Michigan’s Department of Education’s proposed A-F grading plan for Michigan’s schools has been eliminated for consideration.

Mlive.com is reporting that Michigan is dropping its plan to grade our schools with an overall A-F grade.

I thought to myself what kind of freak would ever want to actually give out an A-F grade in a school environment, right.

Michigan’s proposed A-F grading system was based upon six categories:

  1. student proficiency
  2. student growth
  3. graduation rate
  4. progress among students with a limited grasp of English
  5. school quality/student success
  6. and assessment participation

Chris Wigent, executive director of the Michigan Association of School Administrators was quoted in the article stating:

If a parent looks at an overall grade of a school system, it will give them just one snapshot but not give them the details that they need to know in order for them to select the best school for their son or daughter

According to a nonpartisan research organization, Education Commission of the States, there are at least 16 states which currently rate their schools with an overall A-F grade.

Instead the state is looking at a dashboard type “grading” system to inform parents how their child’s school is performing.

State Board co-President Casandra Ulbrich believes the dashboard system is a better method because it provides:

Information people can use as opposed to an A-F system that creates complex formulas to determine which information is more important versus less important.

The Great Lakes Education Project, a school choice advocacy group, believes Michigan should still go forward with the A-F grading system.  The group’s advocacy director was quoted in the article stating:

"Given that more than 50% of Michigan's K-12 students are not proficient in Math and English Language Arts, GLEP strongly supports an A-F grading system that predominantly measures growth and proficiency of students.  A system like this is outcomes based and would produce meaningful information for parents and students during their educational journey."

Does this mean schools will no longer grade students on an overall cumulative grade point system because it is too simplistic?

We shall see if that is the next grading system to fall.

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