Grading for Equity

Introduction

A key part of AUSD’s 2023 Strategic Plan is implementing new grading practices.

These grading practices are based on the work of Joe Feldman, a researcher and educator who, like many other education researchers across the country, believes that grading should be based on a student’s mastery of the coursework and grade-level standards, rather than non-content factors such as effort and behavior. Mr. Feldman's organization, Crescendo, works with school districts across the country to implement more equitable grading practices.

The goal is to support teachers in adopting more equitable grading practices, ones that are accurate, bias-resistant, and motivational.

The Work So Far

During the 2021-22 and 2022-23 school years, AUSD staff began exploring ways of incorporating more accurate, consistent, and motivating grading practices. For instance, staff:

Trained a cohort of secondary teachers on the pillars of Grading for Equity
Set up a Grading For Equity workgroup
Made several presentations to the Board of Education
Hosted a community forum on these grading practices

In the fall of 2023, the AUSD Board of Education revised AUSD's current grading policy to include "minimum/proportional grading." This method replaces the 0-100 grading scale with a 50-100 scale. The rationale for this change is that in a 0-100 scale, an “F” can be anything from a 0-59, whereas all the other grades (D to A) span only ten points. This makes recovering from an F extremely difficult for a student because it lowers the student’s average significantly, even if they get high grades on other assignments. For instance, a student who gets a 22 on their first assignment, an 81 on their second, and a 96 on their third will end up with 66 (D), even if they have mastered the material. Minimum Grading turns the 22 into a 50. It's still an F, but unlike the 22, it doesn't create an artificial barrier to achieving a better final grade. The resuting grade is now a 76% (C).

This 50 to 100 scale also maps more exactly to the 0 to 4 scale used for calculating Grade Point Averages. A score of 22 would be a zero, not a -3.

A table comparing a 0-50 scale with a 0-4 scale

Traditional Grading Practices

Bullet-pointed list of traditional grading methods

Timeline of AUSD's Grading Policy Changes

2021-22

2022-23

2023-24

Secondary teachers receive Professional Development on Equitable Grading Practices.
20 AUSD teachers participate in Action Research around equitable grading in partnership with Crescendo.
Board Policy Subcommittee receives two presentations on revising BP 5121 so that instruction provides multiple means of engagement, representation, and action; and b) grading is accurate, bias-resistant, and motivational.
Full Board of Education adopts BP 5121 revisions (November, 2023).

Equitable Grading Practices

Frequently Asked Questions

Will this make it easier for students to get higher grades? Will it result in grade inflation?

Is this all there is to Grading for Equity?

Grading for Equity includes a number of tenets in addition to the minimum grading practices. The practice also includes, for instance, an incorporation of considering recent improvement in grades, in which mastering the material later in the course is weighted more heavily than early misunderstandings. This practice is especially helpful for a very distinct group of students: Those who perform poorly at the beginning of the semester or year (i.e., when they’re first learning the material) and then have trouble recovering from that due to the initial very low grades.

In 2023-24, however, AUSD is focusing primarily on minimum grading. Beginning in the fall of 2024 all teachers will be required to use the minimum/ proportionate grading scale, with a minimum grade of 50%.

Have other researchers besides Joe Feldman proposed changes to traditional grading policies?

A wide range of educators and education researchers have been examining grading practices currently in place in public schools. Those practices generally stem from the early 20th century, when instructional and assessment practices were shaped by the need for workers in a growing industrial sector and an emerging belief that students should be placed into a hierarchy of academic “tracks” and, by extension, a hierarchy of vocational opportunities and income potential.

Subsequent research has found that students’ performance on standard assessments is more a reflection of parental education and income than a student’s “Innate intelligence.” Modern educators believe that all children are capable of and deserve equal opportunities to learn and achieve and that they should be assessed in a way that is accurate, bias-resistant, and motivational.

I grew up with traditional grading policies and now I’m doing fine. What’s wrong with them?

Traditional grading is not effective because it is not focused on mastering course content. I.e., you can earn or lose points based on factors such as behavior, homework completion, and effort. These latter factors can disguise implicit bias towards students who, for instance, don’t have a supportive adult at home to coach and remind them to do assignments, have to work or care for younger siblings at home, or demonstrate challenging behaviors due to traumatic incidents or conditions in the home.

Traditional grading can also be misleading and confusing because teachers, even those teaching the same course, might have different assessments, different weighting practices, and different classroom expectations and policies.

How can I learn more?

Contacts

Vernon Walton, EdD

Director, Secondary Education

510-337-7000 ext. 77906

Jan Carroll

TSA for Instructional Technology

510-337-7000 ext. 77927

GFE Resources

Board of Education Presentations

April 25, 2023: “Update on AUSD’s Grading Practices”

August 10, 2023: “Review and Discussion of BP/AR 5121 Grades/Evaluation of Student Achievement” (Board Policy Subcommittee)

October 17, 2023: “Review of BP/AR 5212: Grades/Evaluation of Students” (Board Policy Subcommittee)

November 14, 2023: “Approval of Revisions to BP/AR 5121: Grades/Evaluations of Student Achievement"

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