Is Standards-Based Grading Worth It?

Are the current shifts in grading practices worth it? Think about all the time, effort, and resources used to shift from a 100-point grading scale to a 5-point scale. Is it actually worth it?

Is there, or will there be, an actual return on the investment?

The costs are high. The investments are weighty. Is standards-based grading worth it? Here's a serious look at the what, the why, and the cost of standards-based grading.

The Costs of Standards-Based Grading

If you've experienced a district who changed to "standards-based" grading and reporting, you've undoubtedly experienced some of the costs. Here are a few:

• Leadership training including principals, curriculum teams, and board of trustees.
• Teacher training.
• Public information meetings.
• Parent-teacher meetings.
• Changes in grading software.
• Changes in classroom grading and assessment practices.
• Misunderstandings by students.
• Another "new" way with an array of misconceptions.
• Opportunity loss of time and resources.

What's interesting, districts rarely hold a public conversation about the costs associated with this shift. That's what this blog post is about.

It's difficult at this point to pinpoint what schools are actually doing when they say, "We're moving to standards-based grading."

Let's start with two definitions.

What is Standards-Based Grading?

Here's a definition of standards-based grading, according to edglossary.org: 

"In education, the term standards-based refers to systems of instruction, assessment, grading, and academic reporting that are based on students demonstrating understanding or mastery of the knowledge and skills they are expected to learn as they progress through their education."

Robert Marzano promoted the idea of standards-based grading in several of his works. He defined it as:

"In a standards-based system, a student can demonstrate mastery of a set of standards and move immediately to a more challenging set of standards. This means that if a third-grade student masters the entire set of third-grade mathematics standards in two months, that student immediately begins to work on fourth-grade mathematics standards. (pp. 3–4)"

How Are Schools Using Standards-Based Grading?

Bellingham Schools in Washington describe their efforts this way: "What’s the difference between the traditional “A” through “F” grading system and a standards-based reporting system?

Traditional Grading

• A, B, C, D, F represent percentage of points accumulated
• Non-academic factors affect grades, such as participation, attendance, late work, etc.
• Everything is graded and averaged together
• Early assignments can skew the final grade
• Reports a single grade for each class

Standards-Based Grading

• 4, 3, 2, 1 represent student performance in relation to specific standards
• Based on common core national, state, and district standards
• A report of what students know and are able to do
• Reflect academic performance only
• Behavioral information (called Student Success Attributes) reported separately."

Clear Creek Schools in Texas offer this description:

Westside Schools in California provide only this brief description:

"We Believe in the Power of YET! Break the cycle of a fixed mindset and have a GROWTH mindset instead.
Fixed Mindset: I don't get it.
Growth Mindset: I don't get it...YET!"

It appears intentions are well-meaning. Focusing on reporting academics and student behavior. Showing what students know and can do. Creating learning progressions that make learning targets clear.

Is It All Worth It?

Reporting Academics and Behavior

This is good information. How is a student doing in these separate areas? That's a valuable question. When most of us were kids, isn't that what was reported? The report card had:

• Handwriting
• Spelling
• Grammar
• Reading
• Math
• Social Studies
• Science
• Citizenship

The benefit of a standards-based reporting system is that it breaks the academic areas into subtopics, so "Reading" might be a list of 6-8 priority standards. That's valuable information. 

But is that information improving performance in a tangible way? Is it worth the time and expenses?

Showing What Students Know and Can Do

This how always been the goal of grading and reporting. With standards-based grading this gets substantially more detailed. 

But is it more accurate?

A teacher can provide a poor evaluation in a 0-100 point system just as easily as she can in a 0-4 standards-based system.

Is it the amount of detail on the report card that really makes the difference in evaluating what students know and can do?

Creating Learning Progressions

This is the most valuable piece to standards-based grading. It's less of a reporting piece and more of a curriculum document. 

Many sources have articulated what learning progressions are (James Popham here and the Brookings Institution here).

A well-designed learning progression can communicate how a student moves from mastering basic 2nd-grade addition to mastering the intended skill of using addition to find the total number of objects arranged in rectangular arrays with up to 5 rows and up to 5 columns; write an equation to express the total as a sum of equal addends.

Creating a learning progression is no small task.

"Anyone embarking on the use of this powerful analytic tool should recognize that creating first-rate learning progressions is far from child's play. Isolating and sequencing the building blocks underlying students' attainment of a challenging curricular aim requires rigorous cerebral effort. I encourage teachers to avoid carving out a learning progression at the end of a long teaching day—or during a less-than-lively faculty meeting." - James Popham

A learning progression fits well with standards-based grading because you can evaluate each step along the progression.

However, the entire standards-based grading system fails if:

• The progressions aren't well-designed.
• The assessments aren't well-aligned with the progression.
• The instruction isn't well-aligned with the assessments.
• The curriculum staff isn't carrying the load for creating the progressions.
• The assessment staff isn't carrying the load for creating the assessments.

Maybe entire system failure is a little extreme, but it certainly creates a major flaw in the design. The time and resources of these experts is critical!

The True Costs, When Done Right

Wait a minute! Involvement is essential. It's a needed component if any major shift is to avoid pendulum swings.

So to properly design the learning progressions and standards-based grading, we need teachers involved and invested in all of the steps above. Which means a sober investment of:

• Time Weeks of dedicated work.
• Money...the kind of money spent on football equipment and superintendent cell phone allowances (per teacher).
• Capacity building prior to initiating the move to standards-based grading.

These are weighty investments. So the question remains.

Is standards-based grading worth it?