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Schools

Alternative Report Cards Flunk

School board hears pleas to return to letter grades.

Parents, teachers and trustees in the San Mateo-Foster City School District opened fire on the district's unpopular report card, pleading for a return to the traditional letter-grade system.

Since 2008 the district has used a standards-based report card, which uses an arbitrary number system to gauge how well students are learning and retaining information, as well as track their progress grasping a subset of categories related to a subject.

But according to testimony provided at the district board of trustees meeting Thursday night, overwhelming support exists for the district to shift back to using A-F letter grades.

The system confuses parents and students, said district teachers, who  spearheaded the campaign to junk the experiment.

Bowditch Middle School Jim Remington did not mince words when expressing his frustrations: The numbers amount to meaningless gibberish, he said.

Remington blamed former Superintendent Pendery Clark for installing the numeric system -- creating an unnecessary burden for her replacement, Cynthia Simms.

"Bring back our letter grades only," said Remington to the applause of the crowd.

The software necessary to generate grades is clunky and inefficient, said Bowditch teacher Stacey Sierra.

The hours she spends entering data into the system robs her of valuable time that could be used planning lessons or interacting with parents and students, she said.

Sierra added that counselors in local high school districts have expressed frustration with the system because they don't understand what the grade scores mean.

In some cases that confusion has led to students being placed in the wrong high school classes, she said.

Nathan Beach, a teacher at Borel Middle School who also has a child enrolled in the district, said the current report card is frustrating for teacher, student and parent.

"I come from a pretty informed place," he said. "It doesn't work."

Trustee Ellen Mallory Ulrich was outraged when the district initially transitioned away from the traditional letter grades.

"I know parents are angry. I've heard so many of them," said Ulrich. "If this is not working, let's fix it."

Trustee Colleen Sullivan agreed: "We need a fresh start," she said.

Board Chair Mark Hudak, who initially favored the system, said that he still believes in its intention.

"I thought it would provide more effective, detailed information to students and parents," he said.

But he also acknowledged that the system's reputation is likely too fractured to keep in place.

"I feel at this point we've give standards based report cards all the chance we can. I wish we could have done it differently. But it's probably too late," he said.

The board made no official policy decision Thursday night, but Hudak instructed Simms and her staff to come back to the board at the next meeting Nov. 17 with a recommendation on how the district should proceed.

Did the school district give the alternative grading system a chance, or was it doomed to fail from the start?

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