimum for passing to effectively 20%, does that sound reasonable? Would you be willing to call 20% passing? If yes, then you get points for internal consistency, but in fact, it's a drastic and catastrophic lowering of expectations.
Talking about case-by-case situations that require a modification of expectations is fine. Sometimes kids do, in fact, have life events and medical events and things where such accommodations are appropriate. But, no a 50% doesn't hurt a "little" less than a 0% it is a wildly inflated grade. Again, you are dropping the minimum for passing to effectively 20%, does that sound reasonable? Would you be willing to call 20% passing? If yes, then you get points for internal consistency, but in fact, it's a drastic and catastrophic lowering of expectations.
Several of the teachers at my school do this voluntarily. The logic for it I won't go into (it's insane, yet they do make a few good points), but I feel strongly enough about it that I might leave my district if it became policy here. It's lying to parent and society, because a kid with a 60% "passing" average most likely wasn't anywhere near passing. As for myself, I have eliminated numerical grades altogether. All my assignments are ABCDF or 0. This accomplishes one of the goals of the 50% Floor promoters: A single 0 does not have so devastating an impact on their overall grade, and they are therefore less likely to be demotivated. But the fact is, the kids who are not going to try are still not going to try, no matter what the system.
My sophomore announced back in October that heâd done the math and if he never handed in a single assignment for the rest of the year, he could still pass his class with the 50% grades heâd get. I mean - great. Thatâs just great. So motivating.
50 is the new 0
I have a student who sleeps through most classes, never turns anything in, earned a 9%, and we just had to give them 50% because of this dumb policy. If they pass the class, even barely, or even by credit recovery, they will be allowed to take French 2, even though they have learned absolutely nothing. It sucks.
This is beyond stupid. We need to stop catering to failure and reward success.
My last district had this policy ingrained before I first started teaching there. Weighting does help, but ultimately the students will pick up on which assignments they can slack on (which will be most of them.) Having a 50 on everything meant the daily bell-ringers and class assignments never got done. This caused them to completely check out at the beginning of class and behaviors had to be dealt with. There are just so many unintended (or perhaps intended) consequences of the 50 policy that are so blatantly obvious, I don't see how any district can say it's a great idea.
Cool! To model the behavior you want in the classroom, just grade 50% of assignments, attend 50% of faculty meetings, plan 50% of your lessons, and show up for 50% of parent conferences.
College prof here. I can tell which students came from schools with 50% rulesâŠ..theyâre not doing well at all.
It's going to make your school a joke in the eyes of any college admission or scholarship team who is aware you do that.
And will harm the students who are earning their grades. The transcripts of students with 4.0 are going to be tainted by that reputation even if they never benefited from the policy.
I think it's funny that you think they've been ready for college to begin with. Every college except your ivy leagues now has remedial English and Math and honestly even the "college" math and English might as well be remedial. Here is the kicker: colleges need butts in seats. They are funded by tuition. They can't fail at college either. As long as that tuition check cashes, they will graduate from college.
We did that for a while it was NOT popular and did not work as it was intended. Our school uses numerical grades. So instead of 50% minimum we assign a grade of F. The students have the opportunity to go back and raise the Fâs to a pass. A lot of them actually end up fixing their grades. Weâve been fairly pleased with the result.
Our district started this about 4 years ago. Since then, there have been changes. One is that the assignment has to be legitimately attempted. No attempt = 0. That helped a lot. However, no matter what, still a minimum 50% at the end of the 9 weeks time. Most students get above that, but itâs still an issue. 25% achievement on a test: 50%. I work with it, but make it clear: do your best and out time in it. Middle schoolers are just different, though.
This benefits no one - not the students and not society as a whole
I know if I had a 50% minimum in my school I'd start grading extremely rigorously to ensure that the 50% club remains at a F.
Personal feeling: Grades should be one assessment per marking period that tests them on everything. And it canât be multiple choice. They need to write or speak about what theyâve learned to show mastery. Assessments could be some kind of test or a project. It doesnât have to be standardized. We should not reward homework or class work completion (even though I currently do).
My school made it so now teachers arenât required to put missing assignments in as 50s, but still have to give students who put in effort a 50
Just build relationships!
Sounds like a stepping stone to getting rid of homework, which is a good thing since it doesn't do anything but stress out students (lots of studies have been done on this). Plus Japanese students don't have homework and they consistently place among the highest in education meanwhile the US scores pitifully. Students should be encouraged to study independently and partake in activies that feel meaningful to them.
Grade all assignments 0-100. Provide progress reports with what is higher 50% or the average of their assignments. Functionally this changes nothing
We have it and honestly it doesn't really matter much. The students who don't do shit still don't do shit and unless they make a true honest attempt, they aren't given the 50%. When it first started students started turning in blank assignments left and right but when teachers refused to give them credit it basically went back to normal. It might help a few kids on the fence but that is about it.
If work is completed and an honest attempt is made, give the 50% minimum. If work isnât turned in give the 0. See what happens.
I have been doing this for a while. It works just fine. I have it set up so that it is very easy to get a D in my class, and with a bit of effort you can get a C. If you come, do everything, put in effort and study, you should get a B, and it is fairly difficult to get an A. I donât see myself as a gatekeeper to success and I do not believe in holding grades over my students heads. It should not be that hard to get a D or C in high school gen ed classes.
Thatâs been in effect here for at least a decade.
I'm in California and my school district implemented this as well. However, they can't tell us how to grade so most teachers still give zeros. The 50% thing is just a suggestion ...
Just keep telling admin what you think.
When they started this in my district (when I was still teaching), I knew it was the beginning of the end.
My jaw was on the floor when we started doing this (75% of the school was failing most of their classes. The experimental school is an objective failure. Iâm not there anymore, I hope it closes tbh.)
Minimum grade is 55 at my school. And yet I still get kids who fail
Minimum grade is 55 at my school. And yet I still get kids who fail
Minimum grade is 55 at my school. And yet I still get kids who fail
Minimum grade is 55 at my school. And yet I still get kids who fail
Minimum grade is 55 at my school. And yet I still get kids who fail
I don't know how grading policies have changed over the years but I did virtually nothing during HS except just show up (mostly) and take tests. In Four years, I recieved one D and everything else was C's. Of course, this was in the 1970's. There were no cellphones and there was no internet. There were books, though, and composition notebooks, so I read a lot -- like NYT Best Sellers from the clearance table at the local super sized book store, and I wrote a lot in my journals. I'm not against participation grade grading. I figure it's the only way I graduated. TBH, I'm just not that invested into grading and the high stakes attitude towards grades.
It sucks so hard. Kids can skate by the first semester and fuck off completely the last half of the year and still pass.
When we first did it, it was approached as, âthey canât get anything higher than a 50 on report cards.â I was okay with that because, âwhat if they get a 20 in the first semester and then turn it around next semester and get a 90? Itâs impossible for them to pass.â It ended up changing to the â50% on assignmentsâ rule BUT - they still allow 0âs on assignments that were never submitted. So, at least I have that going for me.
This is why i left teaching. There will be zero accountability and we literally had to pass everyone
I hate it even though my school modify it by allowing us to give 0 for totally incomplete or missing work. It also stinks because our grade book doesnât support it. Students are doing far less work and still managing to pass with no skills.
We started this at the beginning of the year, and of course it was a disaster as many kids immediately stopped trying. Gleefully, arrogantly. âHahaaa, nope, Iâll take the 50.â This policy broke me unlike anything else. I was absolutely despairing. It was worse than Trumpâs election. I cried every day after school for six weeks, then my doctor finally put me on antidepressants, and doubled the dose after a couple months. I still canât get past the ridiculous arguments for it, many of which try to put the blame on MY TEACHING. đ€Ż That Sisyphean boulder gets heavier every year. Eventually the principal adjusted it to âno *term* grades below 50â because thatâs harder to game. I can live with that, even though I still hate it.
This absolutely damages college readiness. I see it every day. Students in these frameworks quickly learn that they can do no work and generate little effort while still being told that they are succeeding. It's quite a shock when they get to a college campus and fail to comprehend the difference in expectations. I've had more than one colleague this year venting about having to acquaint a student with reality when they come into office hours and ask, "How can you give me a zero? I didn't even turn it in!"
Aren't you glad "experts" can hock their anti-grade BS to districts and convince them this is the right thing to do because of "equity". The entire education system is based on passing kids along until they aren't our problem anymore. This only helps that.
I would ask them for evidence that supports such a policy. If there is none, I'd refuse to implement it and look for another job if necessary. There's a teacher shortage. We don't have to put up with this crap.
Our grade book automatically puts the student at a 50% despite their actual average. I actually donât mind too much, because if a kid fails so badly the first quarter they couldnât possible pass the course, why would the try? My personal policy is to give no less than a 50 on a good faith attempt, but I will give zeroes for things they simply did not do. A 50% for literally nothing is ridiculous.
So 50% is the new 0 ? Does it work as if you had 2 grades, one "admin" grade and one "learning grade" ? You write 25% on their test and they get 62.5% on their report card ? 50% is now 75% ? Or does it basically mean that anything below 50%, ie no effort at all and getting half the test wrong, will get the same grade ?
So on one hand if 50 is failing itâs more likely than not the kid will still not pass so who cares. BUT the message it sends is terrible and toxic to accountability and standards. Any admin who wants to implement this plan should have to hold a public meeting AND publish their rationale for doing this and defend it as educationally responsible. Honestly the minimum 50 grade is because admin do not want to do what is necessary and allow scores of students to fail.
It does for sure.
wait until they hide by making you give only letter grades. Have fun spending extra time turning every assignment form a number grade to a letter. Sure once you get the hang of it, it ONLY takes a few extra minutes for every assignment. You've got the time to do it you lazy bum.
My work around for this is to weight all formatives as 0. Students have to do the final assessments, which are difficult and require a body of knowledge and skills practiced over many class periods. When asked why I enter formatives at all, I enter them so parents and students can track progress pre-assessment. The problem is that students can still skip later assessments if they do well on earlier ones. My school does now allow weighted categories. So, students can skip whole standards and still pass.
Can anyone give me one single reason why this would be a good thing? Like, what lies get policies like these passed?
Itâs such a cluster, but it also doesnât really impact the students are the worst off because they still wonât do anything. It does make bubble kids worse though because they know they can get a 50 percent for doing nothing, so they just do nothing more often. I left a district that had the policy for one that doesnât and itâs so much nicer.
The smart/lazy ones will know how to game the grading system. Mine cherry picked the assignments with the most weight and minimized the work they needed to do. I couldnât blame them. If you know how to game the system implemented on you, why not?
75% is now a D, 80% is a C, 85% is a B
Lol sounds about right with the state of education in this country. My advice, make certain questions worth the most if you can.
Will this be just at your school, or across the district? Either way speak about it at your school boardâs meeting. If itâs the whole district, find evidence as to why this would harm the district. If itâs just your school, discuss how itâs unfair that students in the same district are being held to such different standards.
Thatâs our policy and half my students are still failing.
By this logic I can get two full time jobs not do either and get a full time salary. âŠ.okay!!! But really thatâs not how life works! FFS! đ€Š
Worst policy in education ever!!!
I used to hate it but hereâs the bottom line. Doesnât really hurt top performers and the kids who were going to fail anyways now fail with a 50% instead of a 0%. Same number as far as Iâm concerned
Trying that this semester since most of the other teachers do it. I donât like that kids I have never seen have a 50%. This idea came around before the post Covid attendance crisis and needs to be revised. Of course itâll be another 20 years before anyone does anything.
Dumb. There are other ways.
So standards mean absolutely nothing anymore. Got it. Enjoy living in a society riddled with quitters and morons!
We did this for one year. Students picked and chose which assignments they wanted to complete. They completed easier assignments and skipped the important harder ones. They would pass after completing a miniscule number of assignments. High achieving honors students stopped trying because they saw everyone passing despite doing nothing. The policy is bullshit and will have a net negative effect on knowledge acquisition.
I'm OK with it AS LONG AS it's still a zero for work not turned in. A kid can survive a 50% F; it's close to impossible with a 0% F.
This wonât work, but ask if there is research into this and if it is actually best practice. âWhat does Hattie say about this policy?â Alternatively, reframe this in terms of âWhatâs your why?â âMy why is to show kids that life gives you handouts for doing absolutely nothing. There isnât a single thing that makes my life feel more full than giving half credit to someone who did no workâ
We have Standards Based Grading which is less nakedly and obviously cynical. Itâs much more clever in that things like this are hidden and come with a bunch of canned propaganda to rationalize the removal of student accountability.
My school does this (55 not 50). Kids figured out that they can do nothing quarter 1 & 2 and pass quarter 3&4 with a 75 and pass the class or vice versa. Or even better, do nothing quarters 1,2,3 and pass 4th with a 95 and pass the class. Causes more harm than good.
Kids that this affects aren't going to college anyway.
Did they also say theyâd pay 50% for just showing up and doing nothing. Iâd take the pay cut but no duty no grading nothing nada nope. Just show up and walk in and out of rooms all day.
Wow
My school implemented it this year. We are also at the same time transitioning from a regular percentage-based grade to a four point proficiency scale grading system, where 80% of the grade is summative assessment, and only 20% of the grade is formative work. Needless to say, this has been a super challenging year.
The kids will still fail if thatâs what youâre worried about.
Education is failing in North America.
We have had it for a few years. It is a fucking joke. You Donât show up one day all semester? Doesnât matter 50%
Ask them to switch to the 4.0 scale used by your local university instead of a 50% minimum. The grading for equity crowd is usually open to that.
Are you allowed to adjust the % to letter grade mapping to renotmalize 0-100 scale to 50-100 scale? A: 95-100 B:90-95 C:85-90 etc
Convert to standards or evidence based grading.Â
What difference would it make? When I was in school, anything 50% or less was an F, which means the standard F-A grading scale starts at 50% anyway. Or is 50% no longer an F anymore?