Standards Based Grading
Northampton High School
“The primary purpose of standards-based grading is to communicate about student achievement toward well defined learning targets and content standards. Habits of Work and Learning are graded separately from academic content, and student engagement is key to the grading process.”
- Leaders of Their Own Learning
What is a Standard?
- Specific statements of what students should know and be able to do.
- Written at each grade level and developed to monitor progress from one grade to another.
- In Massachusetts, the standards that each district adheres to are called the Massachusetts State Standards (MSS) for grades K-12. These standards and guidelines are determined by the state of Massachusetts.
Standard Based Grading vs. Traditional Grading Practices
Standards Grading: NHS is doing this!
Northampton Public Schools is moving towards a full standards based grading (SBG) practice. This year JFK will be aligning to NHS and elementary school SBG practices.
Standards Based Grading
- Values knowledge and understanding. Reflects what students know and can do. Student scores are tracked by the course standards and does not separate out tests, homework, or projects.
- Supports hope and a growth mindset. Encourages mistakes as necessary for learning and building students’ persistence. Reassessments are on tests or projects are encouraged and replace previous scores with current scores.
- Builds essential skills without including them in the grade. Supports students’ intrinsic motivation to learn rather than rely on an external system where every action is worth “points.” Habits of work and learning are not included in grades and are reported separately.
- Makes grades simpler to understand and more transparent. Rubrics are used to evaluate student performance. Grades provide stakeholders an accurate understanding of the student’s learning.
- Applies a mathematically sound approach. Uses a four-point learning scale 4- Exemplary, 4-Proficient, 2-Developing, 1-Beginning.
Traditional Grading Practices (NHS is NOT doing this and here is why:)
Traditional Grading Practices
- Vary from teacher to teacher. Scores are arranged in the grade book based on types of assignment rather than the essential learning standards.
- Provide unclear and misleading information to key stakeholders. Grades combine diverse aspects of performance including behaviors, attendance, participation, and effort. It can feel confusing to determine what grades represent.
- Value environment, compliance, and behavior. Often driven by implicit racial, class, and gender biases. Grades that include a student’s “effort” or “participation” evaluate a student’s behavior—not their learning. Students who have weaker education backgrounds and fewer supports are likely to be penalized even when they show growth and learning.
- Based on mathematically unsound calculations. Calculates the average on a 100-point grading system. An F earned early in learning and an A at the end of learning traditionally average as a C, regardless of the progress and final achievement, punishing students for early struggles.
Scoring of Standards
Each unit within a course is based on a set of priority standards. The priority standards indicate what students know, understand and are able to do by the end of the unit. Each standard is measured through a summative assessment (ex. final unit test or project) using the following scoring system:
Standards Grade Conversion for Transcripts
Grading
Otus - NHS's New Grading Platform
Reassessment Policy
Students will be encouraged and offered a second-chance on assessments to show they have mastered understanding unit standards. The purpose of reassessment is for students to continue to understand and learn the expected materials and standards of the course.
What is the reassessment policy?
- A reassessment opportunity is available to students who have missed a summative assessment or failed to show proficiency (3 or better) on a standard via a summative assessment.
- Students will be encouraged and offered a second-chance on assessments to show they have mastered understanding unit standards.
- Because proficiency is the target, students cannot reassess to earn a 4. Reassessment is only available to students with a M, 1, or 2.
- Teachers may require students to complete certain learning activities prior to reassessment.
- Consistent habits of work and learning (HOWLs) are required for reassessment.
- Teachers will assign a reasonable and consistent timelines for reassessment opportunities (ie end of unit, quarter, or semester).
- Progress reports will be issued instead of quarter grades. Quarters 1 and 2 and Quarters 3 and 4 will not be averaged together. Semester 1 and Semester 2 grades will be cumulative.
- Students' grades will reflect the level of mastery they have achieved on each standard using the “decaying average” (overall performance will be determined using a calculation that is based on an average with more weight given to the more recent scores) and the average of the unit standards in the semester overall.
Habits of Work and Learning (HOWL)
In addition to assessments on unit standards, teachers also report on the same three Habits of Work and Learning (HOWLs). HOWLs are not used to determine a student’s final course grade but are used to determine a variety of needed supports so that students can succeed in learning. HOWLs grades will be reported in Otus at least once every five weeks.
NHS HOWLs Rubric
How will standards based grading in high school impact college acceptance?
- The Northampton High School Profile will highlight the standards based grading practices at NHS.
- Administrators and school counselors have worked with college admissions offices and can confirm that SBG and transcripts do not have a strong-impact on college acceptance.
Below are links and excerpts from two articles regarding SBG and College Acceptance:
Chris Sturges article "Grades, College Admission, and Competency-Based Education:
"Standards-based grades and transcripts are acceptable, if not preferable. College admissions officers are well aware of the weaknesses in traditional grades for the college admissions process, including “rampant grade inflation, inaccurate portrayals of student performance and the regular need for remediation.” And nontraditional grading has been around for a while. The interviews were clear that students with standards-based or mastery-based transcripts would not be penalized. In fact, separating out academics and behaviors was seen as beneficial."
Getting a Fair Shot? Three findings from a study of university officials’ views on the use of standards-based grading in admissions decisions BY THOMAS M. BUCKMILLER AND RANDAL E. PETERS:
"Letter grades and transcripts based on standards are acceptable, if not preferable, in the eyes of admissions offices, but with some caveats. When standards-based grading principles were more fully explained, university admissions directors expressed general approval. They shared their frustrations with rampant grade inflation, inaccurate portrayals of student performance, the regular need for remediation once students were enrolled and widely varying grading systems from one school district to the next, often associated with traditional grading practices. One admissions director remarked in disbelief, saying, “I’ve seen kids graduate from good high schools who are illiterate — I mean, they are illiterate — and yet they are high school graduates.”