Grading Practices

Progress Reporting

After a semester in North Nation by Design and in collaboration with the Department of Innovation and Learning, we are transitioning from traditional grading methods that do not adequately represent students’ progress toward a new method of recording student progress toward our essential skills. If you’ve looked in the grade book, you’ll notice that it looks differently than last semester. Described below are the frequently used PowerSchool indicators you will notice in the gradebook.

  • When a student turns in an assignment that shows they have submitted evidence of a skill, it will be coded as collected.

  • If a student turns in an assignment, but they need to correct something or add something to show progress toward a particular skill, the student will receive an incomplete indicator as well as feedback on what needs to be done to get to mastery. Teachers will provide feedback on progress achieved toward the skills during their seminars to help students reach mastery.

Finally, if a student doesn't turn in an assignment the student will receive a missing indicator.

Frequently Used PowerSchool Indicators (Assignments)

*Once each seminar is completed, a letter grade reflecting a student's mastery of the skills being accessed will be provided. These letter grades will assist in determining a students final grade.

Sample PowerSchool Gradebook (Assignments)

Seminar Final Grades

Throughout each seminar, students are being given opportunities to provide evidence toward their mastery of the skills being assessed through each seminar. Each assignment is collected, reviewed, and given feedback if needed. There will not be any point value issued to any assignments, as we are focusing on the "collective work/evidences" throughout a seminar to determine where a student is in the progress toward mastery of the skills.

At the end of each seminar, the students will receive a point value which will be expressed as a:

  • 10/10= Student has shown full evidence toward the mastery of the skills being assessed.

  • 7.5/10= Student has provided some evidence but additional evidence is still required to show full mastery (Feedback Provided).

  • 6/10= Student has shown very little evidence toward mastery, but has made attempts (Feedback Provided).

  • 5/10= Student has shown no evidence toward mastery and has shown very little to no attempt at all (Feedback Provided).

Our focus is to challenge our students to not view assignments as a means of points, instead assignments are a means of learning. Throughout the seminars, we want to see growth from our students with the understanding that feedback is a means of additional opportunity to learn and grow. At the end of it all, we want our students to begin seeing grades as the product of their learning and growth, not as the motivator to just get an assignment done. Whenever our student receive a grade, it is vital for them to view the feedback provided and utilize that to make changes to their work, which in turn should provide them the opportunity to provide more evidence toward the mastery of the skills.

Below you will see a few examples of what your student's Power School might look like at the conclusion of a seminar.