Four Things We Have Learned While Discussing Grading Reform With Parents

By Matt Townsley & Chad Lang

A quick scan of news headlines about districts taking a step back from their grading changes suggests parents and/or community members often have reservations or an incomplete understanding of the changes happening inside the district (see examples from the media here and here).

We have firsthand experience with grading reform, supporting educators in implementing standards-based and standards-referenced grades, supporting administrators in navigating the steps to help their systems move forward, and facilitating parent meetings stemming from grading changes.

The purpose of this blog post is to share four things we have learned while talking with parents and schools about grading reform.  We believe that school leaders and grading committees can use this information as they plan to communicate with parents and community members. 

1) Parents want to know what is not changing as much as they want to know what is changing.


No teachers we have ever met woke up daily and intend to do literal or figurative harm to students, grading included. With this in mind, parents should find solace in systematic changes with the intent to be made more transparent than less.  Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle principle might serve schools best looking to communicate in order of the why, then the how, before the what of grading change.  Schools and parents can get sideways from the beginning when that order is inverted (the what and how before the why) and knock-down drag-out arguments stemming from minutia (such as how often teachers should update their grade books) may eviscerate the overall change the school was intending to make with their new grading practices and philosophies.

While it may seem helpful to prioritize communication with parents and other stakeholders in the area of educational research from Guskey, Brookhart, or Reeves about why grading practices are changing, it is equally (and perhaps even more) important to share traditions and practices that are not changing.  For example, if grade point averages (GPAs) will still be determined, as many standards-based high schools continue to do, school leaders should communicate to parents that this practice will remain unchanged. Furthermore, high school administrators should be prepared to share with parents that the high school transcript will be staying the same; therefore, student scholarship eligibility will remain the same. 

2) Parents want to know how this change will benefit their child.

Parents are right to be concerned that grades can affect a child’s future, but it might not be in a way they are thinking.  While GPAs will most certainly play a role in future opportunities for graduating seniors, what might be more problematic is that their grades don’t accurately represent what their child knows, understands, and can do…today! 

The United States is suffering from abysmal 6-year student completion rates for four-year degrees and increasing needs for remediation at the collegiate level. Once parents understand grading that is more transparent regarding what a child knows, understands, or can do, they will have a more accurate picture of what their child’s readiness is for future endeavors. Getting into college, the military, or a vocational or specialized school is not the goal. Completing programs, degrees, and certificates that exemplify competencies reign supreme.

We like to think of a standards-based grade book or report card as being like the “multi-point inspection” that a mechanic offers vehicle owners.  Within this multi-point inspection, we can find out the status of brakes, windshield wipers, the battery, and other important components of the vehicle.  Similarly, a standards-based grade book or report card provides detailed information about strengths and areas for improvement. Emphasizing this level of detail to parents can help them see how standards-based grading will benefit their child. 

3) Parents may not be familiar with the language or format of the new electronic grade book or report card and will need to be given explicit information to understand the “new way.”


Because parents experienced their K-12 school grading with points and percentages, they have come to expect the same for their own children.  Furthermore, with online access to electronic grade books that have traditionally communicated points and percentages (and report cards that have emphasized letter grades), parents’ childhood grading experiences in school have been further reinforced.  School leaders should seek out ways to help parents navigate the “new way” of reporting student learning.

Some schools have chosen to create a unique website landing page (see Des Moines, IA and Wautoma, WI).  Still other schools have created videos that walk parents through understanding the new look of the electronic grade book.  The most successful schools we know create drafts of communication tools and share them with a small group of parents to pilot and give feedback, before pushing them out to all parents. By understanding questions that may arise from a smaller group of parents, school leaders can leverage the pilot parents’ feedback to anticipate the questions other parents may be thinking. 

4) Parents will need guidance on the purpose of grades.

As schools transition to grading practices that are more equitable, fair, and transparent, the purpose of communicating proficiency becomes the primary purpose of grades. As grading experts (Brookhart, 2011; Brookhart et al., 2016) have long pointed out, this can be problematic when combined with other purposes of grades that seek to create distinctions between students.  As challenging as it is for a universal symbol, letter, or grade to represent one purpose, trying to serve more than one is impossible.

The paradox of the 21st-century parent is that, like many other norms, customs, and traditions, they long for the normalcy of “what it was like when I went to school” while demanding today’s schools do what is right, fair, and equitable. Unfortunately, much research about traditional grading practices hinges on tradition and belief regarding extrinsic motivation than it does on research and enduring learning of knowledge and skills. School leaders should be able to articulate to parents an agreed-upon purpose of grades early and often during the transition to more effective grading practices.

Conclusion 

Laura Link and Thomas Guskey (2022) found schools that transitioned to new grading practices failed primarily because grades that purported to communicate student proficiency simply did not do so. It wasn’t that the grades weren’t more valid and reliable than in traditional arrangements; it was more that students and parents were not contextualized enough to the “new” grading systems. 

While teachers and school leaders can feel that at times they don’t get the professional respect they deserve, suffice it to say that parents can be intimidated while discussing grades with teachers, which can manifest itself as defensiveness and even brashness. 

We have found that educators who treat grades, and their subsequent symbols, as other professionals do are highly effective in increasing the communicative function of grades. Students and parents should not be left to their own devices to interpret professional evidence of learning without context.  Fancy apps and student-information systems can do more harm than good without quality communication and context to accompany them. Data delivered instantaneously and more readily available doesn’t make it any more accurate if parents and students don’t fully understand what they are looking at interpreting and what actions need to be taken from the data provided.

About the authors
To connect further with Dr. Matt Townsley, follow him on Twitter. To connect with Dr. Chad Lang, follow him on Twitter or check out his Learning with Interesting People podcast.

Overcoming the implementation dip in standards-based grading

One of the things we know about leading second order change — such as when a school transitions to standards-based grading practices — is that it often involves an implementation dip (see McRel’s Balanced Leadership research). For example, we should anticipate that students will initially question the value of completing homework if there is no point value attached to it. After all, our schools have often (in the past) trained these very students to complete their assignments for the sole purpose of earning points: “Be sure to do this one, it is worth 50 points!”.

Accelerating out of the implementation dip

One question I am often asked by educators beginning to implement standards-based grading is “How do we help students accelerate out of this inevitable dip?” Refocusing the classroom and school culture on learning rather than earning takes time, but it can be done! *Below is one classroom action and one school action that may help students accelerate out of this dip.

  • Ask students to self-assess their homework (i.e. using emojis or a Red(no idea), Yellow(still unsure), Green(got it!) before turning it it. After the teacher provides some narrative feedback, he/she will also assess the students’ learning using the same emoji or color scale before turning it back to the student the next day. This self-assessment and quick feedback strategy often adds value to the assignment from the student’s perspective. When teachers value an assignment, students are likely to value it as well.
  • Hold students accountable (outside of the grade book) for not completing their homework assignments. Unfortunately, some students will need additional time and support to understand the nexus between completing purposeful assignments and learning the course standards. Some schools have created a catch-up time during or outside of the school day for students (see one example here) who frequently do not turn in their assignments. For example, if a student has not turned in any assignments for a course within a five day window, they may be required to attend catch-up time.

Interested in learning more about accelerating out of the implementation dip? Consider reading Making Grades Matter: Standards-Based Grading in a PLC at Work (2020, Solution Tree)

[*Author’s note: Unfortunately, there are students who do not choose to complete many assignments, regardless of the grading system that is used. Therefore, none of these strategies are intended to be all-inclusive or viewed as a “silver bullet” solution.]

Missing the Point about Homework and Deadlines in the Grade Book

By Matt Townsley & Ken O’Connor

In his April 3rd column entitled “Educators in growing debate scold me for defending grading of homework,” Washington Post education columnist Jay Mathews asserts that homework deadlines help prepare students for life. Mr. Mathews is writing to express his disagreement with Arlington Public Schools’ recent move toward removing penalties for missing homework deadlines and prohibit grading of homework and other assignments during the learning process (known in the field of education as formative assessment). As alluded to in his column, we were two of the many educators who shared emails with Jay expressing our conceptual and research-informed disagreement with his opposition to Arlington’s plan.

The biggest error in Mr. Mathews’ argument is a failure to articulate the purpose of grades. We do not fault him for this omission, as over a century of grading research reviewed by Dr. Susan Brookhart and colleagues has shown that traditionally educators have not done a good job articulating a primary purpose of grades. If we agree the purpose of grades is to communicate student achievement, and any other non-achievement factor should be reported separately, Mr. Mathews’ perspective needs to be re-examined. Achievement should be assessed after students have engaged in a complete learning cycle, not while they are still learning and receiving feedback that helps them deepen their knowledge, understanding, and skills. In theatre and sports, practice gets feedback and performance is evaluated. For example, NFL teams don’t get scores for practice, every NFL game starts 0-0, and it should be the same in the classroom. Not grading homework presents the perfect opportunity for students to see the connection between practice and performance and in doing so, they are on the path to becoming learners rather than grade grubbers.

Mr. Mathews asserts that late work matters in the real world. We agree; however, the default way of treating late work in schools is to penalize students in the grade book. Yet, in the “real world” if you frequently show up late for doctor’s appointments, the office may charge extra or impose other penalties (or they may not); however, the doctor will never modify their assessment of your health. Yet, when educators “take off 10% for each day late” as is often the norm in schools, this inappropriate use of penalties is exactly what a doctor would not do in assessing your health.

Under the Arlington plan, faculty would grade only summative assessments, which Mr. Mathews dismissively calls “a fancy word for tests.” Summative assessments are – or should be – far more than tests. Summative assessment should include products (essays, papers, tests), observation (performance assessments), and conversation (oral exams, interviews); when teachers use a variety of summative assessments, they can triangulate the results and be more confident about the judgments they make when they determine grades.

Mr. Mathews describes a study that shows that Wakefield is in the top two percent of high schools nationally measured by participation in college-level Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate exams but presents no evidence about the success of these students beyond high school. First-year college failure rates and the proportion of students who have to take remedial Math and English courses show that high schools do a very good job of getting students into colleges, but they do not often prepare them well to be successful at that level. Success at college requires students to be independent reflective “learners” and for that, students need to have developed intrinsic motivation and not be reliant on the carrots and sticks approach at Wakefield.

Finally, Mr. Mathews suggests that there is not yet much research to support either side of the argument. While studies are still emerging in this area, a paper published in 2021 by Griffin and Townsley analyzing nearly 800 urban high school students’ semester math grades and the impact of homework on grades, 336 (43.2%) students had their grades inflated or deflated by 5% or more and 97 (12.6%) students had their grades inflated or deflated by 10% or more, which is equivalent to moving up or down a full letter grade.

In conclusion Mr. Mathews is supporting the use of practices by the Wakefield teachers that result in inaccurate grades and that short-change their students by not providing the environment where the students can develop as learners.

About the authors:

Matt Townsley is an assistant professor of educational leadership at the University of Northern Iowa and author of Making Grades Matter (2020, Solution Tree). Ken O’Connor is an independent consultant who specializes in issues related to the communication of student achievement, especially grading and reporting. He is author of A Repair Kit for Grades: 15 Fixes for Broken Grades. Third Edition (2022, First Educational Resources).

Standards-Based Grading Articles Published in 2021 by Dr. Matt Townsley

In 2021, I published four new articles related to grading. The references and abstracts/summaries are below, and when possible, a link to the full article is also provided.

Griffin, R., & Townsley, M. (2021). Points, points and more points: Grade inflation and deflation when homework and employability scores are incorporated. Journal of School Administration Research and Development, 6(1), 1-11. [Available online]

Dr. Griffin and I sought to determine the extent to which employability and homework scores within a traditional points-and percentages-weighted grading model inflates or deflates grades. In our analysis of 795 students’ semester math grades at an urban high school, we found 43.2% students had their grades inflated or deflated by 5% or more and 12.6% students had their grades inflated or deflated by 10% or more, which is equivalent to moving up or down a full letter grade.

Lang, C., & Townsley, M. (2021). Improving teacher evaluation: Walking the talk of standards-based grading. Journal of School Administration Research and Development, 6(2), 81-89. [Available online]

Teachers and school leaders frequently express a disconnect in the purpose and importance of teacher evaluation, particularly as it relates to educator growth. At the same time, some schools are beginning to communicate student growth through a standards-based grading philosophy. One way schools might “walk the talk” of their grading reform efforts designed to communicate student growth is through the use of proficiency scales to prioritize growth in teacher evaluation. In this paper, Dr. Lang and I describe implications of simultaneously utilizing a growth model for teacher evaluation and a student growth model via standards-based grading

Townsley, M. (2021). Grading in the midst of a pandemic. School Administrator, 78(5), 28-31. [Available online]

The benefits of ‘no zero’ and other modified practices ought to long outlast the learning challenges of the moment. In this article for AASA’s School Administrator, I highlighted schools in Connecticut, Colorado, and Iowa that reevaluated their grading practices during COVID-19. Finally, I suggested ways in which schools could more permanently overhaul their grading practices.

Townsley, M., & McNamara, S. (2021). “I thought I was supposed to get an A in PE!” Successes and challenges of teachers and administrators implementing standards-based grading in physical education. Studies in Educational Evaluation, 70. Available online at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191491X21000389

The purpose of this research was to understand the initial successes and challenges of physical educators’ implementation of standards-based grading (SBG) practices. Participants in our study expressed a “building the plane as we fly it” mindset towards the training and implementation so far, benefits included a better roadmap to improving instruction and assessment to enhance student motivation. Dr. McNamara and I provide implications for implementing standards-based grading in physical education.

Top 5 Standards-Based Grading Articles (2021)

As 2021 comes to a close, it time to sift through the list of published literature from the past twelve months. This year’s list includes a combination of articles written for practitioners as well as articles published in academic journals. Note to returning readers: This year I chose not to include any articles that I authored or co-authored, and will instead highlight those separately in the near future.

The following is a list of what I believe are the top five articles from 2021 (in alphabetical order by lead author’s last name) related to standards-based grading.

  1. Guskey, T. R. (2021). Undoing the traditions of grading and reporting. The School Administrator, 78(5), 32-35. [Available online]

    Dr. Guskey discusses how some schools revised their grading practices during COVID-19 and how this might continue in 2021 and beyond. Specifically, he suggests schools should use fewer grade categories and report multiple grades to enhance the meaning, reliability, and accuracy of communicating student learning.
  2. Lehman, E. E. (2021). Leading leaders in rethinking grading: A case study of implementation of standards-based grading in educational leadership. Journal of Research Initiatives, 5(3). [Available online]

    The purpose of this paper is to share the process of how one university instructor worked toward a shift to standards-based grading (SBG) in a graduate Educational Leadership program. Dr. Lehman shares best practices in grading as well as the challenges of implementation of standards-based grading.
  3. Link, L. J., & Kauffman, K. D. (2021). Are your grading policies legally sound? How to avoid court entanglements when student grades are challenged. School Administrator, 5(78), 45- 48. [Available online]

    In this article written for the national school superintendent professional association (AASA), Link and Kauffman offer five guidelines derived from relevant court rulings to help school leaders establish grading policies and practices that not only are legally sound but also equitable and meaningful.
  4. Percell, J. C., & Meyer, B. B. (2021). Resolutions for a new paradigm: Addressing common issues in standards-based grading. Kappa Delta Pi Record, 57(4), 185-190. [paywall access]

    After implementation of a new standards-based grading initiative in one school district, the authors’ research revealed five prominent issues, and corresponding resolutions were developed to address needed changes in standards-based grading.
  5. Wakeman, S. Y., Thurlow, M., Reyes, E., & Kearns, J. (2021). Fair and equitable grading for ALL students in inclusive settings. Inclusive Practices. Available first online at https://doi.org/10.1177/27324745211055398

    In this article, the authors examine the four criteria for high-quality inclusive grading outlined by The William & Mary Training & Technical Assistance Center for grading within the inclusive classroom: (a) grades are accurate, (b) grades are meaningful, (c) grades are consistent, and (d) grades are supportive of learning and discuss how these criteria could be applied to provide a more fair and equitable grading system for students with significant cognitive disabilities.

What grading articles from 2021 would you add to this list?

Also, see my previous “top” articles lists:

Improving Teacher Evaluation by Walking the Talk of Standards-based Grading: Communicating Educator Growth using Proficiency Scales

Teachers and school leaders frequently express a disconnect in the purpose and importance of teacher evaluation, particularly as it relates to educator growth. At the same time, some schools are beginning to communicate student growth through a standards-based grading philosophy. One way schools might “walk the talk” of their grading reform efforts designed to communicate student growth is through the use of proficiency scales to prioritize growth in teacher evaluation. This paper describes implications of simultaneously utilizing a growth model for teacher evaluation and a student growth model via standards-based grading

Lang, C., & Townsley, M. (2021). Improving teacher evaluation: Walking the talk of standards-based grading. Journal of School Administration Research and Development, 6(2), 81-89. [Available online]

Points, points and more points: Grade inflation and deflation when homework and employability scores are incorporated

With a strong movement of schools starting to use standards-based grading practices, one of the aims of this study was to learn if traditional grading practices communicate grades that are accurate based on the students’ learning of the course objectives. The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which employability and homework scores within a traditional points-and percentages-weighted grading model inflates or deflates grades. This study analyzed 795 students’ semester math grades at an urban high school to see if, and to what extent, students’ grades were inflated or deflated due to including homework and employability scores in the grade. Final grades, which included homework and employability points, were compared to each student’s overall summative assessment scores to determine grade inflation or deflation. The study also analyzed how changing grading practices to eliminate homework and employability points would impact the number of students that ultimately passed or failed the course. Results of this study indicated 336 (43.2%) students had their grades inflated or deflated by 5% or more and 97 (12.6%) students had their grades inflated or deflated by 10% or more, which is equivalent to moving up or down a full letter grade. School leaders should consider separately communicating academic and non-academic factors to minimize grade inflation/deflation in order to make decisions based upon grades more justifiable.

Griffin, R., & Townsley, M. (2021). Points, points and more points: Grade inflation and deflation when homework and employability scores are incorporated. Journal of School Administration Research and Development, 6(1), 1-11.[Available online]

Grading in the midst of a pandemic

Waterbury, Conn., superintendent Verna Ruffin noticed early on during the pandemic that students had taken on some demanding and necessary roles outside of their academic responsibilities. They were serving as caregivers and money earners for their families.

During the economic and social upheaval brought on by the coronavirus, the 18,000-student Waterbury schools made temporary changes in their grading policies last spring because of the inequities associated with the brisk transition to online learning. Waterbury, along with other districts nationwide, quickly adopted “do no harm” grading practices such as freezing existing grades and providing students with the option of pass/fail grades.

Townsley, M. (2021). Grading in the midst of a pandemic. School Administrator, 78(5), 28-31. [Available online]