The grading system used in our overly-large school district is unfair.
At least it is according to the more than 2800 parents and students who signed an online petition asking our school board to adopt a more “traditional” scale.
Right now, an A around here is given for a score of 94 or higher. In most systems it starts at 90, which for our kids is a B+. The rest of the grade chart is similarly shifted.
The complaint, of course, is that our students are at some kind of disadvantage compared to those in other districts when applying for college.
However, I’m not sure they have a case.
Our grading system has been in place for more than 20 years, colleges know about it, and teachers have long since inflated their scoring to compensate for the “non-standard” scale.
On top of that we give students who take an AP class a bonus, which means that dozens of graduates in every high school have inflated GPAs above 4.0 on a chart where the “normal” top is 4.
But, more importantly, this campaign is pretty much about trivia. At least compared to all the other problems with our schools.
Instead of demanding that the shutters be painted a different color, shouldn’t we be having a serious discussion of how to fix the cracks in the foundation?
Perhaps fixing this trivial problem would help strengthen the idea that some things really should be consistent across all the nation’s schools?