3 Keys for Standards-Based Grading in a Letter Grades World

Anyone looking to move to standards-based grading while still working under a more traditional model has wrestled with the idea of how to convert their new standards-based grades to traditional ones based on 100-point scales. Having lived through this, here are three things I found to be key to success.

1) Be Arbitrary

There's no way around it, when trying to convert standards-based grades to a 0-100 scale there is no good way to make it work. At some point you will have to make an arbitrary decision about how you convert to a traditional grade. Rather than lose sleep over how you are going to convert, just acknowledge that there is no good way to go about it and make a decision you can live with. This may actually help you win more support to transition to a standards-based system, but more on that in a minute.

If your school uses a 10-point range for each letter grade, here is how I would convert a 4-point proficiency grade to a 100-point scale :

4-100, 3-95, 2-75, 1-60

In this case, a student who exceeds the standard (4) would get the highest grade possible, but you will have a hard time giving a student who did everything they were expected to do and "meeting the standard" (3) anything less than an "A" unless your school typically award "A's" to only outstanding work. The lower scores are harder to convert and probably depend more on your school's grading philosophy. A "C" makes sense to me for a "2", but I could also see this being lower (notice that we completely leave out the option of a "B" here). If a "1" represents a student who did the work but it did not even partially meet the standard, a grade around the failing mark makes sense, but you may also just wish to call it "incomplete." The old adage, "A, B, and 'you're not done'" fits nicely with the standards-based philosophy.

2) Be Clear

You're going to need to be clear in a couple of ways. First, you need to make sure your students know what standards they are working on as they work in class and take assessments. By being explicit about this you will help them start to associate their score with becoming proficient and not with some other measure.

You will also want to be clear in your communication to students and their parents about what your system is and how it translates to their grade in what we often call "the old world." This is the time where you can win over public support, because if your parents understand what you are doing and see the good it does for their children, they will help to push your school out of that old world of letter grades and in to a standards-based system.

3) Have An Alternative Reporting System

If you are one of the first people in your school to make the move to standards-based grades, odds are you school will not yet have a system in place to report out student progress (and when they do, it will always be ready for you and parents "next month"). This means that you will need to come up with an alternative system in place of or in augmentation to a traditional report card.

This system could be as simple as logs students keep themselves to online spreadsheets that can be shared with each individual student and their guardians so everyone has real time access to their progress. Regardless, there are two things you should make sure to do. First, keep your labels simple enough that everyone can understand me but detailed enough so everyone knows what the student is showing proficiency at. Second, make sure there is a space for narrative feedback, as this will always be more meaningful than a number and will help alleviate confusion.

Those are my tips, what else do you think is key when converting standards-based grades in a traditional system?

Playing School

Today I was reading a post Reed Gillespie wrote last year that does a nice job addressing concerns of allowing students to do redos and retakes, and this part stuck out to me:

"Anecdotally, only rarely did I have any of my high-achievers complain about my retest policy—No, it wasn’t because they didn’t voice their concerns to me. I heard plenty of complaints about my projects, my lectures, my expectations, etc.  Those who did complain most likely were used to an educational system that distinguished between the elite and non-elite." (Emphasis mine)

I have to echo his comments here. The students in the past few years who have complained the most about our switch to a standards-based system are the ones who had become good at "playing school." This new system required them to not just sit back on their socio-economic advantages or good behavior, but to actually master content through a process of constant revision. As one of my colleagues pointed out a few times, they had paid dues into a system that no longer existed, and this sometimes caused friction. 

I am happy to report that with students today who have had more time in our new system (even if it's just a year or two), these occurrences are happening less and less. The lesson to be learned here is that any switch in the way we go about education will at first be met with resistance by those who were "winning" in the old system.