Putting Grades in Their Proper Place

By Jay Mathews
Thursday, January 4, 2007

Dear Extra Credit:

I am not a perfectionist parent who insists on straight A's or who gets bent out of shape over a B-plus versus an A, but the following discrepancy does bother me: Why is it that Fairfax County requires 94 percent for an A, while in Falls Church, Montgomery County and other surrounding school systems, 90 percent is an A?

To make matters worse, the number grade gets rounded off to a letter grade and then is recalculated back into a number for the GPA. Thus the kid who gets 93 percent gets a B-plus, which equals a 3.5 GPA, and the kid with 94 gets an A, which equals a 4.0 GPA.

This is illogical and unfair -- why not do away with letter grades and simply put the 93 on the report card and calculate the GPA from there? If we expect to teach our students logic and fairness, we must evaluate them in a logical and fair manner.

Fairfax County is competitive enough without adding this extra stress.

Suzanne S. Summers

Annandale

This is one of the great mysteries of schooling in the D.C. area -- in all of America, for that matter. We write a great deal in The Post about standardized test scores but almost never address the issue that concerns students and parents much more: grades on report cards.

You shared the responses you received from Fairfax County school officials. School Board member Tessie Wilson said "colleges are well aware of our grading scale" and thus will not penalize Fairfax County students because of it, which is true. Even more important, the different grading systems are going to have a very small effect on students' GPAs or admission to college. The only time selective colleges even bother to check such small numerical differences in grades is when they are having to choose which students to accept and which to reject from the same high school. In that case, everyone will be on the same grading system.

College admissions officers see many grading systems and usually judge students by the general achievement category they fall in, not by any precise grade scale. Good grades and test scores get a student into the "maybe" pile at a selective college, but teacher recommendations and extracurricular activities make the difference in who gets in and who doesn't.

Fairfax's system is very common throughout the country. Falls Church is the only district in Northern Virginia to use what educators call the 10-point system, denoting the point range for each grade.

The Maryland suburbs use the 10-point system, while D.C. schools have the same system as Fairfax County's.

Wilson sent you a very long and detailed explanation by Ann Monday, assistant superintendent for instructional services. She said that "the Fairfax County grading scale has been constant from 1970 to present. Please note that twice in the last 30 years, formal studies of grading and reporting at the secondary level have occurred. Both times, after review and deliberation, the decision was made to maintain the grading procedures currently in place."

She said "because of the high performance of our students, most of our high schools no longer provide colleges with a class rank, yet colleges across the country have accepted our students based on the schools' profiles we provide, which reflect the rigorous programs we offer and the high level of achievement typical of so many students."

She is also honest in admitting that the way the grading scale "is used by teachers can vary tremendously. We have been working with our teachers so that they arrive at grades in ways that best reveal the mastery level of students. To this end, more teachers are using 'rubrics' that describe the standards upon which the level of student performance is determined. And, of course, we also offer a full array of AP and IB classes at every high school, with ample opportunity for students to raise their GPAs by getting additional quality points for taking these classes."

I surveyed educators on this question five years ago and could find no one who could explain how or why these different grading systems evolved.

Neighboring districts seem to use the same guidelines -- at that time Manassas was changing its system to conform with the majority of districts in Northern Virginia -- but the systems are almost all the results of local decisions, with few state or national guideposts.

Few D.C. area residents I spoke to even knew that the grading systems on one side of the Potomac differed from those on the other side.

It is probably best not to worry about it and to be assured that whatever grade your child is getting in the Fairfax County schools, the level of teaching is on average demonstrably better than in the vast majority of other districts, and the chances for success in college are much greater.

Please send your questions, along with your name, e-mail or postal address and telephone number to Extra Credit, The Washington Post, 526 King St., Suite 515, Alexandria, Va. 22314. Or e-mailextracredit@washpost.com.