Back in May, before summer break started, I was assigned the story introducing to the school the new grading system that would be put in place for this year. Back then, I thought it was a great idea. 

The way it was pitched, it was supposed to help the hardworking students by not letting their grade tank from a few bad grades by making the minimum grade 50%. But now, none of us have any motivation to do our homework and our grades are tanking from tests and quizzes. 

I’m in hard classes, I won’t lie. What makes them even worse is the fact that 80% of my semester grade is tests and quizzes. One test can completely destroy my grade, the exact opposite of what the administrators told us that the new system would do.

Not to mention hardworking students who are just bad at test taking. Many of my close friends have had legitimate panic attacks because they know if they do bad at all one one test, digging themselves out of that bad GPA will be next to impossible for them. 

It’s not fair that some of the hardest working kids I know have to go through all of that unnecessary emotional stress, especially right after the most stressful academic years of their entire life. 

The homework situation is another thing. I’ve never been a lazy student, through all of my 10 years of schooling. But now I barely see any point in doing homework now. It barely affects my grade. 

Homework is worth 10-20% of our grade and I can’t even get less than 50%. There would virtually be no difference in my grade if I didn’t do my homework than if I did it all perfectly. 

This new and “improved” grading system basically rewards students who do no work at all and completely ruins the grade of students who aren’t amazing test takers.

It has been nothing but a disaster for every kid I’ve talked to, and I genuinely can’t see a single way it’s helped me or anyone in the school.