Eliminate antiquated grading system

John Richardson’s opinion piece has many good ideas but it doesn’t really address what may or may not be happening with hybrid learning. At the moment, it is a system that has been adopted out of necessity and has not been designed with any deep thought. Only time will tell if it will work or have any long-term effect. In spite of massive philosophical shifts in the past 50 years, the Ontario education system has not changed much. All new ideas and trends have been superimposed on a model that was created well over 100 years ago. Sometimes, the new ideas work and become part of the model. Other times, they are relegated to the catalogue of failed experiments like the open concept classrooms of the Hall-Dennis report or Transitions from the Rae era.

Richardson’s piece is rightly concerned with lack of student engagement and dwindling interest in real learning. One way to truly shake up education and make students more interested in learning is to eliminate the antiquated system of assigning marks or grades. Instead of being a motivator, marks have the opposite effect and become the only thing that matters to most people in secondary school. They also have little meaning. What does it really mean to achieve 73 per cent in a course vs. 78 per cent?

Students demonstrate their knowledge and thinking in a variety of ways and all of these can be evaluated without assigning a grade or level to it. This idea would have a profound effect on many things from teacher training to students applying to university. But it is an idea that is long overdue.

Cathy Haley, Ottawa