With the beginning of the school year upon us, it is not uncommon for students to find themselves swamped with work and struggling to make sure that dreaded letter “F” doesn’t come anywhere near their report card.

This past year, Fairfax County Public Schools decided to enact a new policy to aid students who may be falling behind in their schoolwork. Starting in the fall of the 2016-2017 school year, a new grading system will be put into effect throughout all of FCPS, stating that a student cannot receive a grade below a 50% on any assignment if it has been completed thoroughly and submitted. The purpose of this new system is to avoid killing students’ GPA’s because they received a single zero, something that can be almost impossible to recover from.
In addition to a guaranteed 50%, if the assignment was turned in, teachers will be required to provide opportunities for students to raise their grade, such as retakes if a test score is below an 80%. Students will also be able to turn assignments in late and without penalty, permitting they are fully completed to the students’ best ability.
“Their goal is to measure what you know” says Pre-calculus teacher Robert Benton.
Rather than basing grades off of participation, FCPS is attempting to begin basing grades off of students’ knowledge. Some, however, are skeptical of this new policy because of the perceived failure it had at Washington Irving Middle School.
“It’ll just make [the students] lazier… now there’s a backup so if you don’t do your work, you still get 50% anyway” says senior Catherine Kiser.
Fairfax County, however, has attempted to extinguish any endeavors to “beat the system” students may make if they are too lazy to complete their work; teachers have the ability to reward any student who does not turn in their assignment or who clearly put no effort into their task with a zero. A “guaranteed 50” will only be guaranteed to those students who put their best work into the assignment without any obvious lack of effort. The point of this new system is to ensure that students put their best work forward without the fear of ruining their GPA by running the risk of receiving less than a 50%. By enacting this grading scale and policy, students taking multiple Advanced Placement courses and/or participating in multiple after school activities will not be stressed and pulling constant all-nighters in order to avoid failing all of their classes. Beginning in the 2016-2017 school year, FCPS’ goal is that students will be able to focus more on quality of work rather than quantity of work.