Milford School District Board of Education heard complaints from parents about new report grading
At a recent meeting, several parents spoke during the public comments section of the Milford School District Board of Education meeting regarding changes to elementary school report cards. Parents received their first report cards in early December.
“Students came home with their first report card of the year this past Wednesday,” Danielle Deinert said. “The grading system on the report card directly contradicts the current promotion policy in our school district, policy 6201, that was revised September 18, 2023.”
Deinert continued that the policy states that standards based grading would be used for grades K through two, with a. scoring guide of one to four, but the report card parents received does not reflect that grading system.
“The report card all families of K to five received last week had standards based grading for all elementary students, giving them a grade of ‘most of the time,’ ‘some of the time with support, or ‘not yet.’ This does not match our board policy,” Deinert said. “I am also concerned that these new standards based grading system does not effectively communicate to parents how a child is performing in school.”
According to Deinert, parents do not understand their child’s report card or how their child is being graded on assignments. Deinert stated that she does not believe the grading system is training students to be academically competitive or strive to do well.
“Instead, we are creating a system where our children no longer care about their grades or performance,” Deiner said. “Lastly, I would like to share two other changes to the new report card. There was no social studies or science grade. However, there was the addition of a competency section, grading students on nine behaviors that support learning across all content areas. I believe we are sending a message that our priority is on student social behavior instead of academic achievement.”
Deinert stated that she was not criticizing the hard working educators or administrators, pointing out that she felt they did an incredible job trying to work in a system where changes were rolled out too quickly, without proper time to ensure they are effective.
“I am not completely against standards based as I think there is a time and place where it is applicable. I was confused last year when my son was in kindergarten, but gave the district the benefit of the doubt that it would change in first grade,” Sarah Clifton said. “Standards that are chosen seem to be picked at random and academics really seem to have taken a backseat to behavior.”
Clifton explained that math and reading are vital but so were social studies and science which were completely left off the report card. Clifton also stated that grading for assignments and tests were not helpful. She gave the example that her daughter did not want to improve her writing skills since she gets the same score for a sentence with five mistakes as she gets for a sentence with one.
“Instead of making the hurdle low enough we can easily get over it, we should be raising it. The teachers aren’t prepared for this, the parents don’t understand it, and most importantly, it does not benefit students,” Clifton said. “I’m wondering how these changes came about without board approval. It was announced at the beginning of the year this would be the new system and it would have been beneficial to all involved if the members of the board had ensured that the system that is being used was ready.”
Because the board cannot respond to public comment, there was no discussion about the concerns of the two parents. According to the policy cited by Deiner, the district established guidelines for student promotion, which can be found on the district website, do not match what parents are seeing on their child’s report card.
In addition, the district website states that standards-based grading was implemented in 2021-22 with details on the grading process found here. The student handbook for Grades K-5, however, shows a completely different grading system than parents are seeing.
“Formal grades are given in reading, mathematics, science and social studies as noted below. In addition to the above listed subjects, your child is graded in Related Arts,” the handbook reads.
The policy then goes on to state that students in kindergarten through third grade will receive grades ranging from one to four with one given for a student who shows limited progress toward standards and four given for those exceeding the standards. Two is for students approaching the standard and three for those meeting the standard. In grades three through five, the student receives more traditional grading of A through F.
Requests to the district to provide details on the changes to student report cards did not receive a response.
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