SchoolMatch Audit Raises Questions about Grade Inflation

OCALA -- The SchoolMatch audit of the Marion County school system found that students were getting better grades in school than their work on standardized tests showed they should.

The audit shows that Marion County students are scoring significantly lower than the mean for both communications and mathematics on national tests. But the senior class grade point average in Marion County for the 1997-98 school year was 2.7762, while the grade point average for the top 20 percent of similar school districts was 2.2 and the mean grade point average was 2.4.

The prospect that grades are inflated sparked the most comment at Monday's unveiling of the SchoolMatch Audit of Educational Effectiveness at the Ocala/Marion County Chamber of Commerce Business/ Education Forum. The audit was commissioned by the Marion 2020 Task Force, an offshoot of the chamber's business/education alliance.

Cox Communications General Manager Gary Cassard said the grade inflation news surprised him.

"I haven't given grade inflation a thought," Cassard said. "That sort of surprised me, when I saw that there is a problem I thought wait a minute, we have high ACT scores, high SAT scores and we should have a high grade point average -- but it makes sense."

While Marion County seniors boast high scores in both the American College Test and Scholastic Assessment Test, relatively few students take them.

Another indication that student grades are inflated is that less than half of the students who take advanced placement courses score a 3, 4, or 5 -- the score required to get college credit.

School Board Member Jim Kelly said he worried about grade inflation last year when he found out that 53 percent of the students who took calculus failed to get a passing score on the advanced placement test.

"I asked how did the kids do for their final grade ... the answer was most of them got A's," Kelly said.

Roderick McDavis, dean of the College of Education at the University of Florida, and one of the SchoolMatch auditors, explained that the problem can snowball from elementary school.

"The real issue around grade inflation is the impact that giving grades to students in elementary school who are perhaps not at the high achievement end," McDavis said. "When you give an 'A' to a child who perhaps deserved a 'C' or a 'B,' that child begins to think that he or she is at a very high level. The child feels good, the parents feel good. Everybody feels good.

"Then when the child hits middle school and the work becomes a little more rigorous, they're not as well prepared," McDavis continued. "That could be a shocking experience for that student and the family ... then the problem becomes even worse by the time they get to high school."

McDavis said standards should be set high from the beginning. And when that child doesn't get as high a grade as the parent may think, it should pay off with better preparation and would be welcomed by colleges.

"If our school districts will set those high standards and if students bring to us lower GPAs but they're better prepared so we offer fewer remedial courses, I'll take that trade any day of the week," McDavis said.

McDavis urged the school system to consider toughening up grade point averages.

"I think Marion County has an opportunity to do something here that many districts have been afraid to do, and that is to tell the truth about student achievement," McDavis said.

Nancy Stacy, also a member of the Marion 2020 Task Force, said teachers often hesitated to grade accurately because then students wouldn't pass on to the next grade level.

"That puts teachers in a track where they're looked upon negatively if they tell the truth about child achievement?" Stacy said. "How do some of the other districts handle this? Wouldn't there be less social promotion?"

William Bainbridge, president and CEO of SchoolMatch said the city of Chicago started enforcing stricter grading standards with positive results.

"The kids and the parents are starting to take schooling very seriously .. if they can do that there, they can do that in Marion County," Bainbridge said.

McDavis said the cure for grade inflation comes in more intensive instruction -- at early ages and especially in the pre-kindergarten stages.

"I think we can extend the school day and I think we can have Saturday school and I think we can use the summers to get that child caught up," McDavis said. "If a child can't read in the third grade, and we pass that child on to the fourth grade and the fifth grade there's no sense in thinking all of a sudden they're going to do magic and start reading in middle school or in high school."