Why hasn’t my grade changed?

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Art By Julissa Solorzano

This year students are noticing more and more that teachers are behind and just overall not grading the assignments that students are turning in. This is resulting in conflict and is making students annoyed with how their grades look because of the lack of work teachers seem to be doing.

Alexis Otterbein, Staff Illustrator

I had a guitar class, I was failing the class for the whole semester, I always wondered why because everything was submitted and yet nothing had changed until the end of the semester. It later occurred to me why I was failing for so long, the teacher had yet to grade my submissions until the last couple of days of school. I and other students know this struggle, getting grounded for months because a teacher has yet to fail again by updating the grade book for his/her students.

I believe as a student that grading should go both ways, meaning if a student has a due date on their work so should a teacher for grading. Not only would this be more beneficial for the students, but also the teachers. As teachers wouldn’t be so behind in what they’re doing and assigning, students would feel a lot less lost because many would know when and what to fix before their grade goes to a failing. Many students feel as if a reasonable grade for teachers to grade an assignment range between the 1-3 week period. “We as students understand that teachers may have busy lives and have to grade a whole level of students but if they cant grade it during a reasonable time then don’t assign it in the first place. I’m up for countless nights trying to turn in assignments that they give to us just for them to never really look at it anyways” said Robert Allen a junior from Frederick High.

Other teachers also felt as if it’s not fair because students can still turn in late work it’s just that points will be taken off. One teacher Mr.Lear states “I really don’t have much of an opinion I think every person has their own style of doing things some of us take longer than others it’s gonna vary. We are being asked to accept late work from kids and try to help kids out which we do. So I think that patients on both ends are a nice thing.”

Ms.Mires shares her opinion by saying “I think that across the board as far as due dates go their super important so that teachers can get all the materials graded, I feel like if a teacher does assign a due date they should have a quick turn around time like 2-3 days. Otherwise there was no reason for that due date to go into effect.” As well as, “They are always allowed to turn in later just in the case of maybe there was an emergency at home or maybe they just weren’t there that day so they have that flexibility. But it’s still showing them this assignment is a priority and you should get this in by the due date. Personally, my turnaround time is two days so I’ll give out an assignment, the due date is strict, and then two days later or less I will have that assignment graded.”

We asked students how it may affect their work ethic if teachers turn things in late, and how they feel about three weeks for teachers to grade one student from Frederick high school Angelina Rodrekez grade 11 points out “I don’t know my grade and I don’t know when to fix it” Payton Shelly (sophomore) says “I 1000% believe a 3 week period is enough time, my sister looks like she’s failing everything because they don’t grade it on time”

Ms. Mires also stated that “I think 1-3 weeks is more than enough time especially with planning and stuff like that, if you are giving yourself to much work and it needs to take more than that 1-3 weeks then you should probably like take another look at how your planning around your classes.”

Fixing the grade system, and ensuring that teachers grade within a time line will help teachers and students ensure that everything works out between both of them. This will also be able to make everything run smoothly and to be able to keep things between teachers and students calm and friendly.