Montgomery County Council meeting, May 2025
The Montgomery County Council delved into the new MCPS grading system changes in a Thursday meeting. Here’s what you need to know:
Basics:
MCPS has been analyzing historical data up through the previous school year, along with engaging with the community, gathering feedback from working groups and collaborating with committees. The goal? An academic “return to rigor,” according to a presentation from the meeting.
First off, what is the purpose of grades? Dr. Kisha Logan said grading standards have become increasingly inconsistent over time. This, according to Logan, has contributed to iniquities. These new grade policy revisions, starting in the 2025-2026 school year, seek to address those challenges.
Grades, she said, serve many functions. Primarily, they are a communication tool, but they also act as a way to hold both students and teachers accountable. One controversial modification discussed in the meeting addresses how final grades will be calculated: changing from using letter grades to calculating percentages.
What changes?
50% rule
Previously, MCPS’ “50% rule” lacked necessary parameters, Logan said. The rule, designed to ensure a “minimum grade for submitted work to prevent automatic course failure,” meant that teachers were not to mark lower than a 50% on a student’s work. She said the rule was put in place to prevent getting scores of 0, which, according to Logan, “can be a point of no return” for students.
Now, teachers are now expected to assign no lower than a 50% score to assignments showing genuine attempts to engage with the subject material. However, students cannot simply submit a blank paper or writings unrelated to the material and expect to receive at least a 50% on the assignment.
This new standard introduces questions of subjectivity, said County Council Vice President Will Jawando. He expressed concerns over what students would be affected most by such a change; “I just want to say that publicly… for whom this is going to apply, these are students that are struggling.”
Letter grade to percentage
Previously, some students had realized that receiving a C in one marking period meant they could not do work in the next (and fail, which is an E), but still average out to a D letter grade, which isn’t failing.
Now, Logan said final grades are based on the percentage, instead of a student’s letter grade. For example, a student could get a 75% (C) one marking period and 52% (E) the next and average out to 63.5% (D).
While, in this example, the grade didn’t drastically change, what did change was the grade point average (GPA). Specifying the exact grade percentage, essentially, shifts this metric from a more general letter grade to a more narrowly-specified overall percentage.
On the subject of secondary school GPAs, Councilmember Gabe Albornoz said, “it is unbelievable how competitive [college acceptances are] across the entire country… the numbers of applications have just skyrocketed.” And this worry about GPA shifts is not unfounded. Logan acknowledged this change could negatively impact some students’ GPAs. With the change comes the potential of “lowering GPAs for [some] students,” she said.
Remediation
Previously, there was not an identified number of minimum reassessment opportunities; this change quantifies the minimum, Logan said.
Now, teachers in all secondary courses will be required to give students at least two reassessment opportunities, Logan said. They are expected to engage in reteaching the material to the students needing retakes. Teachers will also have the flexibility to reassess students using either the same assessment or choosing a different assessment method.
Additionally, these new rules establish a 10-day due date extension maximum for students, as well as a 10-day grading turnaround for teachers. Logan said this is meant to ensure students get feedback throughout the marking period. Ideally, this would also keep students feeling rushed to turn in several assignments at the last minute.
While it is not a change from the old policy, the new rules still do not allow for giving extra credit or additional points. When asked about this, Logan explained, “there’d be no way to monitor who’s giving [or] getting it.”
Why make the changes?
The Education & Culture Committee said in their meeting presentation that they aim to “restore clarity and establish high expectations for students.” Specifically, they give five pillars:
- Reflect content mastery in grades
- Clearly communicate students’ performance
- Encourage accountability in class attendance and learning content
- Reduce ambiguity in grading methods
- Uplift educators in mentoring students
Logan said all communications surrounding this change would be translated to allow for better understanding in residents’ native languages. To learn more about the changes, visit the MCPS’ Grading and Reporting Information webpage.
