Missouri officials are advancing a policy under Executive Order 26-01 to assign single A–F letter grades to every public school in Missouri.
Some educators within the Perry County School District say this can have harmful effects on our local schools, and are urging the community to reach out to their state lawmakers to encourage the state school board to pause the plan and hold open public hearings before they vote on the framework.
PCSD librarian Heather Baskin wrote a letter to the community on the matter in which she explained what she believed the most harmful effects of this grading system could be.
“While transparency is essential, reducing an entire school down to a single letter grade based on rushed, incomplete test scores misinforms families rather than helping them,” Baskin wrote in the letter. “Historically, states that have used A-F systems—including Indiana, Michigan, and Utah—have often transitioned away from the method and toward “dashboard-style” systems to better communicate diverse performance metrics.”
Baskin said that the simplified grading system can be harmful because it can shorten the window teachers have to teach before being forced to give standardized tests on material that students might not have enough time to learn.
“It definitely impacts our practice, in order to meet the testing window, which is being moved up as early as mid March,” she said. “Our teachers will have to shorten their instruction, so we won’t have time to fully cover the curriculum of our classes.”
Baskin warned that the grading system could also unfairly stigmatize schools based on statistics that do not fully represent a school’s identity.
“A single letter cannot show you the dedicated staff working after school with struggling readers, the strength of our music and arts programs,” she said. “Or the safe, welcoming climate our community builds every day.”
Baskin also warned that the system could be unfairly skewed against small, underfunded public schools in rural communities.
“For 30 years, state letter-grading schemes across the country have mirrored zip-code demographics rather than classroom dedication, penalizing neighborhood schools to push privatization agendas,” she said.
Baskin said she is encouraging parents to sign a petition, which can be found at https://bit.ly/A_F_Grading_Petition, that encourages Missouri lawmakers to delay the vote in order to do more research on the effects of implementing this system.
Baskin is also encouraging parents and teachers to participate in a letter writing campaign.
“We’re also encouraging not only school teachers, but parents and community members to write a letter to the state board,” she said. “Asking that they postpone this vote and really take a look and rework the framework and include educators and other stakeholders in this process to preserve the local public schools having control over their own student learning. …We must demand that they pause this rushed plan, hold open public hearings before they vote on the framework, and measure what truly matters for our children.”
As of now, the vote is scheduled to take place on September 15th.
