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Students Are Always Half Right In Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh Public Schools officials have enacted a policy that sets 50 percent as the minimum score a student can receive for assignments, tests and other work. District spokeswoman Ebony Pugh said, the 50 percent minimum gives children a chance to catch up and a reason to keep trying. If a student gets a 20 percent in a class for the first marking period, he or she would need a 100 percent during the second marking period just to squeak through the semester. The district and teachers union issued a joint memo to ensure staff members' compliance with the policy, which was already on the books but enforced only at some schools. At this rate, it won't be long before schools institute double extra credit Mondays and Fridays to ensure students don't take three day weekends.
Or they could work on policies that reward significant improvement throughout the year. A rough start can be just that. Mandating that everything is at least 50%, even when a student gets a 0%, is a terrible idea.
"And she said one teacher she knows already worries about how awkward it will look when a student correctly answers three of 10 questions on a math quiz -- and gets a 50 percent."
That's just preparation to work in the American financial sector.
BTW, a decent idle story??? Idle still sucks and quote tag doesn't work???
No comprende? Let me type that a little slower for you...
I'M SURROUNDED BY ASSHOLES!!!
Yep, the Idiocracy is well on its way to becoming a reality. Let's not grade on a child's actual performance in school, let's make certain they can at least "catch up." Yep, way to go. This mollycoddle society just irks the living shit outta me.
Let me warn all of you right now, if you do not live in Pennsylvania and you have any thought that it's a state that you would like to try to lead a productive life in, especially the south-western corner, please abandon those thoughts. Pennsylvania is a black hole of taxation and asshattery. Our governor isn't worthy to hold the position of a used cars salesman and the city of Pittsburgh is a financial and logistical burden for anyone who lives anywhere close to it.
Not to even get into the fact that Dan Onorato and Luke Ravenstahl are both self-serving bitches.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Yes of course, and while we're at it, let's make it the law that everyone gets at least $50k/year, whether they actually work or not. That way we all get a "chance to catch up" and a "reason to keep trying".
Caveat Utilitor
There isn't a teacher out there who wouldn't pull the 20% kid aside and say "Look. You bombed. But, over next quarter/semester, if you do all/most of your homework and manage to get a C/B/whatever, I'll pass you."
My school district is looking at a similar policy, and I'm not happy with it. I don't mind putting a "floor" under students in freefall (especially when there are out-of-school forces in play), but its something that you do on a case-by-case basis according to the needs of the student.
If a district's teachers are not looking out for their kids this way, you have a deeper problem than a grading policy.
This indicates a broken grading system with a bad kludge of a hack on top.
If someone gets 5% at first half, and then majorly improves during the second half and gets 80% - and would easily be able to redo the tests of the first half and get 80% on them too at this time -- then of course the final grade should be around 80% - and the first grading should be ignored completely.
It's the actual knowledge at the end of the semester that should be graded - not the performance throughout the year. It's the knowledge one possesses at the end that is important.
Bleh.
Broken sysem with a bad hack .
"Rune Kristian Viken" - http://www.nwo.no - arca
Our district has had this policy for a long time. As a teacher, it's not too much of a hassle because the whole point of education is to get the kids to learn. If it's impossible to pass the year because of what a student scored the first quarter, they'll give up for the rest of the year. With this policy, there is still hope. In our district, they get their actual scores for midyear and final exams and for the 4th quarter, so they will get killed eventually if they do nothing.
By the way, the bigger problem is with kids who do the work but don't think. I have lots of students who copy their friends' work, so they have great homework grades, but bomb tests because they have no clue what they're talking about.
Back when I was in grade school they didn't HAVE numerical points... everything was a letter grade so, yeah, you couldn't go lower than an F which is the equivalent here. Once I was in the upper schools, you STILL couldn't get lower than an F (59 in my school system) on the report card, no matter how low you were. I don't see why you need to "flatten" individual test grades, so long as the value to determine the grade is "reset" every grade period.
Or maybe now we could finally discuss my Spanish language class (In the US and taught by a native German who was visiting for a year?!?) who gave ONE quiz for one grading period comprising 4 questions (2 5 pointers and 2 45 pointers) and I had to explain to my parents why I was flunking Spanish because I missed 1 question for 45 points!
Also, if students make... oh say... 150 points on a test are they allowed to skip a later test or get A++++++ because they obviously have earned it? Or are they gated as well... what happens to THEIR self-esteem when this occurs?
Calvin and Hobbes
So, the problem is the teachers can only be bothered to test twice per class... Meaning a student getting 20% on the first test has to get 100% on the second to get a 60% average.
As a radical suggestion, somewhere in the long summer vacations, after the 2pm finishes... Get off your lazy asses and come up with say ten tests throughout the course.
Now a 20% on the first test only knocks 8% off the total grade, not 40%, and is quite surmountable without needing pity grades.
I realize this is clearly advanced rocket science so take your time to fully digest the idea. I'm freely offering it for the good of ull duh stoodnts in pitsbug.
Let's try not to make their being even stupider any more acceptable. One of these kids could end up becoming president one day and the last thing we need is a moron spending eight years in the whitehouse, driving the country, its military and its economy in to the ground. Let's keep that an unthinkable impossibility people!
That said, I do assign a grade of zero to the students who simply don't bother to do the work. I would have issues with any school district that mandated that I give a grade no less than a 50, because that removes the option for me to assign a zero if I believe it's warranted. At any rate, we just need to scrap all this grading scale granularity and assign pass/fail grades: Either you have subject mastery, or you don't. No subject (not even math) is so objective as to ensure fairness for all students operating at the same level of content mastery.
Much like the current economic crisis, shouldn't failure be allowed? As some banks should be failing for bad investments, some students should fail to allow them to do-over.
I blew off a year of math and I went to summer school, once. I'm not proud, but it was a motivational experience. Summer school sucks.
SMU Dean David Chard In support of DISD's new grading policy
On a more frightening note, public education now seems to be king, in California at least. Homeschooling Banned in California
Does anyone else notice that things are going downhill? And they're speeding up?
"Lame" - Galaxar
There is one course that I took that made us write down not only our answers in the test, but also our certainty for our answer. The scoring was a logarithmic scale such that if you say you are 100% sure of an answer but get it wrong, you get Negative Infinity for that question and you end up failing the class. Oddly enough, this course was in CMU at Pittsburgh.
If you're thinking about the way pilots are (or ought to be) evaluated, or you think grades are a good stick with which to beat kids, this probably sounds like utter crap. But if you're really concerned about how to motivate kids, the picture is much more complex.
If you've never read it Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance has an interesting passage related to this subject. (It's one of my favorite books--you really should just read it in its entirety.)
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
Dallas (Texas) Independent School District is doing the same thing.
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/081508dnmetdisdgrades.48e6cc22.html
DISD is exceedingly dysfunctional (can't manage a budget, kick-backs, and so on). So this idiocy is small potatoes compared the the problems of the district as a whole.
Prime numbers are exactly what Alan Greenspan says they are -S. Minsky
Like anything else in government accomplishing goals is not a priority. Even when it comes to edcuating children. Or ensuring the future needs of a country.
Everyone wants a cushy job, nice pension. So, if the children are underperforming, it either the kid's fault or the teachers. Now that kids can't fail and all get 50%, well its probably a lot harder to fire a really lousy teacher, huh??!!!
I mean this one seriously to boot (sadly enough):
1) Let Students get at least 50%
2) ????
3) Profit!!!!
Has anyone thought of what this actually means? Mathematically?
For example, let's say there are 5 assignments and 2 tests. The tests are worth 25% of your final mark.
The assignments are worth 10% each.
Additionally, let's go with the ABCDE scheme, and the student needs a 60% to pass with a D.
What's the minimum mathematical grade needed to pass?
First the tests: 0% on either test.
We've now got 25% on the course.
Then the assignments:
3 assignments: 0%
We've now got 40% on the course.
2 assignments: 100%
We've now got our 60%, D grade for the course.
That means even though the student received a mathematical 20% when their entire coursework is taken into account, they would receive a D.
That is definite grade inflation.
Based on my behaviour in high school, I would have most definitely gotten 100% on the first two assignments, and then skipped the rest of the term, walking out with my 60%. Would I have known the material? Definitely not. Would I have known 60% of the material? Definitely not.
This teaches a great life lesson and ethic. Let's see how well it carries over into the working world!
Not leaving the struggling behind is noble and all, but when the rope pulling up the strugglers is tied around the neck of the non-strugglers the nobility ends and the entire system is degraded.
If you blow off a test you damn well deserve a zero. If you don't turn in homework then you damn well deserve a zero.
If you just. can't. get. chemistry then the teacher should be willing and have latitude to help you.
Why should someone who works their ass off for a 55% be completely marginalized by someone who skipped class to get 50%?
Government intervention in the housing market has royally screwed things up. School administration intervention into teaching will royally screw things up. In both cases we lose as a whole.
:wq
Yah, leave it to the corporations. You know, the ones that have nothing else but the best interests of the students education in mind... wait a minute...
This reward system sends the wrong message to students in an already faltering education system and it will cause system dependence later in life. The effective message is students do not have to do anything to receive half the benefit they would have received had they performed their work to the best of their ability. There will also be unintended consequences to an automatic 50% grade: the lower tier students will have no incentive to work harder for a free handout (grade) and top tier students will be discouraged by a system that rewards apathy over achievement.
I can agree with their reason behind it, but not the execution. This is just like the "Everyone take off their shoes in case they're bombs" rule--it has a background, it has a "good" intent, but it's a horrible answer.
I know that many times in college, getting a very low grade early on struck a blow because I thought I might not be able to understand the rest of the material and pass. Even if everyone failed along with me, that wouldn't do much to perk me up. And often times the professor would state that there is a curve, but it's still a horrible one. A few times I just decided to withdraw rather than risk an F.
So I can get behind their idea that those who start failing early on will lose hope, and so need some sort of assurance to continue working. But auto-grading at 50% is a bad idea; how do you easily distinguish someone who tried but just doesn't get it and someone who didn't care and decided to just flake it? They both need help, but help of a different sort. This answer says "Well they should both just try harder".
Unfortunately, I don't know what a better solution might be. Many of my college classes had a policy for tests/quizzes where the lowest one would be dropped or the weights would change depending on how you did between them. Homework was graded normally. I think this works better-- they still get an accurate grade on assignments and so know what they have to work on, but it won't hurt them in the long run.
On another note, why the hell is this in Idle? Idle is for worthless shit and slashvertisements. This seems something better fit for Politics (maybe Science?). And what the hell is up with Idle's newline formatting?
So, at what point do we just start handing out diplomas and degrees to newborns? I mean, we would not want them to try and fail at an education; that might scar their delicate self-esteem. At some point in the near future, mediocrity becomes the standard, and there is no initiative to achieve or strive for excellence, because doing so makes you a show-off, elitist, or you take more than your fair share of the accolades.
Timmy got an F, you got an A. Well, let us just average that together and you both get a C+. OMFG.
You know, I have to wonder if all these stupid putzes that pass rules like this ever had problems succeeding as children and are trying to make up for some neurotic after-effects of a childhood of low achievement, or if perhaps they excelled and feel guilty for having done so and this is some kind of catharsis for their academic guilt.
Either way, it is pretty fucked up. More and more I lean towards home-schooling when I finally find a woman who will have sex with me and, $_DEITY willing, bear a child to me that looks suspiciously like the bag-boy at the local Publix.
The 50% policy has been in use by teachers for a long time. It's not news, and it's not a symptom of the decay of our education system. Sure, our system has flaws, but this is not one of them. As usual, people love to mouth off about things they know nothing about, especially on the Internet. As a college teacher with nine years of experience, I can tell you that the 50% policy actually makes no difference in terms of whether a student passes or not. There is never, and I mean never, a situation in which a student fails miserably in one area (such as assignments) and excels in another (such as tests). This goes back to the simple aphorism, "Either you know it or you don't." Most teachers I know have a simple policy: late work receives a grade of zero. Work submitted on time receives a minimum of 50%. At my school, a passing grade is 65%. For my part, I don't allow a 50% minimum on tests, and I have a reputation of being somewhat tough. So I've been using the 50% policy, in slightly modified form, for the past nine years. I can honestly say that I have never given a passing grade to a student who did not achieve the bare minimum competencies as outlined in my school's course descriptions. Actually, I've never "given" a grade to anyone... I've only recorded the grades that they earned.
A better solution that several teachers I've had have used is this. They simply discard the highest and lowest score.
There were variations on this. A couple teachers did it if it improved the grade. One of them repeated removing the highest and lowest test score if it further improved it. Another teacher had a bit of complex formula for deciding how much of the top and bottom to remove.
The basic idea was that it compensated for a bad day. One teacher removed only the lowest score and didn't remove any high scores. This involved cases where there were at least a few scores to work with. If they are talking about the scores on semester exams only, the sampling is poor.
I'd like to know why the HTML in my posts on IDLE don't work (it works in other Slashdot sections).
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
It's the students that are trying hard and only getting 60% that could be hurt by this.
A 'free' 50% means their is little reward for their hard work and little incentive to continue putting in.
I can certainly see that giving students an incentives not to give up is a good idea, but it's something that needs to be done carefully.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
All you need are two equations.
Having marked normally the teacher says
politically_correct_score = real_score / 2 + 50;
Or receiving a score the brighter kids can apply
real_score = 2 * (politically_correct_score -50);
This way mediocre Mike can congratulate himself on 55% while brilliant Beryl knows that she has to work harder having scored 75%.
This sounds like the same kind of philosophy that said that "everyone should be able to go to college" and "everyone should be able to buy a big house."
Just plain stupid.
Life is hard, folks. A quality life is going to require a lot of hard work. If you cannot pass your classes in high school, there are still jobs to had, but don't expect that you deserve that 65" plasma TV and the S-class Mercedes.
there are 3 kinds of people:
* those who can count
* those who can't
My father teaches (admittedly on the college level), and in a number of his classes, he refuses to accept homework that is non-passing. Thus, in this situation, you would not have to assign 50% to those homeworks, since they are not turned in yet. Or, say that a requirement for a grade above F is to turn in at least 60% of all homework.