National Affiliate Spotlight: Adams 50 eliminates grade levels
04/09 -- Adams County School District 50 in Denver is embarking on a radical restructuring in which all grade levels will be eliminated. Instead, students will advance to the next level when they demonstrate proficiency, which could happen any time during the school year, as well as at the end of the year.
The district’s new standards-based system is based on the idea that “time is a variable and learning is the constant,” says Superintendent Roberta Selleck.
“What we’ve been doing in the past wasn’t working. We needed to try something new,” says board President Vicky Marshall. The district had a large achievement gap, high dropout rate, and was on the state’s “academic watch” list.
“Looking at the data, we found our kids were not succeeding,” Selleck adds. For example, 48 percent of the district’s graduates who went to college needed remedial help once they got there, compared to a statewide average of 42 percent.
School board Vice President Marge Rinaldi heard about the no-grade approach from education consultant Robert J. Marzano at a Colorado Association of School Boards conference. The concept was pioneered by the Chugach, Alaska, school district and has been implemented in other Alaska districts and in individual schools in other states.
But, in the lower 48 states, Adams 50 is first to implement the concept across the district.
Marshall credits Selleck with building support for eliminating grade levels by hosting numerous conversations in 2007 and 2008 to explain the concept to the staff and community.
By April 2008, Selleck says the board-superintendent team “knew we had critical mass when 86 percent of the staff agreed that we absolutely had to do this.” The next steps included developing a shared vision and having conversations with parents and students. Eventually 95 percent of parents approved the plan, she says.
The new system will be implemented in grades preK-8 next fall and for grades 9-12 in fall 2010. It’s being piloted this year schoolwide at Metz Elementary and in one classroom in other schools.
Over the past few months, Marzano worked with 100 teachers to develop “essential learnings” in 10 content areas: language arts, math, science, social studies, art, PE, music, technology, world languages, and personal/social skills.
Students advance to the next level when they reach proficiency in a content area. Instead of letter grades, a student at the “proficient” level will receive a 3.0. A student at the “advanced” level will have a 3.5 or 4.0, Selleck says.
No one gets a failing grade. Instead, students will receive feedback and support and will know exactly the areas in which they are weakest so they can work harder to advance to the next level.
In the elementary schools, Selleck expects students will be placed according to proficiency levels in reading, math, and writing. A student could be placed in an advanced class in reading and a more basic level in math, for example.
To avoid classes with wide age ranges, two separate tracks likely will be set for elementary schools -- one for students ages 6-7 and another for those 8-10.
“In this system, there is no such thing as retention,” Selleck says. Less-proficient students would have more time, while those who master the material quickly could move ahead without having to wait until the next school year.
Once children reach age 12, they move on to middle school even if they are still behind academically, Selleck says. It wouldn’t be appropriate to have a 12-year-old in the same class with 8-year olds; instead, the curriculum will follow the student to middle school.
Some students might need more than 12 years to demonstrate proficiency and graduate. Other students might be able to graduate early. But Selleck doesn’t think highly advanced students should necessarily graduate years earlier than their peers; instead, they can stay in high school while taking college courses and earn an associate’s degree along with a diploma.
Several details still need to be worked out, says Marshall, including when students would take standardized tests, how proficiency levels would be translated to grades on college transcripts, and what to do about students who are over 18 and still not proficient.
“When we talk to kids about the concept, they get it,” Marshall says. In the classrooms where it’s being piloted, “discipline issues are down, students aren’t feeling frustration about failure, and students are more engaged. They come to school with goals and know what they want to accomplish that day.”
And, she says, “Teachers like the system because they no longer have to deal with such a wide range of abilities in their classes. But it’s going to take some time to track whether the new concept is succeeding.”
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