Early grades for Wake students ‘are concerning.’ Is remote learning hurting them?
Grades are down for students in the Wake County school system after two months of remote learning to start the school year.
The Wake County school system is reviewing the grades from the first quarter of the school year amid concerns that student performance was lower than expected. The review comes after some schools had warned families that more students than normal were in danger of failing unless they improved their grades.
“Last week was the end of the first quarter grading period, and one of the things I know that our schools are engaged in right now is taking a deep look at student performance and course grades for the first quarter,” Drew Cook, Wake’s assistant superintendent for academics, told a school board committee this week. “Quite honestly, some of the things that they’re seeing are concerning.”
Wake Superintendent Cathy Moore said the review will allow them to determine how widespread the grading issues may be in North Carolina’s largest school district. Lisa Luten, a district spokeswoman, said Thursday that the review is ongoing and more information could be shared with the school board at its Nov. 10 meeting.
Parents will be able to view the first-quarter report card grades on Friday.
The drop in grades isn’t surprising to some parents who complain that the all-virtual environment isn’t a fit for all students. Wake, like a majority of other North Carolina school districts, started this school year only using online classes due to concerns about COVID-19.
“Many kids are doing well in virtual, but there’s a certain percentage who thrived on social interaction and they’re not doing well because nothing is motivating them now,” Julea Danielson, a Cary parent of a high school freshman, said in an interview.
High grading expectations set for virtual learning
This school year marks the first time that Wake and other North Carolina public schools have tried to treat grading of online work the same way they would if students were attending classes in person.
When schools were closed in March for in-person classes, the State Board of Education ordered schools not to give failing grades last semester due to the pandemic. State and local education leaders readily admit that the “instructional year functionally ended” in March, even though schools tried to offer online classes.
But school leaders said this school year would be different with students learning new material. It’s proving to be a challenge though, especially at the high school level.
At Green Level High School in Cary, families were warned earlier this month that 140 students were in danger of failing one or more classes. Similar warnings were given at other schools before the first quarter ended.
“We are hearing from our principals and from our teachers concerns about being held accountable in a traditional framework, in a traditional structure for course content that they’re working really, really hard to cover and teach as they normally would,” Cook said at Monday’s school board student achievement committee meeting.
“But as we’ve talked about, the pacing is such that it makes it very, very difficult to do.”
Cook said Wake is hoping the state will give schools some of the same grading flexibility it provided last school year.
Virtual learning not best option for some students
Prior to the pandemic, virtual learning had been promoted as an option that some students could use if a traditional in-person environment didn’t work well with their learning style.
But virtual learning has become the default for most students, either by choice of families for health reasons or when districts didn’t offer in-person classes.
More than 85,000 of Wake’s 160,000 students signed up the fall semester for the Virtual Academy program. Registration for the spring semester runs until Nov. 4 for middle school and high school students. It will run Dec. 2-9 for elementary students.
“In ideal circumstances if a district was going to create a virtual option, there would be an application process,” Cook said. “ We would want to vet to make sure that it was the right skill set for students and all of those things. Obviously that’s not the case here.”
Wake school board member Jim Martin, who is now teaching online classes as a chemistry professor at N.C. State University, said it takes more time to cover the same amount of material in a virtual environment. He said virtual learning can work well for students who work independently but not for every student.
“The learning is not happening necessarily the way it needs to,” Martin said at the Monday committee meeting. “I do think that’s going to be reflected in grades. Do we need to think about some grading flexibility, course repeat options?
“Do we need to think about recognizing that this is not a normal year and maybe we need to give people the option of an additional semester or an additional year?”
Successful students now struggling
Some Wake parents say that their children have gone from being solid learners to now struggling to pass.
Cyndi Tomblin, a Cary parent, said two of her three children are doing well in virtual learning. But her eighth-grade son, who has ADHD, got Cs and Ds the first quarter after having never gotten below a B before in middle school.
“He learns differently,” Tomblin said in an interview. “Some kids can watch a video and learn. But some need more tactile learning. He just has a different learning style.”
Teachers aren’t entering grades as quickly online, so Tomblin said it makes it harder for her to see how well her children are doing and where they need help.
Danielson, the Cary parent, said it took a hard push at the end of the quarter to help raise her son’s F grade in three classes. She said the problem is schools aren’t prepared to help students like her son who weren’t on their radar before.
“Until the school can figure out how to motivate them, I’ll have to,” Danielson said.
Teachers asked to give more flexibility on grades
Some Wake students aren’t necessarily failing in the remote environment, but their parents say their first quarter grades were lower than expected.
Brian Clemens, a high school parent from Wake Forest, said some teachers aren’t cutting students enough slack.
Clemens cited how his son, a sophomore, got a 55 instead of a 95 on an assignment because it was submitted one day late.
In another case, Clemens said he had to fight for his son because a teacher gave him a zero on an online project that supposedly hadn’t been turned in. Clemens said his son had done the work but had submitted it incorrectly.
“During this pandemic when it’s all new to the teachers and students, I don’t understand why they’re not being a little bit more generous,” Clemens said.
Clemens is now also paying for a math tutor after his son got a D in math. Clemens said his son previously was getting all As and Bs in his classes.
Some parents want in-person classes now
Clemens signed up his son for the Virtual Academy program for the whole school year due to concerns about COVID-19.
But Tomblin and Danielson did not. They want their children getting in-person instruction as soon as possible.
Monday marked the first day of in-person classes since March 13 for thousands of Wake students. Wake is phasing in the return of PreK-3 students and K-12 special education students in regional programs on a cycle of one week of in-person classes and two weeks of online classes.
On Nov. 16, the PreK-3 and K-12 special-ed regional students will switch to daily in-person classes. Also that day, students in fourth and fifth grades will return on the three-week rotation of in-person and online classes.
Middle school students will start on the three-week rotation on Nov. 9. High school students will stay with online classes for the rest of the fall semester.
Danielson said it’s taking too long to get high school students like her son back in class. She said the continued delay is hurting the futures of many high school students.
“High school grades, whatever is happening now affects them for the rest of their lives,” Danielson said. “It’s grades that are affecting their future and we’re playing with their lives. It shouldn’t be business as usual.”
This story was originally published October 29, 2020 at 2:11 PM with the headline "Early grades for Wake students ‘are concerning.’ Is remote learning hurting them?."
