School is about learning, not just grades, expert says

A new report card pilot project in the Anglophone West School District is igniting a debate among parents and educators over the best way to track the progress of students.

A Swedish educator said a larger problem in the education system is students are aiming for grades instead of aiming to learn.

Lisa Bjorklund, who is from Stockholm, is in New Brunswick this week to share some of her extensive experience with student assessment.

From 1998 to 2011, Bjorklund worked on Sweden's national mathematics assessments.

She said she appreciates why some parents aren't pleased with a new grading system introduced recently by the Anglophone West School District.

“I can understand that they do get frustrated, definitely,” she said.

“On the other hand, I would like a system where the parents did want more information about how their child really is learning because that is what school is about. School is not about percentages or getting a grade. School is really about learning.”

Bjorklund said that in Sweden, children don't start school until they are seven years old and don't start receiving grades until they are 13.

The education expert said it’s important to have a serious conversation on how best to assess the progress of students’ education.

“I would like all systems to really be part of a discourse where we talk about how to invite all children into the school subjects, how to engage them,” she said.

“I don't think that aiming for a certain percentage or for a certain letter is helping in that respect.”

Report card pilot project is contentious

In the pilot project being run by the Anglophone West School District, students will receive progress reports in early November and early April, which will indicate if the child is Progressing Well, Progressing or Progressing with Difficulty.

The report is then intended to focus the discussion during parent-teacher interviews.

A separate achievement report will be distributed in early February and the end of June. These separate reports will have a four-point scale to indicate the student’s performance. In this scale, a 4 indicates a student is exceeding learning goals, meanwhile a 1 indicates a student is working below the learning goals.

Previously, middle school students received a numerical mark. Elementary and primary students had report cards noting whether performance was superior, appropriate or needed improvement, for example.

In a two-page document shared with parents, the Anglophone West School District said the pilot project affects all students from kindergarten to Grade 8 in the district and it will be implemented in all other Anglophone school in the next two years.

The pilot project has prompted some parents, who are opposed to the new report cards, to say they feel like "guinea pigs."

However, Peter Fullerton, the president of the New Brunswick Teachers' Association and Ann Sherman, the dean of the faculty of education at the University of New Brunswick, have said the pilot project needs more time to see how effective it is at assessing results.