That specific section isn't there anymore—though some subjects have similar categories where you could basically slot in a grade like that. For instance, Tech has "independence and responsibility," PE covers "student engagement and developmental impact," and Art uses "productivity," and so on. These more specialized subjects don't have those explicit headers, so you're pretty much stuck using the teacher's notes. At my school, some professors just tack an effort grade onto whatever category fits—you can tell from the comments that the grade is actually based on being active in class, showing up, answering correctly, or joining discussions. Looking at his English grade, it seems the teacher just tucked his participation and effort under "listening comprehension."
Everything should really be handled on a case-by-case basis—it needs to be individualized. We need year-long progress reports to tell the real story—like whether we're looking at someone who just had a few lucky breaks push their GPA up to a 4.48, or a straight-A student who hits a wall on one final because they were having a rough day
Honestly, my favorites are the students with a solid track record and plenty of grades on file—especially when there's a rule that ignores one outlier grade, because—let's face it—shit happens to everyone. That’s how you get the actual picture, rather than just focusing on the kids who only took five tests all year long.
Dennis Alvarez2 said:It’s honestly surprising to me that San Francisco has such a limited selection of high schools. The lower entry requirements there might suggest that the grades aren't being inflated quite as aggressively, though I can't say for certain. Personally, I find myself leaning toward the idea of national standardized testing. It would function much like the SATs—tests administered under strict conditions with sealed materials until the moment they begin. Implementing a uniform standard across the entire United States would ensure that students with genuine talent and knowledge receive a fair assessment, while simultaneously providing invaluable data regarding the performance of individual teachers and institutions. Of course, I wouldn't mind if schools kept their own entrance exams; allowing each school to set its own specific criteria and expectations for incoming students seems perfectly reasonable.
Furthermore, I feel strongly that grading should be calculated to two decimal places rather than rounding off a 3.5 and a 4.4 into the same value. When you round everything up, you end up with those frantic, last-minute scrambles where a student sitting at a 4.3 or 4.4 spends the final two weeks of the semester desperately trying to claw their way to a 4.4, just to be lumped in with the students who maintained a steady 4.8 or 5.0 all year long. I truly wish I understood the reasoning behind why we don't implement two-decimal grading instead of this simplified system, which puts unnecessary pressure on teachers at the end of the term and feels fundamentally unfair to the students who have been consistently high achievers. So many people advocate for this change, yet it seems to be perpetually ignored, so I am genuinely curious about what arguments are being used to block it. 🤔 Has a two-decimal grading scale ever actually existed within our American school systems? I don't recall it ever being part of the curriculum, though I haven't followed the nuances closely enough to be sure. 🤔
The whole point of the recent reform was to move away from focusing solely on averages—grades shouldn't just be about the numbers. The idea was to reduce the number of formal, numeric grades and increase qualitative feedback, looking at the student's progress as a whole. It’s not a bad approach—even top students deserve a bad day now and then. If we did it the way you suggest, a straight-A student could have a few perfect scores, then catch a stomach bug or a fever during a test and end up with a 4.43 average—which effectively drags them down to a B.
Or take a kid with solid grades around a 4.6 or 4.7 all year. Then, in the final week of school, they take a big exam, the teacher is exhausted, and because there weren't enough prior grades recorded, the teacher decides to break that one exam into three separate mini-grades. Since each part carries less weight, one mistake results in a 4—suddenly, you have three 4s on the record, the average drops to 4.4, and the kid loses their A. We're talking about 10-year-olds in elementary school here, not high schoolers.
So—God forbid we ever go back to a system where elementary schools rely exclusively on robotic, arithmetic-based grading.
It’s hard to get anything concrete out of them—you just sort of observe from a distance. To me, this feels like a senior capstone project or some polished programming and database assignment 😬 Back in my day, if you needed an app to pass a class, you ended up building a "video rental store manager" 🤣 This is textbook stuff for learning data organization, databases, tables, UI, clicking around... great for practice, great for a group project. You end up with a pretty product to show off, but practically zero utility 🤣
I’m looking at the average grades for schools in my neighborhood and the surrounding suburbs... strictly by the numbers, it looks like everyone has similar GPA distributions and failure rates. In reality, though, one school is a grind—it's rigorous, and you actually have to work your tail off to pull a decent grade (which means the struggling kids either drop out or don't even apply in the first place). That leaves the second school to naturally attract more average or underperforming students because passing there is easy. Long story short—on paper and in the statistics, they look identical, but those colorful charts fail to capture how it actually works on the ground.
We'll see. One thing to consider is that everyone switched over to this "reformed" curriculum in the meantime—and from what I’ve gathered in the comments, the old one was actually more comprehensive and rigorous, requiring grades to be based strictly on averages. Now, that's not really the case; there's enough wiggle room to turn a 4.3 into an A just by padding it with a few good assignments during the year. That shift, combined with the COVID era, explains why we saw such a massive surge in honors students.
Looking at the SER data—at least from the perspective of RI—it’s clear that grades spiked across all grade levels during the COVID era; they definitely weren't this high before. But since last year, things have been trending down again, and now that we're fully back to in-person learning without any isolation requirements, everything will likely just settle back to normal.
Michelle Nelson4 said:Wait, what do you mean it isn't working? Are you using Safari? It runs perfectly fine on Chrome for me.
It wasn't working on my phone—had to track down a laptop just to check. 😬 All these numbers are giving me a bit of a headache. 😵
I’d love to be able to pick a specific high school and see which middle schools feed into it—then compare those grades. We could finally see whose A's were earned and whose were just handed out.
It’s hard to make a direct comparison since school quality varies so much—it isn't just about the curriculum.
I’ve actually touched on this before when discussing the situation in Cleveland... if you're a STEM-focused student, your options are pretty slim—maybe one or two solid prep schools at most. We don't really have a top-tier technical school, nothing like Rudyard Kipling, so typically, the vocational tracks are filled by students who aren't quite hitting those straight-A marks. That explains why someone might only need 63 points for a Google designer program; let's be honest, it's not exactly an elite program. Anyone with high grades and actual talent would rather head to a specialized math academy than settle for a design track.
rowdypanther12 said:Hey monstera, my colleague’s son is currently enrolling. He scored a 4.8 in seventh grade and a 4.6 in eighth. Could you please help him out and let me know which high schools in the area he might be able to get into?
I'm pretty sure if you use that link I posted above, you just plug in all the grades—it calculates the total score and lists every school he qualifies for.
It doesn't have to be that way—you could just pick a combination of irrelevant classes that slowly drags down your GPA every year. Like, say, 4.6 + 4.8 + 4.8 + 4.8 and suddenly you're sitting at a 79.
Edit: Actually, looking closer, I see you're aiming for that second decimal point, but... honestly, the post targeting a 79 wasn't exactly going for mathematical precision.😬
There's an admissions calculator here—plus a breakdown showing the minimum scores required over the last four years for specific majors. I've also attached a PDF with all the score data if you want to dig through the numbers there instead.
"The schools in the Midwest want this reform more than anyone—there are only two in Washington, D.C., and not a single one in Miami or Seattle!" I love a city with some flow 😍 🙂
It looks like they just ripped this whole article from USA Today; nobody seems to have an actual accurate list, just some rough estimates:
jadetinker85 said:When I was in school, everything had two paths: teaching or non-teaching. That went for everything from chemistry and biology to math, history, and English.
In NYC, sure. Not really in other cities. It was either pick the teaching route or move to NYC.
jadetinker85 said:Look, subject-specific teachers are people who actually went to college for an education degree. Does that mean anything to you?
That doesn't hold much weight—especially regarding high schoolers or older generations living outside of major hubs like New York City. Back when I was in college, there wasn't really any other path besides teaching—it just wasn't an option. We all finished those degrees because there weren't any smart alternatives. Some actually ended up staying in the classroom, but most didn't.
Don't laugh—but we’ve completely overlooked something that is actually essential these days. I’d love to see it integrated into computer science classes—not necessarily as its own subject, but just part of the curriculum. 😬 It is infinitely easier and faster to type when you actually know how to do it properly, rather than picking up bad habits early on that are a nightmare to fix later. Is touch typing still taught in business schools at all? It seems strange that nobody thought to expand this further; after all, everyone uses a keyboard now, not just secretaries. 😬