It’s time to scrap percentage grades

Re At these schools, 35% is as low as it goes,

Nov. 13 The Canadian Assessment for Learning Network promotes the use of assessment that supports student learning.

We were saddened and disappointed to see the criticism of the Toronto Catholic School Board’s requirement that teachers report nothing lower than 35 per cent on mid-term report cards. Failure is failure and energy spent quantifying failure is patently absurd.

Recording grades below 35 per cent serves no purpose but to humiliate students and convince them that any further attempt to be successful is futile. To suggest that precise grades exist below a 35-per-cent threshold is ridiculous and to further suggest that somehow grades below 35 per cent can help to identify student needs defies all reason.

The fundamental problem is the unfortunate insistence of the Ontario Ministry of Education that we continue to utilize percentage grades in this province. As long as they remain, we must ensure that the harm they cause — espe- cially to struggling students — is minimized, and that means that minimum grades of 35 per cent — or higher — should be required by provincial and district policies.

Since the 1999-2000 school year the ministry of education has provided achievement charts that identify five levels of performance for all subjects and grade levels. It is long past time that percentage grades be eliminated and that the five levels be used to communicate student achievement.

If this were done the silly argument in the article about the precision or accuracy of grades below 50 per cent would be irrelevant. Damian Cooper, president, and Ken O’Connor, past president, Canadian Assessment for Learning Network