Emilia Ryan
Landry Tagliere started off the past two school years using standard based grading for her French classes. After trying to adapt to its differences from traditional grading she found it wasn’t working the best. This school year, Tagliere has decided to go back to traditional grading.
The standard grading system uses numbers one-four to evaluate students instead of percentages that result in A’s, B’s, C’s..etc. Whereas four means advanced, three means proficient, two means basic and one means below basic. Proponents of the standard system argue that it breaks down complex subjects into smaller concepts which helps students understand where they need to improve and helps teachers better understand student learning. Contrary, the traditional system uses A-F where A is the highest grade and F is the lowest in order to measure student performance. French teacher and Online Study Program coordinator, Isabelle Picalause, uses standard-based grading in all her classes. She began using this system two years ago and believes every teacher should use this method to assess students, as it is more beneficial for everyone.
“It’s really a matter of equity,” Picalause said. “I truly believe that the grade with percentage and letters [traditional grading] does not really give an accurate feedback on the skills of the students. Instead of having one number, having different standards and giving them an appreciation on those standards gives the students a snapshot of what they can do, what they cannot do and what they cannot do yet, so it gives better feedback because grades are all about feedback. A grade is not a punishment, it’s feedback.”
Picalause acknowledges that Campbell Hall uses the traditional grading system which requires her to convert the 1-4 system into a letter grade at the end of a trimester. However, she believes the standard grading system is still worth using, despite the extra work to translate letter grades.
“I think that all my students who are graded with standard based grading by me really see the benefit,” Picalause said. “They are not so concentrated on the grade, but concentrate more on their performance, what the grade means and what the feedback is so they understand how to progress.”
Unlike Picalause, French teacher Landry Tagliere uses the traditional grading system, which is based on percentages and letter grades. Although she understands the appeal of standard based grading, and tried using it in the last two years,she prefers traditional grading after she found that standard grading did not work well within the limitations of the school’s traditional trimester grade system.
“Standard based grading should be cumulative over time meaning it does not end when the trimester finishes,” Tagliere said. “And so, it was problematic for me, using standard grading because I felt like in the space of a trimester there wasn’t enough time to have enough graded assessments for each standard. Also, I know how to work within the traditional system and I think that those grades reflect my students skills more accurately than what I was getting using standard based grading.”
Catie Bass ‘26 is in Tagliere’s French four honors class. She has experienced both the standard and traditional grading systems in her French classes throughout the years. There are pros and cons to both grading systems she believes but the traditional approach ends up being easier on the teachers.
“I think that there’s more room to get an A with the standard grading system,” Bass said. “The standard grading system is more based on how well you understand versus the traditional grading system that ends up focusing more on what specific errors you make, like just forgetting an accent. But I think they both work. I don’t think one’s necessarily better than the other. It’s just a different way to get to a similar result. Despite some of the benefits that may come from a standard grading system, I don’t think that there’s enough difference to say that it is overall better.”