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Grading in crisis: examining the impact of COVID-19 on secondary public school teachers’ grading and reporting in south Florida

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Grading in crisis: examining the impact of COVID-19 on secondary public school teachers’ grading and reporting in south Florida

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Content GRADING IN CRISIS:
EXAMINING THE IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON SECONDARY PUBLIC SCHOOL
TEACHERS’ GRADING AND REPORTING
IN SOUTH FLORIDA
by
Jennifer Louise Berne
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC ROSSIER SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF EDUCATION
December 2023

© Copyright by Jennifer Louise Berne 2023
All Rights Reserved

The Committee for Jennifer Louise Berne certifies the approval of this Dissertation
Jane Rosenthal Dieken
Kathy Stowe
Courtney Malloy, Committee Chair
Rossier School of Education
University of Southern California 2023

iv
Abstract
This study assessed the impact of COVID-19 on secondary teachers’ assessment, grading, and
reporting practices in south Florida. The study included a review of the literature on the history
of traditional versus criterion-based grading and reporting; accountability and equity in grading
prior to COVID-19; challenges in implementing alternative grading prior to COVID-19;
challenges in inaccurate grade alignment to standardized testing; grading alignment to
standardized testing; ideal components of assessment, grading, and reporting practices; and
priority learners and grading with equity. Using the Bronfenbrenner Bioecological Model of
Development as its theoretical basis, the study evaluated teachers’ perceptions of environmental
influences on purpose, accuracy, and equity in grading and reporting practices, as a result of
COVID-19. This study employed an interview protocol to address the research questions. The
study found that grading policy mandates implemented by the state and districts impacted the
interviewed teachers’ accuracy and equity in grading. As a further result of the grading policy
changes, student extrinsic motivation dropped resulting in lower grades due to significantly
higher amounts of academic dishonesty, late work, incomplete work, and absenteeism, severely
and inequitably impacting lower socio-economic level priority learners. This shift in motivation
in students created in interviewed teachers a shift in the perceived purpose and practice of
grading in order to shift students towards more intrinsic motivation, accurate pictures of learning,
equitable access to content, social-emotionally aware connections to learning, and scaffolding of
executive functioning skills to motivate students to submit quality work.
Keywords: assessment, formative assessment, summative assessment, standards, grading,
traditional grading, standards-based grading, reporting, traditional reporting, and standards-based
reporting

Dedication
To my friends and family who offered phone calls of support, cheering texts with fireworks
emojis, and words of encouragement, thank you for always believing in me. To my mother, my
eternal inspiration, for always setting the path of excellence for me and for showing me what’s
possible for a strong woman in this world; you taught me to walk tall, get back up again, and
love with my heart wide open – I love you. To my best friend, Jackie, who has cheered me on
every step of the way and who has toiled in the educational vineyards for thirty years as a fellow
teacher and administrator: you never cease to amaze me, you have changed so many lives for the
better, including mine, and I would not be who I am without our almost forty years of friendship.
To my children: you fill my heart to bursting, and I thank you for your unwavering support for
all my crazy academic endeavors – I am so very proud of each one of you, and you bring me joy
every day. I love you all so very much. Finally, to my dear husband, who devotes himself to
public service and literally saves lives every day, only you will know how challenging this
process truly was and how you bolstered me and believed in me, even in my lowest moments.
Every day I love you more – thank you, my love.

Acknowledgements
I would like to express my deepest gratitude for my USC Dissertation Committee Chair,
Dr. Courtney Malloy, professor extraordinaire, for her guidance, patience, and honesty
throughout my writing and revision process. I would also like to extend my appreciation to my
Committee Members, Dr. Jane Rosenthal Dieken and Dr. Kathy Stowe, who contributed
valuable insights and suggestions which improved the quality of my research study
tremendously.

vii
Table of Contents
Abstract ......................................................................................................................................... iv
Dedication (Optional) .................................................................................................................... v
Acknowledgments .........................................................................................................................vi
List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ ix
List of Figures ................................................................................................................................ x
Chapter One: Introduction to the Study ..........................................................................................1
Context and Background of the Problem ............................................................................2
Purpose of the Project and Research Questions ..................................................................5
Importance of the Study ......................................................................................................6
Overview of Theoretical Framework and Methodology ....................................................8
Definitions ...........................................................................................................................9
Organization of the Dissertation .......................................................................................12
Chapter Two: Literature Review ..................................................................................................14
History of Traditional Grading Prior to COVID-19 .........................................................14
Accountability and Equity in Grading Prior to COVID-19 ..............................................14
Challenges in Implementing Alternative Grading Prior to COVID-19 ............................18
Challenges in Inaccurate Grade Alignment to Standardized Testing ................................22
Ideal Components of Assessment, Grading, and Reporting Practices ..............................23
Priority learners and Grading with Equity ........................................................................38
Conceptual Framework .....................................................................................................50
Summary ...........................................................................................................................54
Chapter Three: Methodology ........................................................................................................56
Research Questions ...........................................................................................................56
Overview of Design ..........................................................................................................56

viii
Research Setting ................................................................................................................57
The Researcher ..................................................................................................................58
Data Source: Interviews ....................................................................................................59
Validity and Reliability .....................................................................................................63
Ethics .................................................................................................................................64
Chapter Four: Findings .................................................................................................................66
Participants ........................................................................................................................66
RQ1: Environmental Factors Influencing Teachers’ Perceptions of
Grading During COVID-19 ..............................................................................................68
RQ2: Teachers’ Perceptions Regarding the Purpose of Grading During COVID-19 ......79
RQ3: Teachers’ Perceptions Regarding the Accuracy of Grading During COVID-19.....94
RQ4: Teachers’ Perceptions Regarding Equity of Grading During COVID-19.............106
Summary .........................................................................................................................118
Chapter Five: Recommendations ................................................................................................121
Discussion of Findings ....................................................................................................121
Recommendations for Practice .......................................................................................124
Limitations and Delimitations ........................................................................................131
Implications for Future Research ...................................................................................132
Conclusion .....................................................................................................................133
References ..................................................................................................................................135
Appendix A ................................................................................................................................149

ix
List of Tables
Table 1: Summary Grades Tallied by Three Different Methods 16
Table 2: Table of Interview Participants 67

x
List of Figures
Figure 1: Superordinate and subordinate categories of motivation and self-regulation
as defined by self-determination theory (SDT) 30
Figure 2: Examples of self-regulation of students completing a math problem assigned
for homework. 32
Figure 3: Proposed Bioecological Model Framing Grading Influences on Secondary
Teachers in South Florida 51

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CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY
COVID-19 has affected every individual around the world since its identification in late
2019. In addition to its multifarious impacts, COVID-19 created significant repercussions on the
educational system at all grade levels and on numerous fronts, exposing the weaknesses and
inequities in our educational system (Dibner et al., 2020; Sahlberg, 2020). Since early 2020,
school districts grappled with changes to grading policy in light of school closures and a surge in
online, virtual learning (Goldstein, 2020). The Florida Department of Education (FDOE)
canceled remaining assessments, including the state standardized tests, the Florida State
Assessment (FSA), on March 17, 2020, and ordered that K-12 grades would not be calculated
(Florida Department of Education, 2020). However, as the pandemic continued, specific Florida
districts, such as the Miami-Dade County Public School (M-DCPS) District, directed teachers to
issue letter grades (A-F) that corresponded to 0-100 point scale grades with the option to issue
Incompletes or override D or F grades to a C or higher, depending on student situation (MiamiDade County Public Schools, 2020).
Across the country, the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) announced that
students would be “held harmless” and would not receive a grade lower than they had on March
13, 2020; further, all assessments were suspended (Castro et al., 2020). DC Public Schools,
Chicago Public Schools, and Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia ultimately awarded letter
grades based on third quarter grades, using those grades as a baseline from which only further
scores on assessments that would positively impact the grades would be counted (Castro et al.,
2020; St. George, 2020). Some school districts in states like Wisconsin, Delaware, and New
Mexico recommended Pass/Fail grading, but many states like Ohio offered individual districts
the option to use traditional grading, Pass/Fail, or standards-based grading (Delaware

2
Department of Education, 2020; Ohio Department of Education, 2020; The State of New
Mexico, 2020; Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, 2020).
As the pandemic continued, students experienced what became termed the “COVID
slide,” with failing grades more than doubling in Broward County, dropping by as much as 23
percentage points in some categories (Travis, 2021; Broward County Public Schools, 2021). Due
to vague, changing, and sometimes conflicting guidance on grading and assessment policy from
states and local districts, grading methods and possibilities have abounded, as teachers and
districts struggled to decide the most accurate and equitable form of assessment for students.
This study focused on learning more about the impact of COVID-19 on assessment, grading, and
reporting practices of teachers in secondary public schools in south Florida.
Context and Background of the Problem
The COVID-19 pandemic forced states and districts to make well-intended policy
decisions on grading and reporting that forced teachers to pass students who were failing or who
were not attending class; these policies, along with pandemic effects of student absenteeism,
poor participation, and academic dishonesty, led to inaccurate and inequitable grading and
reporting practices with which teachers were not comfortable. Prior to COVID-19, educational
researchers, governmental agencies, and educators questioned the purpose of grading, the
alignment between educators’ grading methods and the accuracy and equity of their assessments,
and their ability to motivate students to learn through grading (Black, 2017; Brookhart et al,
2016; Feldman, 2019; Guskey, 2002, 2006, 2009, 2013, 2015; Guskey & Brookhart, 2019).
Once the COVID-19 pandemic emerged, educators found themselves in a perfect storm of
confusing district and state grading policies combined with low student participation and/or
attendance, low student engagement and motivation, and rampant academic dishonesty (Darling-

3
Hammond et al., 2020; Feldman, 2019; Ryan & Moller, 2017; Toro, 2021). Teachers who
thought they understood the purpose and application of grading were forced to adapt and
question their practices during COVID-19 in order to motivate students to learn, reduce cheating,
and increase engagement, accuracy, and equity.
Historically speaking, grading has been traditionally completed using a 100-point
standardized scale that developed in practice over the last hundred years; however, traditional
grading has also been plagued by a lack of uniformity, accuracy, or ability to predict success
(Guskey, 2013). Munoz & Guskey (2015) asserted that, at a minimum, grading should be
consistent and factual, but ideally grading should be an essential piece of communication in
which grades are “meaningful, accurate, and fair” (p. 64). In response to national accountability
initiatives like No Child Left Behind (NCLB), the Common Core Standards, and the Every
Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), schools began to explore a gradual shift away from traditional
grading towards standards-based grading (SBG) and standards-based reporting (SBR), although
educators questioned the uniformity and accountability of those standards (Black, 2017;
Brookhart & Nitko, 2019; DeLuca & Bellara, 2013; Darling-Hammond et al., 2014).
Prior to COVID-19, educational research demonstrated that traditional norm-referenced
grading led to a lack of clear grading criteria, inconsistency in factors that influence grading,
confusing scoring of grading, and little meaning or feedback on grading for students and parents
(Brookhart et al, 2016; Guskey, 2002, 2006, 2009, 2013, 2015; Guskey & Brookhart, 2019;
Hooper & Cowell, 2014). Traditional grading was especially problematic in equitably

4
addressing the needs of students whom Hill et al. (2017) called “priority learners”1: minoritized2
students, lower socio-economic level students, underserved students, English language learners
(ELL), special needs or exceptional student education (ESE) students, and marginalized students
(Guskey & Jung, 2009; Jung, 2009; Jung & Guskey, 2007; Mattern et al., 2011; Marbouti et al.,
2016; Sampson, 2009).
In contrast, a growing body of research demonstrated that alternative forms of grading
and reporting like standards-based grading (SBG) and standards-based reporting (SBR) along
with rich feedback offered equitable, consistent, and meaningful demonstrations of content
mastery and learning progress to both students and parents (Brookhart et al, 2016; Guskey, 2002,
2006, 2009, 2013, 2015; Guskey & Brookhart, 2019; Proulx et al, 2012; Westerberg, 2016).
Additionally, SBG and SBR afforded flexibility in “just-in-time” feedback and reporting for
minoritized, ELL, ESE, and marginalized students (Guskey & Jung, 2009; Jung, 2009; Jung &
Guskey, 2007; Marbouti et al., 2016; Sampson, 2009).
Further complicating the best methods of grading was an inherent debate among
educational stakeholders on the actual purpose, terminology, and application of grading and
reporting (Guskey, 2020a). As schools aimed to rectify the failures of traditional grading,
especially for exceptional or struggling learners, criterion-based grading implementation proved
1 Hill et al. (2017) examined the efforts of the New Zealand Ministry of Education to increase the preservice teacher
education programs with the goal of equitable and successful outcomes for students they termed “priority learners,”
or learners who traditionally experienced less successful outcomes. These “priority learners” included students from
low socio-economic backgrounds, marginalized indigenous students from Māori or Pacific Islander ethnic heritage,
or students with special needs. Hill et al. argued that using terminology like “priority learners” reduced deficit
mindset and placed emphasis on giving increased priority to traditionally marginalized students.
2 Harper (2012) argued that educational researchers should employ the term “minoritized” in lieu of “minority” to
acknowledge the role that systemic racism plays in creation of racial marginalization in the educational system: “I
use “minoritized” instead of “minority” throughout this article to signify the social construction of
underrepresentation and subordination in U.S. social institutions, including colleges and universities. Persons are not
born into a minority status nor are they minoritized in every social context (e.g., their families, racially
homogeneous friendship groups, or places of worship). Instead, they are rendered minorities in particular situations
and institutional environments that sustain an overrepresentation of Whiteness” (p. 9).

5
inconsistent (Welsh & D’Agostino, 2009). Administrators faced resistance from teachers,
students, and parents in sustaining actual change in grading and reporting (Guskey, 2020).
Despite these difficulties in implementation, Townsley, Buckmiller, and Miller (2019) and
Knight and Cooper (2019) anticipated a second wave of SBG implementation with better
understanding of the benefits of standards-based grading and reporting. Darling-Hammond et al.
(2013) suggested that ideal grading should encourage “deeper learning, or students’ ability to
analyze, synthesize, compare, connect, critique, hypothesize, prove, and explain their ideas” (p.
i). Regardless of the grading system, however, COVID-19 has created unanticipated and
constantly shifting challenges for teachers and districts. Educators continue to grapple with the
most appropriate system of assessment, grading, and reporting, and COVID-19 has only served
to complicate those decisions further.
Purpose of the Project and Research Questions
The purpose of this study was to analyze teacher perceptions of the environmental
influences and potential changes surrounding grading and reporting practices in grades 6-12
public schools in south Florida as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This study intended to
place the Secondary teacher at the center of Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model to analyze
what Gardiner (2018) called the “dynamic and evolving...interactions between individual and
environment [which] are viewed as two-directional and characterized by reciprocity” (p. 22).
The study attempted to qualify the impacts on grading and reporting resulting from influences at
the microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, and macrosystem levels. This study also addressed the
impact of time and sociological conditions or the chronosystem, and its effect on teachers’
grading practices before and during COVID-19. The following research questions guided this
study:

6
1. What are teachers’ perceptions of the environmental factors influencing grading and
reporting during Covid-19?
2. What are teachers’ perceptions regarding the purpose of grading and reporting during
Covid-19?
3. What are teachers’ perceptions regarding the accuracy of grading and reporting during
Covid-19?
4. What are teachers’ perceptions regarding equitable grading and reporting practices during
Covid-19?
Importance of the Study
The importance of this study is situated in identifying the potential long-term effects of
COVID-19 on the educational system and its stakeholders: teachers, students, and
administrators. The pandemic created a worst-case scenario for the American educational
system, and the focus of this study was to analyze how teachers reacted in their grading practices
as a result of how those stakeholders performed under stress at each level.
Prior to COVID-19, the lack of clarity, accuracy, and consistency inherent in traditional
grading and reporting led to a lack of communication and understanding about the purpose of
grades for teachers and students of all abilities (Guskey, 2015; Jung & Guskey, 2012). During
COVID-19, this gap was disproportionately challenging for exceptional and struggling learners,
leaving priority learners farther behind. Educators and researchers expressed fear that COVID19 exposed and exacerbated already serious underlying challenges to accuracy and equity within
the U.S. educational system connected with assessment, grading, and reporting (DarlingHammond et al., 2020; Guskey, 2020b; Sahlberg, 2020). Darling-Hammond et al. (2020) called
for a fundamental and cultural shift in educational approach to assessment to serve all students

7
post-COVID-19: “This shift from a measurement culture to a learning culture is imperative now,
so that we can support diverse learners well: It paves the way for assessment systems that are
designed to transform learning and close opportunity and achievement gaps” (p. 22). This study
identified how shifts in grading practices could move students forward from what DarlingHammond et al. (2020) termed “measurement culture” towards “learning culture.” Further
clarification in the purpose and application of grading could help teachers clarify learning targets
and help students move towards intrinsic motivation in meeting learning targets.
This study could additionally help educators and administrators address equity in grading
and reporting specifically for priority learners post-COVID-19. Traditional reporting posed a
distinct and inequitable challenge for marginalized, ELL, and special education students, since it
failed to measure gaps in learning or account for differentiation and policies of inclusivity
(Marbouti, Diefes-Dux, & Madhavan, 2015; Jung & Guskey, 2007; Sampson, 2009). Both
Marbouti et al. (2015) and Jung & Guskey (2007) argued for the inclusion of standards-based
grading and reporting into the classroom setting at all educational levels (primary, secondary,
and higher education) to provide more clarity, accuracy, and equity in communication about
learning and mastery outcomes, especially for ESE, ELL, and marginalized students. Feldman
(2019) proposed a new system of grading that shifted away from an “omnibus grade” (one letter
or number to represent mastery) toward grading representations that were accurate, biasresistant, and motivational, pillars that would particularly benefit priority learners who were
consistently left behind by traditional norm-referenced grading. Feldman’s suggested methods
of grading for equity encompassed transparent and understandable goals and skills that students
could understand; grades based on valid evidence of students’ mastery of content or
demonstration of skills; grading that was mathematically sound; grading that motivated students

8
intrinsically with opportunities for practice and redemption; and grading that connected soft
skills like practice, learning from mistakes, reflection, and self-regulation to the final academic
outcomes, of which grading was only one method of communicating student successes and
challenges (2019). This study echoed Feldman’s suggestion of a post-COVID-19 shift towards
equitable educational grading and reporting policies and practices that could potentially level the
educational playing field for priority learners by including those learners in the process of their
own learning and assessment. The study’s significance also investigated the concept that
COVID-19 pushed priority learners significantly farther behind in equity, despite teachers’
adaptive grading and reporting practices during COVID-19, creating further systemic inequities
that could be addressed through more intensive and inventive interventions.
Overview of Theoretical Framework and Methodology
This dissertation positioned the secondary teacher as the focal point of Bronfenbrenner’s
Bioecological Model of Development in an effort to assess the influences on grading and
reporting both pre-COVID-19 and during COVID-19. Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model of
Development is ideal in framing how Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological transitions, or shifts in
the setting or environment, impact the different systems and settings that influence individual
teachers. Certainly, COVID-19 would qualify as an ecological transition but so would every
sphere of influence in the individual teacher’s life. Specifically, Bronfenbrenner’s model could
help researchers examine teachers’ perceptions of the role and application of assessment based
on their environmental influences over time (Gardiner, 2018). Bronfenbrenner saw individuals
as active participants in their development, continually adapting to a changing environment that
included both microcosmic and macrocosmic systems of personal, community, and societal

9
culture (Shelton, 2019), and the challenges of COVID-19 have required constant adaptation at all
societal levels, making Bronfenbrenner an ideal framework.
This study used qualitative analysis. Interviews of teachers in grades 6-12 education in
south Florida were conducted to learn more about the impact of COVID-19 on grading and
reporting practices and the environmental factors that influenced assessment.
Definitions
The main definitions pertinent to this study of assessment, grading, and reporting during
COVID-19 are provided below. The main terms used in this study include assessment, formative
assessment, summative assessment, standards, grading, traditional grading, standards-based
grading, reporting, traditional reporting, and standards-based reporting.
Assessment
Assessment is defined broadly as “a process for gathering and interpreting information for
use in making decisions about students, instruction, curriculums, programs, and educational
policies” (Guskey & Jung, 2013, p.16). On a large scale, the information that assessment
provides can be used to drive decisions about policy, curricula, and school programs. On a small
scale, the information that assessment provides can be used to drive decisions that drive student
instruction, student placement, student counseling and guidance, student classification, and
student certification or promotion. Assessments can also be used to glean information to help
monitor student progress, diagnose student learning difficulties, provide feedback to students,
assign grades and report student outcomes (Brookhart & Nitko, 2019). Assessment can be
viewed through the lens of formative assessments or summative assessments.
Formative Assessments

10
Formative assessment is assessment of foundational work evaluated one or more times
during the development of the unit of understanding (Guskey & Jung, 2013). Formative
assessment evaluates ongoing learning and ideally provides feedback to the student prior to a
summative assessment.
Summative Assessments
Summative assessments are summary demonstrations of the mastery of skills, content, or
learning graded at the end of the unit of understanding (Guskey & Jung, 2013). Summative
assessments are typically based upon the understandings gained through the formative work.
Summative assessments are typically graded against a scale or rubric that delineates the degree
of mastery of a set of standards.
Standards
Standards are categories of skills that the student should be able to demonstrate (Guskey
& Jung, 2013). Educators distinguish between content standards or “the subject-matter facts,
concepts, principles, and so on that students are expected to learn” and performance standards or
“the things students can perform or do once the content standards are learned” (Brookhart &
Nitko, 2019, p.15). Examples of standards might include state educational standards, nationally
based Common Core Standards, Advanced Placement (AP) Standards, or International
Baccalaureate (IB) Standards. Educators can use standards as a basis of measurement in the
process of grading and reporting on student learning (Brookhart & Nitko, 2019).
Grading
Brookhart et al. (2016) defined grading as, “the symbols assigned to individual pieces of
student work or to composite measures of student performance on student report cards” (p. 804).
Grading can be performed in multiple modes, but the two most common methods are traditional

11
grading, or norm-referenced grading, and standards-based grading (SBG) or criterionreferenced grading.
Traditional Grading
Traditional grading is the use of norm-referenced symbols assigned to the evaluation of
work measured on a grading scale typically in a 100-point scale or letter grades of A to F with
variations of pluses and minuses (Guskey, 2015). Traditional grading can be applied to
formative and summative assessments to measure student learning and outcomes.
Standards-based Grading
Standards-based grading (SBG) is the use of criterion-referenced symbols assigned to
the evaluation of work measured against governmental or organizational educational standards
and benchmarks. Standards-based grades are assigned through formative and summative
assessment which attempt to communicate a richer picture of student learning and challenges
over time (Guskey, 2015).
Reporting
Guskey (2020a) defined reporting as “interim summaries of students’ performance at
specific intervals during the school year” (p. 94). Reporting typically summarizes or computes
grading over specifically designated grading or marking periods, usually at the end of a term of
learning. Cumulative reporting of student grades is presented as a student transcript. Reporting
can be used to provide communication on the degree of content mastery, class ranking, grade
level promotion or remediation, course level placement, eligibility for special programs, patterns
or strength or weakness by discipline, or identifying areas of improvement for instruction,
teacher, or course (Brookhart & Nitko, 2019). Two main types of reporting are traditional
reporting and standards-based reporting (SBR).

12
Traditional Reporting
Traditional reporting presents a report of end of term grading on a norm-referenced
scale, which typically corresponds to a 0-100 or A-F scale which can include pluses or minuses.
Advantages of traditional reporting include perceived ease of use for administrators and teachers,
accuracy based on numerical calculation of grades, and concise format of overall performance
(Brookhart & Nitko, 2019).
Standards-based Reporting
Standards-based reporting (SBR) presents a report of end of term grading on a criterionreferenced scale, which typically corresponds to the SBG scale ratings (0-5/Below Expectations,
Approaching Expectations, Meets Expectations, Exceeds Expectations) (Guskey & Jung, 2013).
A standards-based report card might include overall evaluation of cognitive factors like academic
achievement and non-cognitive factors like participation, effort, punctuality, and homework
completion, which would all be aligned to standards. It might also include multiple grades per
discipline based on those cognitive and non-cognitive factors (Guskey, 2020a).
Organization of the Dissertation
This dissertation is organized in a classic five-chapter format. Chapter One will
introduce an overview of the problem of practice: the challenges for teachers of grading and
reporting in grades 6-12 schools in south Florida prior to and during COVID-19. It will also
introduce the significance of the study and state the research questions. Finally, it will frame the
research study through the Bronfenbrenner Ecological Model of Human Development. Chapter
Two will review the pertinent literature related to grading and assessment. Chapter Three will
focus on the methodology including the research design, research setting, participants, data
sources, validity and reliability statement, positionality statement, and ethical considerations.

13
Chapter Four will offer the findings, and Chapter Five will provide discussion and
recommendations for practice and further study.

14
CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW
Introduction
The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of COVID-19 on secondary teachers’
grading and reporting and to learn more about the environmental factors affecting assessment,
grading, and reporting. This chapter provides an overview of the relevant literature and includes
a brief history of the use and purpose of norm-referenced grading and reporting, criterion-based
grading and reporting; accountability and equity in grading prior to COVID-19; challenges in
implementing alternative grading prior to COVID-19; challenges in inaccurate grade alignment
to standardized testing; grading alignment to standardized testing; ideal components of
assessment, grading, and reporting practices; and priority learners and grading with equity. The
conceptual framework for this study is offered at the end of the chapter.
History of Traditional Grading Prior to COVID-19
Grading and reporting practices in the U.S. public school system have varied little over
its path in terms of style and accuracy from when their origins were established over 150 years
ago. In their watershed study of 100 years of grading practices, Brookhart et al. (2016) found
that from the earliest inception of scoring in the U.S., teacher assigned grades were wholly
unreliable. Indeed, Guskey & Bailey (2019) confirmed that early studies attributed grading
inconsistency to: evaluation criteria, quality of student work, teachers’ attitudes towards grades
as punitive measures, differences in task understanding, grading scale, and teacher error.
In the 1800s, the number of schools in the U.S. was roughly 500, fitting the “one-room
schoolhouse” model, and student attendance was low; correspondingly, grading or reporting was
mainly in verbal, narrative form with teachers communicating their assessment of student
performance directly to parents (Guskey & Bailey, 2001; Guskey, 2013). When the government

15
mandated compulsory school attendance in the late 1800s to early 1900s, school construction and
student attendance skyrocketed. Teachers needed a more efficient way to grade.
As the demands on their time grew, teachers began to use percentage grading and
reporting, and researchers raised the first concerns about accountability and accuracy (Guskey,
2013). Guskey and Brookhart’s (2019) thorough review of early studies on the reliability of
grading in the U.S. found wide ranging evidence of historical inconsistencies and inaccuracy in
grading practices. In one of the first such studies, Starch and Elliot questioned the use of
percentage grades as early as 1912 and found arbitrary grading and assessment within the same
discipline amongst different teachers. The researchers noted little consistency or even accuracy
among different teachers using percentages, even with grade norming (Brimi, 2011). Starch and
Elliot’s back-to-back studies from 1912 to 1915 evaluating English, math, and history teachers
and their findings of inconsistent grading practices across the board ultimately led U.S. teachers
to adopt the traditional A-F scale, which reduced inconsistencies and remained the standard until
around the 1990s.
With the advent of grading software and online grade books within a Learning
Management Systems (LMS) and the corresponding promise of numerical accuracy and ease,
teachers’ use of percentage grades increased exponentially (Guskey, 2002). In an effort to assess
any progress towards the accuracy of grading, Brimi (2011) replicated the Starch and Elliot study
one hundred years later and found similar results: amongst teachers who had already received
professional development in writing assessment, there was still tremendous variability in grading
in teachers who graded the same paper, with scores ranging from 50 to 96 out of 100. Guskey
(2013) addressed the flaws within percentage-based grading, focusing on errors in logistics,
accuracy, percentage grade vs. percentage correct, and impact of the zero. In one of his earliest

16
studies of the impact of averaging grades, Guskey (2002) provided an illustrative example of
how averaging grades resulted in a meaningless narrative for students.
Table 1.
Summary Grades Tallied by Three Different Methods
Source: From “Computerized Gradebooks and the Myth of Objectivity,” by T. Guskey, 2002,
Phi Delta Kappan, 83(10), 775–780.
produced the same total mean score, but the story of each student’s learning varied wildly.
Guskey (2013, 2015) proposed a 1-4 system that would eliminate the 59 points out of 100
devoted to a failing score and simplify grading based on standards attached to skills. Any
number could theoretically be distorted unfairly, however, so Guskey also asserted that, even
with a change in scoring, there would still be no substitute for professional judgment in
attempting to consistently and precisely assess learning (2013). Ultimately, many researchers
argued for grades that are meaningful, fair, and accurate (Guskey, 2002, 2006, 2009, 2013, 2015;
Miller, 2013; O’Connor, 2018; Westerberg, 2016).
Accountability and Equity in Grading Prior to COVID-19

17
As grading practices shifted in the U.S., researchers were quick to point out the failings
of traditional or norm-referenced grading, especially with priority learners, such as low-income,
marginalized, minoritized, ELL, or special needs students (Black, 2017; Feldman, 2019; Jung,
2009; Jung & Guskey, 2007, 2009). As early as 1916, John Dewey cautioned educators against
what he called a society “concerned with averages” (1922/2008, p. 297) and espoused an
educational system that would “in fact and not simply in name discount the effects of economic
inequalities, and secure to all the wards of the nation equality of equipment for their future
careers” (1916/2018, p. 104). Accountability and accuracy initiatives in U.S. grading resulted in
several governmental attempts to ensure uniformity in grading practices. On a national level, the
first major piece of legislation aimed at education equity was President Johnson’s Elementary
and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) of 1965, which promised to address inequalities based on
income and access, as well as to ensure that students could meet educational state standards
(Brookhart & Nitko, 2019). ESEA equated uniformity with desirability in grading, and many
schools adopted A-F grading scales that tied to the traditional 0-100 scale scoring (Guskey,
2002).
The 1980s saw a push for further accountability through the amendment of No Child Left
Behind (NCLB) in 2001, which created specific standards that students and schools needed to
meet in order to close achievement gaps. Although well-intentioned, NCLB also specifically
tied high-stakes testing results or school “grades” to performance-based funding for those
schools. Grading and assessment of students and schools became highly sanctions-based and
score-focused. Schools that received failing “grades” based on the grades of their students had
their federal funding pulled, and students at failing schools could be reassigned to charter schools

18
(Black, 2017; Brookhart & Nitko, 2019). Black (2017) asserted that NCLB’s impact specifically
left minoritized students further behind than before the act.
With amendments like Race to the Top (RTTT) in 2009 and Every Student Succeeds Act
(ESSA) in 2015, legislators strove to ameliorate the punitive connection between grading,
accountability, and funding. ESSA changed the requirement for failing schools to achieve 100%
proficiency (a component widely panned as unachievable and unreasonable) and instead allowed
schools to meet state goals with progress plans to meet turnaround goals. ESSA also kept the
key concept of disaggregation of grades, which meant that test results were reported by
subgroups of student populations, key to accountability for gains or losses in particular student
groups (Brookhart & Nitko, 2019). Critics pointed to flaws in both NCLB and ESSA for ELL
students and students with special needs: under both acts, only 1% of students with special needs
or ELL students could be given alternative tests, even though roughly 13% of students received
services for special needs or ELL (Brookhart & Nitko, 2019). Critics also questioned ESSA as
an act that, while intended to increase equity, created a disparate system of fifty states with
varying measures of school success and accountability (Black, 2017).
In their quintessential textbook for pre-service teacher education, Brookhart & Nitko
(2019) pointed to serious flaws in traditional grading processes: meaningless grades,
educationally unimportant grades, unnecessary grades, and harmful grades. Brookhart et al.
(2016) concluded that teachers ultimately assessed both cognitive and non-cognitive factors in
grading, which recalled the original norm-referenced versus criterion-referenced question of how
grades should function. These inconsistencies in traditional grading led educators to push for
alternative forms of assessment.
Challenges in Implementing Alternative Grading Prior to COVID-19

19
As a result of NCLB and ESSA and the need for standards-based accountability, most
states moved to and currently employ state standards based on Common Core State Standards
(CCSS) and/or American Education Reaches Out (AERO) Standards as a means of ensuring
some standard measure of skills are taught on equal levels (Brookhart & Nitko, 2019), but issues
abounded with the very terminology of “grading with standards.” Guskey & Jung (2013)
reflected on the importance of terminology and how the educational community regularly uses
terms like grading, marking, scoring, assessing, and reporting interchangeably but with varying
meanings in practice. Further complicating the issue of grading with standards is terminology
related to what students were meant to learn and demonstrate, which could include terms like
standards, skills, content, benchmarks, performance indicators, targets, expectations, outcomes,
competencies, proficiencies, learning results, and learning goals, all of which sound
synonymous but can vary in meaning (Brookhart & Nitko, 2019; Guskey & Jung, 2013;
O’Connor, 2019; Sadler, 2005). Educators needed to come to consensus on the language of
grading and reporting.
Brookhart & Nitko (2019) attempted to distinguish between content standards -- the
knowledge or skills students are expected to learn -- and performance standards -- what students
can do to demonstrate their mastery of the content they were supposed to learn. CCSS and state
standards were intended to drive educational goals at the school level. Accordingly, Brookhart
& Nitko (2019) differentiated between overarching educational goals, what Blythe (1998) and
the Harvard Teaching for Understanding framework called throughlines, and specific learning
objectives that broke down those overarching educational goals into individual units of
instruction or what students should achieve at the end of a unit of instruction. Both
Brookhart & Nitko (2019) and O’Connor (2019) devised similar clarifying framework

20
diagrams to simplify for educators the standards-based structure of education: educational
goals→standards→content and performance standards→course curriculum→specific learning
objectives→formative and summative assessments→grades→reports. These frameworks
seemed to clarify the role of standards in grading; however, many educators who claimed to
practice SBG and SBR, and did align curriculum with state standards, ultimately reverted to
traditional 0-100/A-F grading and reporting that didn’t necessarily correspond with the
standards that drove the curriculum (Westerberg, 2016). Educators recognized the need to
clarify and align the purpose of curricular design, grading, and reporting with standards.
Clarifying the Purpose and Components of Grading and Reporting
In attempting to clarify the purpose and practice of accurate grading, Muñoz and Guskey
(2015) argued for the use of standards-based grading and reporting to ensure the criteria for
validity and reliability. In defense of SBG and SBR, Guskey (2020a) charged educators to
initially come to a consensus as to the purpose of grading and reporting. Guskey (2006)
employed Brookhart’s (1991) term hodgepodge grading to describe the diverse and inconsistent
components that teachers used in varying combinations to craft students’ grades: exams, tests,
quizzes, projects, performances, lab work, presentations, classroom observations, homework
(completion/quality/accuracy), class participation, punctuality, effort, attendance, behavior,
progress, and/or work habits. Feldman (2019) further confirmed his experience with teachers’
inconsistent criteria for grading depending on homework, late work penalties, work formatting,
grade weighting that might be different than another teacher who teaches the same class, or
inclusion of non-academic behavioral skills. These variances in what teachers counted as
grading confounded the variables which created further inconsistency and inaccuracy.

21
Muñoz and Guskey (2015) reflected Brookhart and Nitko’s (2008) evaluated how
teachers graded using three different types of criteria based on the purposes of grading: product
criteria, process criteria, and progress criteria. Product criteria were used by educators who
believe that the purpose of grading should be to assess summative evaluations of students’ work.
Teachers who used product criteria viewed final exams, final projects, and other culminations of
learning as the foundation of grades. Process criteria were used by educators who think product
criteria doesn’t go far enough in demonstrating a complete picture of student learning. Process
criteria reflected not just the end product but how the student got to that end product. Process
criteria might have reflected work habits, participation, punctuality, effort, formatives, quizzes,
and other non-summative assessments. Progress criteria were used by educators who assessed
students based on the gains they made over time in the process of learning. Grades might be
based on the number of skills or standards students have mastered over time (Muñoz and
Guskey, 2015), but they might be based on a combination of these criteria. Muñoz and Guskey
(2015) stated that most teachers used some combination of product, process, and progress
grading and then tried to assess student learning. The results were ultimately arbitrary and
impossible to interpret accurately.
When teachers and schools assessed student learning by standards and skills and not by
numbers, they developed a much more accurate picture of learning, and they didn't need to
arbitrarily combine categories to come up with a number. Muñoz and Guskey (2015)
recommended the following for meaningful grading and reporting:
● Teachers must know the strands, domains, or organizing elements and the standards.
● Teachers must base grades on specific criteria derived from the standards (ideally from
state/national standards).

22
● Teachers should distinguish in grading amongst product, process, and progress criteria in
assigning grades.
● Guidelines for reporting should consider feasibility, accuracy, and adaptability for
students with disabilities and second language learners.
● Finally, teachers should use a standards-based report card that reflects the standards and
the skills, so students and parents get a clear and consistent picture of learning at all
stages as the student progresses through the educational system (p. 66-68).
Muñoz and Guskey (2015) also recommended including a section in standards-based grade
reporting for comments from teachers and custom-scoring sections especially for teachers
working with special education and ELL students to assist with accommodations and to help
parents and schools to support those learners. Despite the challenges and confusion over
terminology, researchers, administrators, and educators continued the movement towards clear,
accurate, and equitable standards-aligned grading and reporting.
Challenges in Inaccurate Grade Alignment to Standardized Testing
One long-championed argument for traditional grading was alignment with standardized
testing, necessary for student promotion and college admission. However, Welsh and
D’Agostino (2009) found that traditional percentage grades did not correlate with high stakes
standardized testing results. Interestingly, criterion-grading that was implemented poorly did not
correlate with standardized test scores, either. However, when teachers focused on having
students demonstrate the desired skills, and those skills were thoughtfully aligned to the
standards and materials, correlation with standardized test scores increased (Welsh &
D’Agostino, 2009). This study echoed the lesson of Welsh and D’Agostino’s results and spoke
to the need for deliberate and thoughtful application of skills and standards to assessment,

23
grading, and reporting to increase accuracy and alignment with any sort of standardized
measurement of student success or learning. Significantly, all 50 states canceled state
standardized testing during 2020 due to COVID-19 (Reich et al., 2020), and national
standardized tests like the SAT and ACT were also temporarily canceled during COVID-19, as
were many national and international program tests like AP, IB, and AICE, forcing many
colleges to change their admissions policies to include test-optional policies and nonstandardized testing evidence for admissions (Cai, 2020). In Florida specifically, the FDOE
canceled all end of the year Florida State Assessments (FSAs) for 2020, and for 2020-2021,
students had the option to take the FSAs at home virtually, come in person, or not sit for them at
all (FDOE, 2020, 2021). Post-COVID-19, state, district, and local educators could re-examine
the purpose that standardized testing plays in assessing, grading, and reporting student outcomes
and how aligned those outcomes are to the content taught and mastered.
Ideal Components of Assessment, Grading, and Reporting Practices
A growing body of research demonstrated that good assessment and grading should offer
equitable, consistent, and meaningful demonstrations of reflection, content mastery, and learning
progress to both students and parents (Brookhart et al, 2016; Guskey, 2002, 2006, 2009, 2013,
2015; Guskey & Brookhart, 2019; Proulx et al, 2012; Westerberg, 2016). Link and Guskey
(2022) surveyed over 10,000 students, teachers, parents, school and district administrators, and
support educators from 9 different school districts as to the purpose of grading, and the majority
reported that the purpose of grading should be: “(1) to provide information to students about
their learning progress, and (2) to communicate information to parents about students’
performance in school.” In its simplest form, good assessment should begin with standards or
goals of teaching and learning that represent content and performance: what educators want

24
students to learn and what educators want students to be able to do (Guskey & Jung, 2013).
Typical components of an ideal standards-based educational approach should include the
following components:
● clearly specified learning skills or goals based on standards;
● student-centered and student-driven approach;
● reflective use of aligned formative and summative assessments;
● multiple opportunities for students to demonstrate their learning;
● timely, frequent, clear, and informative feedback;
● education that focuses more on the learning and less on the score;
● progress instead of perfection;
● separate grades for product, process, and progress criteria;
● simplified assessment levels of typically four to seven criteria;
● increased narrative descriptions that specify the focus of instruction and the
degree of mastery for particular grading periods;
● optional inclusion of student portfolios and conferences; and
● replacement of single grade or score report cards with standards-based, multiple
skill report cards (Brookhart et al., 2016; Guskey, 2004, 2006; Guskey & Bailey,
2010; Guskey & Jung, 2013; Miller, 2013; Muñoz & Guskey, 2015; O’Connor &
Wormeli, 2011; Stiggins, 1997; Townsley & Wear, 2020).
Marzano (2006) pointed to the necessity for moving from omnibus grades (single score or grade)
towards standards-based or topic-based schooling, grading and reporting, and he predicted that
this fundamental shift would change the educational landscape in untold, dramatic, and positive
ways.

25
Ideal Assessment and Grading Methods and Neuroplasticity
One of the main goals for ideal assessment and grading has been the shift towards
meaningful engagement of students in their own growth and learning journey. In their
neuroscientific study on rest, reflection, cognition, and the brain, Immordino-Yang et al. (2012)
argued that we need rest and “constructive internal reflection” for making new meaning and
distilling connections that build deeper understanding. Rest and reflection were essential for
long-term retention and deeper understanding, suggesting that, in an educational environment,
quick, one-time assessments might not engage all the learning centers of the brain. Instead,
reflection and review stimulated connections in the brain, leading to brain plasticity and longterm understanding. Assessment and grading that incorporated reflection and review led to
deeper learning connections and stronger long-term retention of information.
Immordino-Yang, Darling-Hammond, and Krone (2019) added to this initial research
with their study on brain development and social-emotional learning (SEL) and what
demonstrated good teaching and assessment at each developmental level to help optimally
develop students’ brains. At the secondary level specifically (the focus of this study), middle
school and high school students’ brains’ neuroplasticity developed in specific ways in reaction to
their social-emotional environment and as a result of physiological changes. From middle school
to high school, hormonal changes set off a period of dramatic brain development where students’
neurons increased and the growth in the amygdala and frontal lobes set off reward-related
structures and planning and decision-making centers, which led to risk-reward behavior and
emotional shifts. High school students’ brains “pruned” unused neural connections in late
adolescence, an operation meant to increase neural efficiency; essentially, if students did not use
neural connections, they lost those neural connections. Broader communications across brain

26
regions also increased during this period, with a focus on higher level cognition, reasoning, logic,
inference, and reflection skills. Immordino-Yang et al. (2019) recommended that ideal
developmental assessment and grading designed for the whole-child at the secondary level would
ideally include social-emotional awareness; be meaningful and culturally relevant; assess handson activities about real-world issues; involve rich, constructive feedback on students’ learning;
and encourage disciplined self- and peer-reflection. This self-reflection would allow secondary
students to develop more disciplined thinking to create self-regulation and student agency. Such
a shift in grading would help middle schoolers develop what Carol Dweck (2006) called the
“growth mindset,” as well as critical thinking and problem-solving skills necessary for optimal
brain development.
Integrating a whole-child, SEL-focused approach into curriculum, assessment, and
grading design would do more than just increase learning outcomes, Immordino-Yang et al.
(2019) argued; it could help direct brain development for priority learners. Secondary students
who persistently experienced physical trauma, food insecurity, insufficient sleep, poor nutrition,
or social trauma due to divorce or abuse in the family sustained an increase in neural circuits that
promoted aggression and anxiety and decreased the neurons associated with cognition,
reasoning, and memory. The hormonal signaling molecules in these same students created brain
toxicity that led to poor physical and mental outcomes, and the epigenetic impact on neural
development at this stage meant that changes to the brain and the resulting behaviors would
impact the students for years to come. From an equity perspective, priority learners from
underprivileged backgrounds were disproportionately exposed to higher levels of stress, toxic to
brain development. For minoritized and marginalized students, the emotional stress of
stereotyping negatively impacted neural cognition and physiology. Immordino-Yang’s et al.’s

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(2019) research ultimately argued for an integrated, biopsychosocial approach to teaching and
assessment, one that recognized that SEL does not occur in just one region of the brain, and that
SEL is not an isolated aspect of teaching and assessment. Immordino-Yang et al.’s (2019)
research also unintentionally refuted the NCLB movement towards high-stakes testing and what
Black (2017) called its unanticipated consequence of teachers “teaching to the test” at an
accelerated pace, skipping or ignoring non-tested content until after the standardized test was
administered. Grading that provided little to no feedback other than a number would be
insufficient to promote optimal student brain development in students, especially in priority
learners who needed it the most.
Ideal Assessment and Reflection
The need for reflection and feedback also repudiated traditional grading methods, which
offered simple scores in lieu of more meaningful feedback and opportunities for growth.
Formative and summative assessments tied to skills and standards created opportunities for
grading through reflection on assessments in order to provide students with better, more
meaningful engagement, processing, and information about their learning, aside from a single
numerical score. Dewey (1916/2018) stressed the unparalleled importance of student growth
through experiential learning and reflection: “Plasticity or the power to learn from experience
means the formation of habits … Active habits involve thought, invention, and initiative in
applying capacities to new aims” (p. 57-58). The type of progressive educational model for
which Dewey advocated in 1933, one that stressed learning built on inductive, resourceful,
differentiated, and meaningful learning, is still applicable almost 100 years later.
As a component in ideal assessment and grading, feedback and reflection should
meaningfully inform the student where they have historically been in their knowledge, where

28
they currently are, where they are going, and the concrete steps needed to get to that learning
destination. Hattie & Timperley (2007) proposed a model of feedback and reflection that
connected what students learned previously, how that knowledge connected to the skills they
would learn currently, and how that learning would build and inform their future learning, a
model in which they suggested that teachers should ask three questions in assessment and
grading: “(1) Where am I going? (2) How am I going? and (3) Where to next?” (p. 88). Fisher &
Frey (2011) ultimately adopted and expanded Hattie & Timperley’s feedback model into their
own Feed-Up, Feedback, and Feed-Forward model, which asked both teachers and students to
learn from the feedback provided to students: “Feed-up ensures that students understand the
purpose of the assignment, task, or lesson, including how they will be assessed. Feedback
provides students with information about their successes and needs. Feed-forward guides
student learning based on performance data. All three are required if students are to learn at high
levels” (p. 2). Feedback as a component of ideal assessment and grading would move students
towards agency, where students had a desire and willingness to understand their own learning
and contribute to their own understanding.
Feedback would also encourage assessment and grading systems that relied less on
extrinsic rewards and instead encouraged intrinsic motivation. Hattie & Timperley (2007)
commented on the ineffective nature of extrinsic rewards as motivation for learning and to
encourage intrinsic motivation and learning in students; instead, they posited that the most
effective forms of feedback – those which provided specific cues or reinforcement to learners,
which provided multiple and multi-media means of access to feedback, and which related
specifically to the goals students were expected to achieve – would encourage intrinsic
motivation for student learning. Fisher & Frey (2011) echoed Hattie & Timperley’s sentiment

29
that feedback alone was not enough, and that feedback should shift the responsibility ultimately
back to the learner, increasing their intrinsic motivation. Fisher & Frey (2011) later incorporated
Hattie & Timperley’s feedback model into the basis for their Gradual Release of Responsibility
model, where the teacher moved from a teacher-centered learning environment (“I do it”) toward
guided instruction (“We do it”), through to collaborative work (“You do it together”), finally to a
student-centered learning environment (You do it alone”), where students took responsibility for
their learning and self-assessed their knowledge. Ideal assessment and grading, then, asked
teachers to move towards teaching and grading practices that encouraged students’ intrinsic
motivation, reflection, and self-regulation to instill deeper learning, metacognitive processes, and
lifelong learning habits.
Ideal Assessment, Modeling Reflection, and Teacher Education
Researchers touted the additional benefit of ideal grading and assessment – rich,
descriptive, reflective, and clear communication of skills mastered – through improvement in
teachers’ engagement of the material they were teaching to students. Westerberg (2016) argued
the imperative nature of teachers modeling those reflective behaviors that they wanted their
students to exhibit, exhorting administrators to provide opportunities for schools to encourage
this type of modeling. However, studies on teacher education demonstrated that coursework on
grading mainly occurred during teachers’ bachelor's degree classes with little attention on
alternative forms of assessment, writing/developing curriculum, or theories of grading
(Brookhart, 2011; Proulx et al, 2012). Rogers (2002) posited that for students to be reflective
learners, teachers also needed to be reflective learners. Rogers (2002) presented her model of
Dewey’s reflective cycle as having two main goals: (1) for teachers to develop their ability to
“observe skillfully and to think critically about students and their learning”; and (2) for teachers

30
to see the relationship between teaching, the subject matter, and the students, so they could adjust
their teaching (231). Ultimately, Rogers (2002) urged teachers to take intelligent action based on
their own reflection and understanding of their practice. By rethinking teaching, assessment, and
grading as a reflective cycle, Rogers proposed that teachers and administrators would begin to
model reflective behaviors that would create lasting understandings of the learning process for
every student.
Ideal Assessment and Reflection, Motivation, and Accountability
In considering ideal grading, motivation, and long-term accountability, several
researchers discussed the negative implications of grading as extrinsic motivation. Pink (2011)
spoke specifically on the negative long-term effects of carrot-and-stick behavioral modification
for simple tasks that did not require a lot of cognition; initially, the results were positively
extrinsically motivational, but as soon as the reward or incentive (grades, in this case) were
removed, the behavior or result stopped. However, when the task was meaningful and
challenging, requiring metacognition, Pink saw an increase in positive intrinsic motivation and
long-term behavioral change. Pink suggested that teachers who use extrinsically motivating
omnibus grades create compliant behavior but not engaged behavior, and as soon as the
extrinsically motivating grade motivation was removed, the student’s incentive to perform was
also removed.
Other researchers, such as Csikszentmihalyi (2008), contended that true long-term
motivation and happiness occurred through meaningful, relevant challenging tasks where
subjects (students, in this case) chose their tasks, the tasks were intrinsically motivating, and
students received immediate, clear, and aligned feedback. Csikszentmihalyi’s (2008) concept of

31
“Flow” spoke specifically to a goal of happiness through self-actualization in autotelic tasks
which involved eight steps:
1. Complete concentration on the task.
2. Clarity of goals and reward in mind and immediate feedback.
3. Transformation of time (speeding up/slowing down).
4. An intrinsically rewarding experience.
5. Effortlessness and ease.
6. Balance between challenge and skills.
7. Merged actions and awareness, resulting in loss of self-conscious rumination.
8. A feeling of control over the task.
Csikszentmihalyi’s theory of “Flow” can be applied to the process of helping students find
autotelic enjoyment while learning new content and applying knowledge in novel, real-world
situations.
Self-determination theory (SDT), as explicated by Ryan and Moller (2017), builds on
motivational concepts similar to Csikszentmihalyi and proposes that human motivation and
personal development depends on a need for competence, autonomy, and relatedness in order to
move along the Internalization Continuum (see Figure 2) from Amotivation through Controlled
Motivation to Autonomous Motivation and Intrinsic Regulation. SDT argues that movement
along the Internalization Continuum is most effective with refined and responsive feedback
combined with standards of competence, and mastery goals.

Figure 1
Superordinate and subordinate categories of motivation and self-regulation as
defined by self-determination theory (SDT)

32
Note. Adapted from “Competence as Central, but Not Sufficient, for High-Quality Motivation: A SelfDetermination Theory Perspective,” by R. M. Ryan and A. C. Moller, in A. J. Elliot, C. S. Dweck, and D.
S. Yeager (Eds.), Handbook of Competence and Motivation (2nd ed., p. 216), 2017,
https://lccn.loc.gov/2016036820. Copyright © 2017 The Guilford Press.
Ideally, using SDT, educators could move students from the most controlled level of
Amotivation to the Autonomous Intrinsic Regulation by building a design task that the student
would find optimally challenging, interesting, enjoyable, meaningful, and able to complete with
autonomy. In Figure 2, Ryan & Moller (2017) provide the example of varying levels of
motivation for a math student. Similarly, educators could adapt the model to help teachers and
students design meaningful formative and summative activities, assessments, and grading
rubrics.
Figure 2
Examples of self-regulation of students completing a math problem assigned
for homework.

33
Note. Adapted from “Competence as Central, but Not Sufficient, for High-Quality Motivation: A SelfDetermination Theory Perspective,” by R. M. Ryan and A. C. Moller, in A. J. Elliot, C. S. Dweck, and D.
S. Yeager (Eds.), Handbook of Competence and Motivation (2nd ed., p. 216), 2017,
https://lccn.loc.gov/2016036820. Copyright © 2017 The Guilford Press.
Like Pink, Csikszentmihalyi, and Ryan & Moller, Feldman (2019) contended that for simple
tasks, extrinsic motivation might have short-term success, but for long-term, more complex
tasks, such as most state standards required in both assessment and grading, extrinsically
motivational grades and rewards actually lowered performance.
Researchers like Black (2017) pointed to traditional grading and assessment as
reinforcing a culture among teachers of teaching to the end goal of a test or a score with little
requirement on the teacher’s part for curricular revision to encourage student learning
engagement; as long as students met the number, the number became the measure of success. By
contrast, researchers championed the benefits of ungraded practice formative work to enable
students to build course competencies, working towards the mastery they would demonstrate

34
during the ending, summative assessments (Feldman, 2019; Fisher et al., 2011; Frey & Fisher,
2011; Marzano, 2006; Townsley & Wear, 2020; Westerberg, 2016). Harvard researchers
(Ritchart, 2015; Ritchart et al., 2011; Ritchart & Church, 2020) proposed the use of non-graded
visible thinking routines to “make thinking visible” and encourage a formative, reflective culture
of thinking, one that enhanced what Ritchart & Church (2020) called a “two-way street actively
involving students and teachers in dialog about learning” (p. 11-12). Educators advocated for
methods of assessment that encouraged cognition and a culture of thinking.
One consequence of deeper, extrinsic learning was the very rise in standardized test
scores that early accountability measures and traditional grading failed to deliver uniformly;
schools who practiced the formative concepts of making thinking visible at the middle, high, and
higher ed levels around the world saw impressive increases in standardized test scores such as
the International Baccalaureate (IB) exams, the Smarter Balanced Assessment, Partnership for
Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) exam, and other state standardized
exams (Ritchart & Church, 2020). When educators and students focused on deeper learning and
assessment and not the scores, students’ demonstrations of understanding on standardized tests
improved, as did their grades.
During COVID-19, standardized tests were forced to be taken remotely online or
canceled entirely. Michel (2020) questioned whether remotely proctored standardized testing
might continue post-pandemic. Concerns over academic honesty, security, mode of test delivery,
standardization of home testing conditions, and access to technology all affected the student’s
ability to experience an authentic testing environment (Michel, 2020). Universities canceled
SAT and ACT requirements during COVID-19, leading educators, teachers, students, and
parents to question the existential value of standardized testing in college admissions. Bennett

35
(2022), an employee of the Educational Testing Service, the company that produced the
Graduate Record Examination (GRE) and Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL),
argued that standardized testing is meritocratic, ideal for a democracy, but he cautioned that as
our melting pot country shifts towards a higher percentage of students of color, our standardized
testing would need to shift to reflect that different demographic. Bennett (2022) acknowledged
that civil rights groups continued to oppose college admissions testing on the grounds that it
perpetuated systemic racial biases and oppression; however, he felt confident that our country
could find a path forward using standardized testing. Emdin (2016) and Chardin and Novak
(2021) refuted claims that standardized testing is meritocratic, stating instead that college
admissions testing like the SAT, ACT, and GRE are inherently and statistically biased against
students of color and are themselves a product of the systemic oppressive structures and
businesses that created the importance of the testing itself. As the pandemic is ongoing, further
study will reveal how educational companies like ETS and College Board weather the COVID19 storm and to what extent standardized testing will return post-COVID-19.
Feldman (2019) argued that a “logical yet unintended” consequence of penalizing
mistakes and using grades as extrinsic motivation is that students were incentivized to cheat to
get the grade and the score (p. 31). Feldman further argued that point-based or norm-referenced
grading also inadvertently misdirected students away from the value of the content that points
represented and away from the value of intrinsic learning, a system that made students dependent
on the teacher and one in which learning became transactional. While the literature abounded in
research on cheating at the higher education level during COVID-19 (Dutta & Guswami, 2023;
Lee et al., 2021; Newton & Essex, 2023), there was minimal research on cheating at the middle
school or high school level (the topic of this study), perhaps, as Middleton (2020) argued, that

36
because COVID-19 is ongoing, studies are ongoing. Perhaps, though, this study will contribute
to further understanding of the effect of cheating as a result of the cause of both the pandemic
and grading policies.
South Florida districts attempted to modify their policies to deal with the rise in academic
dishonesty during the pandemic. After initially mandating that students did not need to have
cameras on during virtual class, Miami-Dade County Public Schools and Broward County Public
Schools pivoted to requiring students to have cameras on in an effort to mitigate online cheating;
Palm Beach County did not require students to have cameras on, but schools in the county told
students they were expected to use them (Travis, 2020). The larger question, Toro (2021) asked,
is why do secondary school students cheat? Toro asserted that, “To eliminate the temptation of
cheating, we need to adopt strategies that reduce anxiety about tests and exams, increase clarity
of learning expectations and students’ learning progress, and emphasize the process of learning”
(2021). Toro recommended changing testing language to open-ended questions that allowed
students to describe the process of their learning; presenting clear learning standards, skills,
goals, and objectives for students to meet; offering frequent, low-stakes testing prior to the
summative assessment; hosting small group diagnostic tests with peer review; providing the
structure and format of the test in advance; using question styles that encouraged students’
problem-solving; using post-exam reflection and review; and offering opportunities for one-onone student and teacher metacognitive discussion of thinking about student thinking. Overall,
the literature suggested that ideal grading practices could create intrinsic student motivation to
reduce cheating and emphasize the intrinsic value of learning.
Ideal Assessment and Grading as Clear Communication of Learning

37
Educators have argued that ideal grading and assessment should also improve accuracy,
consistency, and communication of learning. Grading and reporting based on demonstration and
mastery of skills and learning goals spelled out in state standards and reported in rich, clear, and
meaningful narrative format removed the tendency for teachers to conflate scores with nonacademic criteria (Guskey & Brookhart, 2019; Muñoz & Guskey, 2015). Using criteria-based
descriptors rather than norm-based grading created a clear understanding of learning targets and
components of the grade for teachers, students, and parents. One unintended consequence of
teacher training using alternative forms of grading like standards-based grading was better
teacher understanding of the differences between standards-based and norm-based criteria in
grading, an understanding teachers hadn’t had before the training. However, even with training,
researchers noted that teachers’ classroom practices did not necessarily reflect and connect to the
skills and standards teachers aimed to teach (McMunn et al., 2003). Researchers commented
that there was still much to be done to study and improve the disconnect between what was
taught in the classroom and what was graded and reported, regardless of grading system (Guskey
& Brookhart, 2019).
Teachers and parents surveyed preferred a narrative style of communication of
information about the students’ mastery of specific learning skills and goals as an alternative to
traditional grading. Initially, parents found the narrative, standards-based report card confusing
in format, since it represented a departure from the traditional method of scoring (Guskey &
Brookhart, 2019; Westerberg, 2016). To mitigate confusion over a transition to alternative forms
of grading and reporting, Guskey & Bailey (2010) recommended a team stakeholder-based
approach to developing effective communication, accurate interpretation, consistency of
terminology, and descriptive narrative in standards-based report cards. Ultimately, the goal of

38
ideal grading and reporting was to include the stakeholders to present a clear assessment of skills
assessed in language that students and parents could understand and upon which students could
act for future improvement.
Priority Learners and Grading with Equity
Beyond issues with accuracy, researchers noted the inequity in traditional grading
methods for priority learners, marginalized students, and special needs students. Educators
advocated alternative assessment and grading methods, differentiation in teaching, grading, and
reporting, Universal Design for Learning (UDL) as equitable course design for all students, and
equitable grading practices as potential measures of improvement towards equity for priority
learners. For priority learners, criterion-based grading and reporting afforded a much-desire
flexibility and adaptability of grading through “just-in-time” feedback and reporting for
minoritized, ELL, special needs or ESE students, and marginalized students (Guskey & Jung,
2009; Jung, 2009; Jung & Guskey, 2007; Marbouti et al., 2016; Sampson, 2009). Each priority
learner population reflected the diversity of their groups, highlighting specific challenges for
equitable assessment, grading, and reporting among each population. Jung & Guskey (2012)
focused on priority learner challenges that included how to grade a student who could not meet
standards but gave excellent effort; how to fairly grade an ELL student who could not pass the
language standards by level; how to grade students receiving interventions but who were not
diagnosed with a disability; and how to grade all students with fairness and equity. Black (2017)
pointed out the difficulty of assessing low-income student performance on national assessments
against higher-income populations and adjusting assessment policies to increase equity and close
the achievement gap. In each instance, grading priority learners with equity demonstrated

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techniques that would ultimately lead to equitable outcomes for all learners, regardless of ability
or learning challenge.
Grading with Equity and Differentiation
Tomlinson and Moon (2013) argued for a holistic and differentiated reform of teaching
and grading, one in which the teacher was proactive in their response to student needs and one
guided by the principles of differentiation Tomlinson and Moon would outline in their Elements
of Effective Differentiated Instruction:
● An environment that encourages and supports learning;
● Quality curriculum;
● Assessment that informs teaching and learning;
● Instruction that responds to student variance; and
● Leading students and managing routines (2013, p.128).
Part of Tomlinson and Moon’s model of differentiation included differentiation in product, or
how students could show that they knew, understood, and could do, a grading process that would
also ideally differentiate for different learners who need differing levels of support. Tomlinson
and Moon (2013) also argued for nine guiding principles of effective grading that would create
grades consistent across classrooms, accurate in their measurement of student learning, and
meaningful and supportive communication to the learners and their families, harkening back to
O’Connor (2011). The nine principles asked educators to:
1. Base grades on clearly specified learning goals: plan for and communicate knowledge
and understanding goals.
2. Use grades that are criterion based, not comparative or norm based: encourage growth
mindset and reduce bias and grading on a curve.

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3. Don’t overgrade work: encourage the importance of ungraded practice work and “failing
forward,” the safety of making mistakes without grading penalties.
4. Use only quality assessments: use thoughtfully designed assessments aligned with clear
standards and skills known to the student that avoid “gotcha” or trick questions and
where directions are clearly spelled out and students can demonstrate mastery in ways
that account for student variables.
5. Reduce “grade fog”: avoid late penalties, bonus points, attendance, behavior, or other
non-skills-based components that distort the academic reporting of the student’s grade.
6. Eliminate “mathematical grade fog”: eliminate zeros and averaging and instead use
student median or mean or avoid any mechanical formula for processing grades
numerically.
7. Grade more heavily later in a grading cycle rather than earlier: decrease error and
encourage student persistence and growth mindset.
8. When reporting, use the 3-P approach: separate reporting of Guskey’s (2006) grading
criteria of process (the steps and methods towards mastery of clearly specified goals),
progress (growth towards those goals), and product/performance (end mastery of those
goals).
9. Open up the assessment and grading process: involve students in the assessment and
grading process by helping them to internalize and articulate the learning goals, their
performance on formative and summative assessments, and the steps they need to take to
improve their mastery of the goals. Further, share ongoing progress reports with parents
to develop a community of support for the students (pp. 128-137).

41
Where students were not able to demonstrate mastery of knowledge, understanding, and skills,
Tomlinson and Moon (2016) recommended teacher assessment of student gaps in knowledge
with additional targeted instruction, student and teacher identification of concrete next steps for
improvement, and follow-up reassessment, rather than punitive, one-time only assessment and
grading. Tomlinson and Moon’s (2016) work on differentiated instruction and grading
suggested that, similar to Pink (2011), Ryan & Moller (2017), and Feldman (2019), grading itself
would not solve student motivation or learning challenges; rather, ideal teaching, assessment,
and grading would help the student to become more intrinsically motivated to understand their
own learning through the educator’s clear communication of learning goals, prioritization of
formative practice, elimination of mathematical confounding variables in grading, and
encouragement of student internalization and self-actualization of learning goals.
Universal Design for Learning and Equity in Grading
Universal Design for Learning (UDL) took Tomlinson and Moon’s concepts of
differentiation for some learners and applied them to all learners. UDL placed a focus on:
● inclusive, culturally aware, and accessible learning environment;
● intentional adaptation of materials for accessibility for all learners;
● deliberate design of curriculum for students of all variability prior to student arrival at the
beginning of the year;
● embedded choices to create agency;
● planning for all students, inclusive of ability, culture, background, and access;
● elimination of barriers to access;
● scaffolding to teach executive functioning skills, encourage autonomy, student agency,
internalization of learning, and self-reflection and self-assessment of learning; and

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● deliberate focus on engagement, intrinsic motivation, and meaningful curriculum that
incorporated multi-media, multi-sensory, and multiple means of access to materials and
demonstration of learning. (CAST, 2016; Chardin & Novak, 2021; Grant & Perez, 2018;
Novak, 2016).
Grant and Perez (2018) and the Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) (2018) outlined
how UDL used neuroscience to encourage teachers in course, assessment, and grading design to
consider the three main networks of the brain to activate learning and initiate and engage all
areas of the brain in learning:
● the affective networks, or what CAST called the Engagement network or the “why” of
learning located in the center of the brain;
● the recognition networks, or what CAST called the Representation network or the “what”
of learning located in the back of the brain; and
● the strategic networks, or what CAST called the Action and Expression network or the
“how” of learning located in the front of the brain.
Focusing on three main areas, Engagement, Representation, and Action and Expression, UDL
would move all learners from introduction to content, toward building on course content, to
internalization and mastery of content, all with the intent of creating learners who are purposeful,
motivated, resourceful, knowledgeable, strategic, and goal-directed (Center for Applied Special
Technology, 2018; Grant & Perez, 2018). Like other models, one main goal of UDL was to
move learners from extrinsic forms of motivation to intrinsic forms of motivation.
In designing assessment and grading using UDL, Novak (2016) recommended that
educators create rubrics that allow for grading on choice-based assessments, where students have
choices in how they demonstrate their mastery of content. For example, in demonstrating their

43
understanding of a text in English Language Arts, students might have the option to create a
video, slide-deck presentation, portfolio, series of journal entries, musical piece with written
explanation of interpretation, etc. Novak (2016) argued that rubrics created to account for
variances in methods of representation of learning might use growth mindset benchmarks of
“Not Yet,” “Meets Expectations,” or “Exceeds Expectations” with the standards and skills that
the student is meant to demonstrate attached in clear language on the same rubric. Scaffolding
the writing process using the same rubric in ungraded formative rough drafts and then allowing
students to revise multiple times prior to final submission using the same rubric allowed for
clarity, transparency, and the ability to make mistakes without fear of failure, an essential
component of Tomlinson and Moon’s earlier premise of differentiation. Grant and Perez (2018)
proposed student inclusion in the process of assessment and grading through assessment design,
self-reflection and assessment in concordance with teacher assessment and grading, learner
portfolios to demonstrate deeper learning and understanding, and rubrics to communicate clear
expectations of skills to be demonstrated in a variety of ways.
Chardin and Novak (2020) took UDL into the realm of social justice for priority learners,
specifically arguing for practices that value and make visible students’ cultures and lived
experiences. Using Emdin’s (2016) concept of cogenerative (cogen) dialogues, Chardin and
Novak (2020) suggested that students and teachers create a multi-representation group of
students (high achieving and low achieving, engaged and disengaged students, students of
different abilities, students of different backgrounds and ethnicities) to enter into a dialogue to
help create rules, design learning, and address inequities in the classroom collaboratively.
Chardin and Novak (2020) proposed that teachers ask students four questions in the design
process of the class:

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1. What do you think you need to know or do to be able to meet this goal?
2. How would you best like to learn it?
3. What materials can I provide you that will help you to meet this goal?
4. How will you share with me that you met it? (p. 71).
Students can be assessed using the same rubric that they helped to create that reflects the learning
standards, but they will have been given student choice and agency to represent their learning in
culturally and racially authentic ways which “embraces differences, creativity, and innovation”
(p. 72). Using UDL, educators and students could design meaningful learning experiences and
assessments that honored their culture, abilities, thinking, and processing through equitable and
accessible means for all learners.
Grading and Equity for Minoritized Students
Ideal grading for equity in minoritized, low-income, or marginalized student populations
requires a shift from a points-based, penalty-laden system where minoritized priority learners are
penalized for non-participation, non-compliance, and biased perceptions of ability to one that
encourages participation, access, and encouragement of growth mindset. Coleman (2011)
itemized nine rationales for minoritized performance disparity on standardized tests: family
income disparity; poor educational preparation; tracking bias; lack of role models; peer ridicule;
stereotype threat; subject matter bias; segregation bias; and poor English skills (p. 511-512).
Coleman distinguished between ascription, or when placement in society is beyond an
individual’s control, and merit, where the individual’s success is the result of objective ability
(2011). Coleman (2011) suggested a necessary shift away from what he argued were inherently
biased standardized tests like the Standard Achievement Test (SAT) and a movement towards
evidence-based tests that assessed what students were taught in class and in that current year. He

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further argued for assessments that addressed multiple intelligences advocated by Gardner
(2011) in multiple formats which would allow students from diverse populations and experiences
to demonstrate their learning in more robust ways (Coleman, 2011). In grading and reporting,
SBG and SBR could ultimately provide a method of assessment for these specific marginalized
students where the assessment functioned more on the basis of merit than ascription.
For African American students, Feldman (2019) echoed Coleman’s description of a
biased system of testing disparity. Feldman described what Payne (1998) called a “deficit lens”
for a “culture of poverty” in which African American, Latino/a, and low socio-economic level
students were seen as less capable of achievement and only motivated by extrinsic positive and
negative grading rewards. Feldman argued that using extrinsic points as rewards both devalued
the minoritized and marginalized students and created an illusion of engagement and motivation,
one that would not create long-term strategies for intrinsic motivational success or one that
would honor the capabilities of these students as equal to all other students. Feldman (2019)
contended that our nation’s systemic use of norm-referenced, points-based grading has created
systemic gaps in learning and failed to serve the students who need equity and support the most.
Impacts on grading minoritized students went beyond academic, grade-based outcomes.
Adam, Villaume, and Hittner (2020) echoed Immordino-Yang et al.’s (2019) neuroscientific
research on the importance of biopsychosocial school interventions to promote brain
development and decrease the likelihood of negative epigenetic neural loss, with specific
attention to racial and ethnic identity and biological stress. To reduce the social, emotional, and
biological effects of race-based stress, Adam, Villaume, and Hittner (2020) called for educators
to design lessons, assessments, and grading that connected with, celebrated, and cultivated pride
and positive affect in students’ ethnic and racial heritage. Using Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological

46
Framework as a basis for their study, the researchers recommended educators create thoughtful
and deliberate curricular interventions to reduce stress-related biopsychosocial health outcomes
in students of color.
Grading and Equity for ELL Students
For Hispanic/Chicano/Latino priority learners, Valencia (2011) argued that student
failure was nothing new in the Chicano community. Rather, he posited that Chicano student
failure was a result of systemic educational inequalities, a form of historical oppression
manifested in personal attitudes and deficit thinking, institutional processes that encourage
segregation and curricular differentiation, and negative effects and outcomes that result in low
academic achievement and high dropout rates (Valencia, 2011). Valencia related numerous
factors that led to poorer ELL student outcomes such as zip code inequity and segregation;
heritage language suppression, inequitable school funding; negative student stereotyping; poorly
qualified teachers; tracking of Hispanic/Chicano/Latino students into lower academic
achievement groups; inaccurate tracking of Hispanic/Chicano/Latino students into ESE
programs; statistically lower representation of Hispanic/Chicano/Latino students in gifted
educational classes; and underrepresentation of Hispanic/Chicano/Latino teachers to serve as
models for Hispanic/Chicano/Latino students. Statistically, these inequitable practices led to
specific academic outcomes for Hispanic/Chicano/Latino students: higher rates of grade
retention (being held back); higher dropout rates; low matriculation to college; adverse impact of
high-stakes testing; and higher levels of stress.
Garcia et al. (2020) and Izquierdo (2020) argued for the inclusion of English-PlusSpanish and dual language development strategies to both honor the native culture and allow
students to develop both heritage and English language skills without placing negative

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stereotypes on the heritage language. In teaching, grading, and assessment, teachers would
ideally use translated materials, assessments, and reporting to communicate learning mastery and
goals to both students and parents. Izquierdo (2020) also exhorted administrators to faithfully
apply dual language strategies at all grade levels of instruction to provide continuity. Valencia
and Villarreal (2020) proposed the use of multicultural assessment, dynamic assessment using
the test-teach-retest method, and nonverbal measures of assessment especially to identify gifted
ELL students; however, these methods of assessment would increase equitable outcomes for all
ELL students. Ultimately, Valencia and Pearl (2020) argued for an inclusive classroom
environment incorporating meaningful curricula which developed Hispanic/Chicano/Latino
students’ sense of their right to an equitable education, one that encouraged a sense of citizenship
and participation in their own community. To help Hispanic/Chicano/Latino ELL students
succeed, course design, assessment, and grading would ideally include dual language,
translations, inclusion and celebration of heritage culture and language, and student agency in
assessment and grading.
Grading and Equity for Marginalized Students
In addressing innovative methods of improving equity for marginalized student
populations, Marbouti et al. (2016) created models for early prediction of marginalized students
in a course using SBG. In a report on the retention rates of marginalized students in higher
education, Marbouti et al. demonstrated that only 45% of marginalized students graduated after
five years of college (Marbouti et al., 2016). Academic success was the highest predictor of
retention, and thus, Marbouti et al. argued that to increase retention, early and accurate prediction
of marginalized students was key to increasing academic success (2016). In the challenges and
shortcomings of current prediction models for marginalized students, a generalized model could

48
not compensate for the complexities of various types of classes, such as lecture vs. active
participation. More importantly, norm-referenced grading, like standardized grading, measured
students against the success of other students in the class. Criterion-based grading, like SBG,
measured the student against the criteria or skills within the course content. Accordingly, the
researchers recommended a shift to SBG to identify marginalized students earlier. In the context
of early risk predictors, SBG allowed students to identify the areas in which they specifically
needed to improve. Further, SBG provided “clear, meaningful, and personalized feedback”
(Marbouti et al., 2016), qualities essential in providing early information to potentially
marginalized students.
Grading and Equity for ESE Students
For ESE students, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 1973
intended to provide an equal school experience for these students, ensuring an individual
education program (IEP) for each student as a requirement of the Americans with Disabilities
Act (ADA) (McDonnell et al., 1997). One overarching challenge to providing that equal
experience lay in the extraordinarily wide-ranging spectrum of differing abilities for ESE
students based on the amount of time spent in ESE classes vs. general education classes, the
amount of time spent with ESE specialists, and the degree of parental involvement (Guskey &
Jung, 2009; McDonnell et al., 1997). IDEA provided incipient steps towards equity, but more
action was needed to achieve equity.
The Committee on Goals 2000 and the Inclusion of Students with Disabilities, a project
of the National Research Council, highlighted the challenges to grading for the diverse students
in ESE programs (McDonnell et al., 1997). First, ESE students were by and large excluded from
large-scale standardized assessments engendered by NCLB, since they could not accommodate

49
adaptations necessary for ESE students, and schools driven by test-score funding were
incentivized to reduce the student populations who would produce lower scores. Ironically, by
not participating in standardized assessments, ESE students were also excluded from the
accountability measures these very tests touted.
Jung and Guskey (2007) reported on ESE and ELL student inclusion into non-ESE/ELL
classes and highlighted the potential problems with accommodations and traditional grading in
giving useful information to parents and students. They asserted that separating product,
process, and progress grading criteria and then situating academic achievement within the
context of accommodations and modifications for ESE or ELL learners within a SBG
environment could lead to accurate, meaningful, and contextual grades that would allow support
systems to help students who need different styles of learning. Jung and Guskey created a fivestep grading system for an inclusive SBG model for ESE/ELL students:
1. Determine whether accommodations or modifications are needed.
2. Establish standards for modified use.
3. Determine the need for additional goals.
4. Apply fair and equitable grading practices to appropriate standards.
5. Clearly communicate the meaning of grades (2012, p. 38).
Jung and Guskey also offered five categories of adaptations or modifications to standard grading
practices to make when grading ESE/ELL students:
1. Considering progress on IEP goals.
2. Measuring improvement over past performance.
3. Prioritizing assignments or content differently.
4. Including indicators of behavior or effort in the grade.

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5. Modifying the weights or scales for grading (2007, p. 50-52).
Guskey and Jung (2009) echoed Brookhart and Nitko’s (2008) recommendation on reporting
separately on product, process, and progress criteria within the accommodations and adaptations
in the IEP to fully represent the learning process and mastery of the skills within the standardsbased grading environment. Guskey and Jung (2009) suggested that only after considering the
various grading criteria and the needs of the students, the IEP team could decide whether the
student should be held to the same grade-level standards as other students. By keeping the
progress and process grading report separate from the product criteria, Guskey and Jung (2009)
argued that teachers could reduce arbitrary grades, and students with disabilities and their parents
could better judge the success or challenges for those students.
Jung et al. (2019) also encouraged educators to partner with students and parents to create
goal attainment assessment scales to help the ESE student to achieve IEP goals they and their
team have set. Goal attainment scales should be personalized, individualized, use clear
language, give precise, leveled descriptions of progress, describe observable levels of measurable
progress, and be mapped across several different subject areas to map for consistency in different
classes (Jung et al., 2019). Involving the student in the creation of the assessment tool that will
measure their progress increases engagement, student agency, and buy-in, all key to achieving
UDL-like goals of student internalization, independence, and self-regulation. In order to
implement their recommendations on integrating students with disabilities into leveled,
standards-based classrooms, McDonnell et al. (1197) suggested significant investment in teacher
professional development to prepare for new approaches to instruction, assessments, and
classroom organization.
Conceptual Framework

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As demonstrated in Figure 1, the conceptual framework of this study employed the
Bronfenbrenner Bioecological Model of Development as its theoretical basis. The study
analyzed how multiple levels of influence impacted a teacher’s experiences with grading and
reporting before and during COVID-19. These surrounding factors were all interrelated and
interdependent and, therefore, exerted considerable influence over the teacher’s ability to
successfully implement grading and reporting, whether traditional or standards-based, with
accuracy, consistency, equity, and meaning.
Figure 3
Proposed Bioecological Model Framing Grading Influences on Secondary Teachers in South
Florida

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Bronfenbrenner (1979, 2005) defined five main interconnecting systems that provided a
framework for the individual’s relationship with his or her environment, the Bioecological
Model of Development: 1) the microsystem, or the interconnecting web of influencing relations
between the individual person and his or her immediate environment; 2) mesosystem, or the
interaction of microsystems in a given period in that person’s life; 3) exosystem, or the systems
or structures that do not interact with the person’s immediate surrounding yet nonetheless
influence the person’s development; 4) macrosystem, or macrocosmic large-scale organizations
such as government or society that peripherally but significantly influence the person’s
development; and 5) chronosystem, or the impact of life experiences and events on a person’s

53
future development over time. In the context of an individual teacher’s relationship with his or
her environment during COVID-19, these five systems could be defined along Bronfenbrenner’s
levels.
Microsystem
The microsystem might include teachers relationships with students, parents,
administrators, and colleagues; teachers’ families; individual teacher skills and abilities to use
continuous learning technology and applications; teacher interpretation of grading policies;
teacher interpretation of policies on IEP accommodations; teacher interaction with in-person
students vs. virtual students; teacher concern over health of teacher, students, parents,
administrators, and family; students’ changes in behaviors and practices resulting from COVID19 and their effects on teachers’ abilities to teach and grade; and rising numbers of students and
teachers infected with COVID-19, affecting teachers’ ability to teach and grade.
Mesosystem
The mesosystem might include parent interaction and facilitation of students at home;
parent concern over student motivation due to grade policy changes; student and parent concern
over potential impact on college admissions; student concern over graduation requirements;
influence on teachers by schools, parent-teacher associations, other schools, or college advisors;
grading with school learning management system (LMS); school-provided training in continuous
learning technology and applications; school application of policies on grading; school
application of policies on IEP accommodations; and rising numbers of COVID-19 cases at the
school level affecting school policy.
Exosystem

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The exosystem might include district/state level grading policy and guidance; teachers’
unions; state departments of education; local/regional school grading and teaching applications
and software; local/state conferences, professional development, or training; local governmental
policy decisions; local access to internet and wi-fi; district/state-provided access to computers
and/or tablets; available local resources; district/state guidance on grading policy; district/state
guidance on IEP accommodations; and rising numbers of COVID-19 cases locally within the
county and state affecting local policy.
Macrosystem
The macrosystem might include the U.S. Department of Education policy and guidance;
national educational conferences/training; social media; responses to grading changes by
colleges and universities; cancellation of standardized testing by College Board, American
College Testing, and International Baccalaureate; grading for national and international
educational organizations like IB, AP, and AICE; and rising numbers of COVID-19 cases
nationally affecting national policy.
Chronosystem
The chronosystem might include changes over time in grading scales, grading policies,
innovation in technology and LMS practices, and teacher and public perceptions both pre- and
during-COVID-19).
By recognizing the multitudinous, interactive influences on teachers and where
challenges and successes occur, educational policy makers would have a better understanding of
how to facilitate teachers in their grading practices post-COVID-19.
Summary

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Overall, multiple scholars made recommendations that moved away from traditional
norm-referenced grading towards more equitable models of grading that included student and
peer reflection, standards and classroom adaptation and modification, student inclusion, cultural
awareness, dual language inclusion, and a shift from grading that encouraged extrinsic
motivation towards grading that encouraged intrinsic motivation. Ideal grading practices would
be accurate, bias-resistant, and motivational, practices that valued knowledge not environment or
behavior, and practices that supported hope and a growth mindset. Educators asserted that
grades should communicate richer and more meaningful feedback to all students, especially the
ones who needed more feedback and were traditionally not served properly by traditional
grading methods. By extension, these types of adaptations could apply to general education
classrooms, as well as to minoritized, ESE, ELL, low-income, and marginalized students and
schools. Indeed, implementation of differentiation, UDL, reflection, inclusion, access,
engagement, meaningful design, standards-based grading and reporting, clear communication of
goals, skills-based rubrics, and multiple opportunities for practice and revision in assessment and
grading were the next pillars in building a foundation for accurate, meaningful, and equitable
grading and reporting, practices that would lead to better neuroscientific, biopsychosocial
outcomes for all learners.

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CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY
This research study assessed the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on secondary
teachers’ grading and reporting in two south Florida counties. This chapter will include an
overview of the research design and the four research questions that guided the study. Next, this
chapter will introduce the qualitative nature of the study and the interview protocol used, as well
as an overview of the research setting, the researcher, the participants, the data sources, and the
methods of data analysis. This chapter will also address the validity and reliability and ethics of
the study.
Research Questions
1. What are teachers’ perceptions of the environmental factors influencing grading and
reporting during Covid-19?
2. What are teachers’ perceptions regarding the purpose of grading and reporting during
Covid-19?
3. What are teachers’ perceptions regarding the accuracy of grading and reporting during
Covid-19?
4. What are teachers’ perceptions regarding equitable grading and reporting practices during
Covid-19?
Overview of Design
To analyze teacher perceptions of grading and reporting implementation prior to and
during COVID-19, I used a qualitative design to answer the research questions. I conducted
interviews with secondary teachers in two demographically diverse and populous south Florida
counties: Broward and Palm Beach. I began this study with a snowball sample of grades 6-12
south Florida public school teachers using a social media call for participants, and I expanded the

57
sample with a networking sample of teachers who knew teachers I already interviewed or who
knew friends, family, or colleagues of mine.
Research Setting
I interviewed teachers who were from two south Florida counties, Broward County and
Palm Beach County. The study focused on teachers from two main groups within grades 6-12:
middle school (6-8) and high school (9-12) in order to examine grading and reporting
implementation at both middle and high school levels.
Broward County Public Schools (BCPS) is the sixth-largest school district in the United
States with 251,000 students in 239 schools (Broward County Public Schools, 2023). The
School District of Palm Beach County is the tenth largest in the United States with more than
189,805 students in 192 schools (Palm Beach County Schools, 2023). As of 2023, Broward
County had 14,403 teachers, and Palm Beach County had 12,786 teachers. Combined, the two
counties represent a total of 27,189 teachers (Broward County Public Schools, 2023; Palm Beach
County Schools, 2023).
Students at Broward County Public Schools represent 177 different countries and speak
a combined total of 153 different languages (Broward County Public Schools, 2023). Students at
Palm Beach County Schools represent 192 different countries and territories and speak a
combined total of 150 different languages (Palm Beach County Schools, 2023). In Broward
County, 12.6% or 31,926 students are classified as English Language Learners (ELL), 14.8% or
37,573 students are classified as Exceptional Student Education (ESE), and 55.6% or 141,380
students are registered for Free or Reduced Lunch Meals (Broward County Public Schools,
2023). In Palm Beach County, 14% or 35,140 students are classified as English Language
Learners (ELL), 20% or 38,000 students are classified as Exceptional Student Education (ESE),

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and 47.1% or 118,221 students are registered for Free or Reduced Lunch Meals. Both Broward
County Public Schools and Palm Beach County Schools have roughly half of their students who
are considered food insecure, and both counties designated funding and resources for 12-15% of
their student population for ELL and 15-20% of their student population for ESE. Five of the ten
schools at which the interviewed teachers taught during the pandemic were Title 1 schools.
The Researcher
As a high school teacher in the south Florida region, I have an interest in both standardsbased grading and reporting and believe these are promising approaches to assessment. I
redesigned my high school curriculum, grading, and reporting around the principles of SBG and
SBR and had success with communication of student learning outcomes. I also taught prior to
and during COVID-19 and experienced environmental influences on my grading and reporting.
Having contracted COVID-19 in April 2020 and July 2022, I was curious to see how COVID-19
impacted other educators in the south Florida area. I do not currently teach at any of the schools
in the study. I have been a teacher in south Florida for 30 years and have taught writing, rhetoric
(including fallacies and biases), critical thinking skills, and research skills for many years. I
value the process of research, investigation of a research question, and the thrill of following the
research wherever it leads. To this end, I have been persistently aware of my positionality and
potential biases in favor of SBG and SBR, as well as my potential towards confirmation bias
with regard to environmental influences on teaching and grading due to COVID-19. I attempted
to mitigate any conflicts or biases by sharing my research outcomes, methods, and conclusions
with my dissertation committee in a professional manner and openly seeking their feedback and
suggestions.
Data Source: Interviews

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For the qualitative interview process, I recruited public school teachers in grades 6-12
education in Broward County and Palm Beach County to discuss their assessment, grading, and
reporting practices prior to and during COVID-19. The interview provided the opportunity to ask
more targeted questions on the pace and design of assessments due to COVID-19, as well as any
perceived changes to grading or reporting during COVID-19. The interview also asked for
teacher perceptions of what practices and policies were successful and what were not, as well as
what state and district policies influenced their grading and teaching practices. The interview
allowed for analysis of differences in grading and reporting policies and practices within the two
county districts and across grade levels. Finally, the interview prompted teachers to thoughtfully
reflect on changes over time and any ongoing lessons learned on how assessment, grading, and
reporting practices in response to environmental factors, purpose, equity, and accuracy during
COVID-19, as the theoretical model and goal of the study desired.
Participants
The study used snowball and networking sampling among grades 6-12 teachers in south
Florida. The interview participants were teachers who volunteered after open calls for
participation through social media, through colleagues of other teachers and administrators
known to other interview participants or to me, and through other people in my network of
friends, family, and acquaintances. The interview included ten participants.
Instrumentation
The interview protocol (see Appendix A) utilized a semi-structured approach, much like
Patton’s standardized open-ended interview, in that the interview protocol questions were
determined in advance, but the responses were an open format (Patton, 2015). This approach

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allowed the participants some flexibility as to answer naturally and authentically. The semistructured approach also allowed the ability to probe for further information as needed.
The interview instrument was designed to align with and support the four main research
questions (see Appendix A). Question 1 of the protocol first asked teachers to define the purpose
of grading and reporting (RQ1) as they perceived them, since definitions of these concepts vary
even within the literature. Questions 2-4 next asked teachers to describe their grading and
reporting practices prior to COVID-19 and during COVID-19, and the participants organized
their answers from March 2020 to June 2020 (the time of initial lockdown during end of school
year 2019-2020), school year 2020-2021, and 2021-2022; the grading practice questions
potentially addressed all four research questions, since they discussed environmental impacts on
grading, practice and purpose of grading, accuracy of grading, and equity of grading. Questions
5-6 next focused on communications between all stakeholders (state, district, teachers, students,
and parents) and the impact on state and district policies; therefore, these questions were
designed to address Research Questions 1, 3, and 4, since they potentially address environmental
impact, accuracy, and equity of grading. Question 7 addressed participants’ perceptions on
accuracy of grades (RQ3), and Question 8 addressed participants’ perceptions on the equity of
grades (RQ4) during COVID-19. Questions 9 and 10 asked participants to describe any
challenges they had in grading during the pandemic and what strategies or actions they took to
mitigate those challenges or what would have been helpful to them in mitigating those
challenges, addressing all four research questions. Questions 11 and 12 asked participants what
grading practices they would continue and/or discontinue after COVID-19 and why; these
questions aligned to all the research questions, since teachers could speak to changes in purpose
of grading as a result of environmental impacts and as potential influence on or response to

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accuracy and equity. Questions 13-16 asked participants to reflect on what changes they might
make with specific attention to policy, purpose, accuracy, and equity of grading, respectively.
Question 17 and 18 asked teachers to reflect on what surprised them about grading during
COVID-19 and what they learned about the process, which ultimately connected back to the first
Research Question on the environmental impact on teachers’ grading.
The questions proceeded through the teacher’s perceptions of influences on their grading,
which addressed varying levels of Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological system level influences. At
the individual level, teachers were able to describe their individual understanding of the purpose
and practice of grading and reporting. Further, teachers were able to describe concentric levels
of influence from students, parents, other teachers, districts, state, and national levels and how
those levels of influence affected purpose, accuracy, and equity. Speaking to the chronosystem
layer, teachers were also able to reflect on changes over time on their grading and reporting
practice as the pandemic progressed.
Data Collection Procedures
Once teacher participants were identified as interview subjects, the researcher emailed the
participants for convenient times to be interviewed. Interviews occurred over Zoom. Any
teachers who participated in this study were given an Information Sheet, and their identities and
any information collected about them were kept confidential on a secure password-protected
database. Participants were informed that they could withdraw at any point with no penalty or
consequence. For all interviews, the researcher secured permission prior to the interview in order
to audio and/or video record the interviews. Further, all participants were provided with
transcripts of the interviews to allow them the opportunity to ensure the integrity of their words.
The projected time for each interview was roughly one hour, although some interviews exceeded

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that time to an hour and 45 minutes and close to two hours in one case, as teachers wanted to tell
their stories. At the completion of the research, the researcher sent the interview participants a
$20 Amazon gift card to thank them for their time. In addition to the video and audio recordings,
field notes were taken during each interview, both with running notes and observer comments.
All data was stored in a cloud-based drive in Drive, Dropbox, and the Zoom clouds with
transcripts also kept in Drive, Dropbox, Zoom, and Atlas.ti. There were no phone recorded
conversations.
Data Analysis
Transcripts were uploaded to Atlas.ti, a qualitative coding software program to identify
thematic coding groups. Detailed analysis of each transcript used a deductive process to initially
code for a larger number of thematic codes. After analysis of each transcript, the following
thematic coding groups were identified: Assessment; Attendance; Change; Communication;
Covid-19 Impact; Education; Educational Strategies; Equity; Expectations; Grading; Integrity;
Perceived Academic Issues; Policy; Social-Emotional-Cognitive Context; Student Context;
Technology: Challenges; Technology: Successes; Training; and Work Submission. From these
broader themes, the more granular groupings emerged of Policy Impacts; Covid-19 Impact and
Adaptations; Academic Issues, Attendance, and Integrity; Technology; and Equity. The
transcripts were also coded across the different system levels in Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological
Model to align with the conceptual framework, and the interview transcripts were also coded
across the four research questions to align with the purpose of the study. Analysis of the
frequency of comments per code per interview were aggregated into a table to assist in viewing
trends in the data. The Atlas graphs, in particular, were helpful in visually establishing the more

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significant themes. The granular thematic codes and the frequencies assisted the analysis of the
data to align with the Research Questions.
Validity and Reliability
To increase the validity and reliability of the qualitative interviews, this study attempted
to answer the research questions with regard to Merriam and Tisdell’s (2016) concepts of
credibility, consistency, and transferability, along with Erikson’s (1986) concept of reviewing
sample size along with evidentiary adequacy, using what Vasilieou (2018) called “adequate
amounts of evidence, adequate variety in kinds of evidence, adequate interpretive status of
evidence, adequate disconfirming evidence, and adequate discrepant case analysis” (p.15-16).
To establish credibility, this study attempted to provide triangulation using ten participants from
two different counties and across two different school levels (middle school and high school) to
cross-check reported participant experiences. Per Creswell (2019), this study utilized reflexivity,
as I reflected on my own background as a secondary teacher, as well as my experiences teaching
through COVID-19 to increase awareness of and account for potential biases; to increase
reflexivity, I purposely asked participants about multiple types of grading and reporting and
asked open-ended questions that reduce opportunity for leading questions. To prove
comprehensive data treatment and analysis for negative or discrepant responses as a form of
adequate engagement in data collection, I examined the coding for common themes and for
responses that ran counter to most of the respondents. In all cases, those marginally deviant
responses, though different, still aligned with the majority of the thematic coding and results of
the interviews. Finally, the study employed the validity strategy of peer review in the form of
multiple draft reviews by the USC dissertation committee.

64
To establish reliability, I was attentive to Merriam & Tisdell’s (2016) concepts of
consistency and transferability. To ensure these measures of reliability, Creswell (2019) and
Gibbs (2018) recommended focus on transcription checking, drift in coding, and team review of
goals and alignment. I used both Zoom transcript services combined with transcript review while
simultaneously watching the Zoom interviews to correct for inaccurate speech-to-text
transcription errors. I also employed the recommendations and advice of my dissertation
committee to be aware of and correct for definitional drift in coding. The coding of the
interviews demonstrated consistency of themes across all ten interviews with some differences
between teachers who taught at higher socio-economic level schools versus those who taught at
Title 1 or lower socio-economic level schools in levels of resources and support. Across teachers
of Title 1 schools vs. higher socio-economic level schools, though, the experiences in support
and resources were consistent, verifying reliability. Finally, this study collected a rich, thick
description of the data through detailed discussion of the setting and the participants’ experiences
of grading through COVID-19, purposefully seeking maximum variation in interviewing
teachers across different school levels and districts. Through using teams and an awareness of
drift and transcription errors, I attempted to provide reliability in this study.
Ethics
This study was submitted to the University of Southern California Institutional Review
Board (IRB), and the researcher followed its rules and guidelines regarding the protection of the
rights and welfare of the participants in this study. All teachers who participated in this study
were given an Informed Consent form online to sign at the commencement of the study, and
their identities and any information collected from them were kept anonymous and confidential
on a secure password-protected database. Participants could withdraw at any point with no

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penalty or consequence. For all interviews, the researcher secured permission prior to the
interview to audio and/or video record the interviews. Further, all participants were provided
with the opportunity to review transcripts of the interviews to ensure the integrity of their words.
All participants were reminded that there would be a nominal monetary compensation at the
conclusion of the study as thanks for their study participation. At the completion of the research,
the researcher sent the interview participants a $20 Amazon gift card.
This research was intended to benefit teachers, administrators, students, and parents alike,
but it was mainly intended to increase efficiency, equity, and accuracy of grading for teachers.
An equally important benefit of this research could be to the assessment, grading, reporting, and
support policies for ESE, ELL, minoritized, and priority learners for whom traditional grading
has been typically inadequate and inaccurate. Teachers could potentially have been concerned
that, if they gave negative responses to how they perceived their district’s grading and reporting
implementation, there could be retaliation. To alleviate this concern, no identifying information
about participating teachers was provided in the final dissertation or any other reporting.
Further, de-identified pseudonyms were created for each teacher for use in the Chapter 4
Findings section.

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CHAPTER FOUR: FINDINGS
The purpose of this study was to analyze south Florida secondary public school teachers’
perceptions of the environmental influences and potential changes surrounding grading and
reporting practices as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, this study sought to
identify and understand any potential influences on the purpose, accuracy, and equity of grading
during the pandemic.
Participants
The ten participants in the study included seven middle school and three high school
teachers from the South Florida area (see Table 2). Seven teachers taught in Broward County,
and three teachers taught in Palm Beach County. Of the ten teachers, five taught in Title 1
schools. Their years of teaching experience ranged from 4 years to 31 years with most teaching
around 20 years of teaching experience +/- 5 years. Five teachers taught at predominantly
affluent schools, whereas five teachers taught in schools with students from a mix of socioeconomic levels or lower socio-economic levels. The teachers also had a wide range of learners:
AP, IB, AICE, Gifted, Advanced, ESE, ELL, minoritized, and priority students. All interviewed
teachers in this study have been de-identified and issued pseudonyms.

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Table 2: Table of Interview Participants
Teacher Grade Level Title I? County
Years
Teaching
# of
Students
per Class Subject
6-8 9-12 Yes/No Broward
Palm
Beach
Sherry X No X 18 24-34 History
Mike X No X 5 15-24 Math
Veronica X Yes X 13 22-35
ELA/Journalism
/Media/Yearbo
ok
Ira X No X 24 30-60 Theater
Derrick X Yes X 31
American
History
Tony X No X 4 Math
Ed X Yes X 5 30-35 IB English
Robin X Yes X 23 30 IB English
Hugh X No X 20 25-35 Science
Liz X Yes X 16 25-35
AP
Psychology/AI
CE Global
Perspectives
Findings

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Research Question 1: Environmental Factors Influencing Teachers’ Perceptions of
Grading During COVID-19
The findings from the data indicated that four main themes emerged relating to Research
Question 1 as a result of the environmental factors influencing teachers’ perceptions of grading
during the pandemic:
1. State and District Policies Requiring Passing Grades
2. Policies on Late Work and Missing Work Acceptance and Penalties
3. Attendance, “Camera On,” and Participation Policies
4. Teacher Frustration with State and District Grading and Testing Policy Mandates
The state and districts required interviewed teachers to pass students, regardless of failing grades
or lack of work submission. Interviewed teachers were required to provide participation or
completion grades, accept late work with no penalties, and give grades for attendance, even if
students were off camera or did not participate, policies which left the interviewed teachers
feeling confused and conflicted. The state and district policies dictated changes on grading
during COVID-19, but the interviewed teacher participant response, as well as reported response
from colleagues of the interviewed teachers, varied and was inconsistent based on lack of
guidance and disagreement with state and district policy. Ultimately, all ten teachers reported
that the district and state grading policies led to inaccurate grading.
State and District Policies Requiring Passing Grades
Teachers interviewed reported that the state and district directives, whether expressed
stated or implied, were to pass all the students. For example, Veronica reported that in their
district, although the policy wasn’t expressly stated, an F wasn’t even an option in the grading
learning management system (LMS): “The state and district didn’t expressly state the policy, but

69
F wasn't even an option on Pinnacle. It was, A-B-C-D-no F. Where’s the F? No F.” Conversely,
Sherry explained that, although an F was an option in their gradebook, their district policy
explicitly noted in writing that they were to “grade up” and pass the students: “It was in writing.
For me, I did not do the F … Did they have the lowest D possible? Yes.”
Interviewed teachers from five Title 1 schools with mainly lower-level economically
disadvantaged students were also told to pass any failing students, which was a significant
number of students. According to Derrick, “There was nothing subtle about the message. The
message [from the district] was to pass these kids regardless of what’s happening.” Out of 120
students, Derrick had 80 students who were failing, and he struggled with passing a large number
of students who didn’t and couldn’t do the work, since they were missing a year of foundational
skills: “What were they going to do the next year? They were failing a good number of their
subjects.” He questioned the decision of the district and state to pass students who hadn’t
mastered the skills: “How do you move on to the next year of math when you don’t have that
year’s foundational skills, especially if they’re going into high school?” Derrick said that his
Administration would “give him guidance,” but at the end of the day, “it was to cover
themselves. The not subtle message was still, ‘Do what you need to do to pass the kids’ ... move
these children along. There was no punishment for academic dishonesty.” Derrick was surprised
that teachers were being forced to turn in “artificial grades, instead of finding some way to fix
the situation, and then everyone was treating them as normal or accurate grades.”
Whether policies about passing students were implicit or explicit, teachers in this study
reported that there was variation among their colleagues in terms of how closely they followed
policies about passing students. For example, Sherry reported that the district messaged that
teachers should “give [students] grace,” but some teachers at her school were resistant and failed

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students anyway. Robin, who taught both middle school and high school in Palm Beach County
during COVID-19, indicated that although the district asked teachers to try and avoid failing
students, if a student submitted no work, and the teacher attempted to communicate with students
and parents, and the teacher documented the lack of work, that student could fail, a reported
district policy at odds with the state policy. Mike, a middle school teacher in Broward County,
said that the district and state pointedly told them that every student would pass, regardless of
their grades over the course of the entire year: “I was told that their fourth quarter grades don't
count, so again, every kid was passing eighth grade, no matter what they got any other quarter.”
On zeros, though, Mike seemed to differ from the district and state policy: “But yeah, if a kid
didn't do any assignments, I'm still putting zeros.” Mike confirmed what Sherry reported at her
school: different teachers followed the district and state policy on failing students in differing
ways.
District and state communications on grading policies also varied, leading to confusion, a
lack of support for interviewed teachers, and inaccurate grades. Robin reported that the school
administration advised teachers in vague language to be as fair as possible and “do the best they
could” in an unprecedented situation. Some teachers interviewed, like Ed, a high school teacher
from Palm Beach County, reported no guidance on grading at all from the state, district, or
school administration: “I'm going to tell you that the amount of direction or support that I
received from administration here at this school was squat. Pretty much everything I did was on
my own.” Veronica commented on the state’s decision to cancel final exams in the fourth
quarter, saying the state’s and district’s guidance was, “Assign less, grade less, pass everybody.”
However, she didn’t know what to do when a student didn’t submit any work for the entire

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quarter grading period: “How can I pass them? What am I passing them on? I’m looking at a
completely empty [gradebook], but I’m supposed to give them a 60%.”
The lack of consistency, specificity, and accountability in state and district policies,
compounded by teachers who might have ignored those policies, meant problematic grades for
students and higher rates of failure amongst the three counties, despite teachers being told to pass
the students; therefore, the failure rates at these schools might possibly have been higher in
reality and were artificially depressed, despite the record high numbers of failing students.
During COVID-19, interviewed teachers struggled to find consistent grading policy, even within
the same district, and even when presented with guidance and policy from the state and district,
many teachers felt conflicted over that guidance or chose not to follow it.
Policies on Late Work and Missing Work Acceptance and Penalties
Interviewed teachers reported varying district policies regarding penalties for late work
acceptance or missing work, and teachers reported that those policies changed as the pandemic
continued from March 2020 to the 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 school years. All ten teachers
reported that state and district policies initially required teachers to accept late work without
penalties from March 2020 to June 2020. Consistent with the data findings on the policies
requiring interviewed teachers to “grade up,” evolving and conflicting district policies on late
work and missing work moving into the 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 school years caused
confusion and a lack of uniform acceptance and practice among interviewed teachers and their
colleagues.
From March 2020 to the end of the 2020 school year, Hugh, a middle school math and
science teacher in Broward County, said that he received emails from administration reminding
him that students might be going through difficult times, and they now had a policy of accepting

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late work and not taking points off. He spoke to the difficulties of adjusting to this new policy:
“I'm getting stuff at the end of the quarter that was assigned in April, and now I have to go back
and remember what those answers were or whatever it might be that I was grading.” Hugh
adhered to the policies on no late work policies but found it challenging to grade with accuracy.
Liz, a high school teacher in Palm Beach County, accepted late work on smaller
assignments during the pandemic with no penalty but still held students accountable with
penalties on major assessments, which differed from the district policy: “Now, on a small 15%
assignment, if it’s late, it’s not worth it to hold them back with a grade. With a test, it’s
different.”
Despite the pre-COVID-19 whole-school late policy where every day late was deducted a
grade down, Sherry chose not to follow the policy during the first two quarters of 2019-2020,
based on what she felt were harsh late penalties for the younger age of her students,
demonstrating well-intended but inconsistent adherence to grading and late work policies prior to
the pandemic. Moving into COVID-19, Sherry reported that the entire school went
asynchronous with full-school passing grades and no late penalty, which she reported she
followed but said that some of her colleagues chose not to follow; if students submitted work late
or did not submit work at all, some of her colleagues penalized and failed students, a practice
inconsistent with the district policy. Pre-pandemic and into the first few months of the
pandemic, teachers evinced varying levels of adherence to state and district policies on late work
and missing work acceptance.
State and district policies continued to change into the new 2020-2021 school year, and
teachers attempted to adjust their grading practices in response. Veronica maintained that after
October 2020, the state and district policy was still “assign less, grade less, don’t fail them,” but

73
she had to submit a list of students who weren’t submitting work or who were struggling, and the
district and state would reach out to the students. She said she felt like she had a little more back
up: “It wasn’t all on teachers to hunt down the kids.” During COVID-19, she changed her late
policy to a week late, and after that, it was 50% off the grade, which differed in policy from other
teachers within the district. She said that her “week late policy” and her “I’ll accept it all quarter,
but you’ll get 50% off after a week” made students lackadaisical about submitting work, and her
students were suddenly late with everything: “‘A’ students became ‘C’ students real fast.” All
ten teachers interviewed saw a direct correlation between the state- and district-mandated late
policies and a drop or “slide” in grades, a phenomenon they and other teachers interviewed
referred to as the “COVID-19 slide.”
Once teachers returned to in-person class in the 2021-2022 school year, interviewed
teachers reported that administrators tried to get teachers and students to go back to the original
late policies of the teacher, which could officially include point deductions for late work,
although even those policies varied. Hugh said they were told by the administration that, as long
as students turned something in, teachers were still asked to give them at least a 50% for the
grade. His personal grading policy was to deduct a few points off if it was late. The students
could not submit something more than a week late, and he posted the dates on Canvas, so the
students could see the due dates and when they could no longer submit the work, which he felt
increased clarity. Across districts, interviewed teachers were offered conflicting guidance on late
work, and like overall grading policies, some teachers chose not to follow those policies.
Attendance, “Camera On,” and Participation Policies
All ten interviewed teachers reported high rates of absenteeism, lack of participation, and
varying district and state policies for attendance once COVID-19 hit and students became virtual

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learners. Nine of the ten teachers interviewed reported that attendance was mandated to count
for a grade, but policies and practices varied within the same district as to whether students had
to have their cameras on in order to be counted present, or even if they had to indicate they were
participating to count attendance.
In the initial March to June 2020 phase of the pandemic, Liz affirmed that she was
encouraged by the district and school to take attendance, whether students’ cameras were on or
not, and if they were online, they received a participation grade, which helped most of their
grades. Ira, a Broward County middle school teacher, cited the statistic that Broward County’s
student failure rate more than doubled during COVID-19, which came as a large concern to him,
and which he attributed to students not participating online. Initially, Ira said that the county
dictated that if a student signed into Teams, teachers had to mark them present, but “kids would
sign in and then just not do anything, go back to sleep, or not participate.” He said that teachers
pushed back, but he said the parents were okay with their kids not showing up.
Veronica simplified her grading for attendance and participation. She would post a
discussion question, and if the students responded to it, they “were good and they would get a
participation grade…I just needed something to prove that you were alive.” Interviewed teachers
struggled to both hold students accountable and make sure they were physically safe and sound
while attempting to be authentic in their grading practices.
Transitioning into the 2020-2021 school year, all the interviewed teachers reported that
many students didn’t show up online. According to Ira, “There were some kids who did nothing,
some kids who didn't even log in, and kids that would log in but wouldn’t turn on a camera,
wouldn’t turn on a microphone, wouldn't let us know that they were there.” Ira stated that
teachers in the county complained to the district about their policy of marking students present,

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even if they didn’t appear on camera or participate: “We said they're signed in, but no one's
doing anything. At least hit the little yellow hand to say, “I'm here!” Right, we need to have
them turn the camera on, so we can see that they're physically there.” Ira ultimately encouraged
his students to turn their cameras on and participate, in contrast to the district policy.
At a different middle school in the same district as Ira, Veronica reported that initially, in
March 2020, attendance was not mandatory, and not everyone was expected to hold Teams
meetings for office hours, which varied from the policy of different middle schools in the same
district. By the 2020-2021 school year, though, Veronica communicated that teachers were
required to record whether the kids were coming to class and submitting work because it became
a truancy issue. Additionally, she stated that teachers were required by administration to have
Teams and teach both students in person and students at home, and attendance and work
submission mattered.
Derrick, a middle school teacher at a Title 1 school in Broward County, spoke to the
sharp increase in absenteeism with his lower socio-economically disadvantaged students. During
early COVID-19 in March to June of 2020, the attendance rate of his students dropped off by 60-
70%, and that absentee rate continued through the end of the 2020-2021 school year. The issue
of truancy and students’ lack of participation and the conflict it created with grading for nonattendance continued to come to a head between interviewed teachers and the district
administrators into the 2020-2021 school year.
By late November 2020, Miami-Dade and Broward County mandated that cameras
needed to be on for a student to be called and graded present in attendance. Differing slightly in
policy, Palm Beach County stated the goal of ensuring all students would have a laptop with a
functioning camera but no policy requiring it to be on; if the student logged in on time, they were

76
marked present, regardless of participation. Tony, a Broward County middle school math
teacher, said that despite the district policy that cameras needed to be on for attendance, that
frequently didn’t happen, and students still remained with their cameras off. To combat this offcamera lack of participation, Mike and Veronica asked the parents of non-participating students
to send them back to school in person to help the students improve, even though that suggestion
was at variance with district policy and was, as Veronica noted, potentially risky due to high
virus transmission rates at the time. Mike was one of the first teachers to state that COVID-19
immediately decreased student learning outcomes through lack of in-person teacher motivation
for students to learn. Interviewed teachers looked for ways to adjust their teaching and grading
practices in the face of off-camera and unmotivated students to create authentic learning and
grading while encouraging students to attend class.
By June of 2021, interviewed teachers were frustrated by the high rate of absenteeism
and lack of support by school staff who were often as burdened as the teachers. Ira stated that
some kids never signed in at all, and from August to the end of the year, there was just a line of
“As” for absent down the entire gradebook. There were two students in particular who never
showed up, and he reported their absences to the school guidance counselor, who never got back
to him. Weeks later, he followed up with the guidance counselor, and the guidance counselor
said, “We’re working on it. These kids are two of many. We’re overwhelmed. I’m sorry, but
we’re working through them.” Overall, interviewed teachers’ perceptions of the impact of
absenteeism, “camera-on,” and attendance policies by the district and state often reflected
students' lack of participation, support staff’s inability to keep up with the sheer numbers of
absent students, and those teachers’ desire to have grades authentically reflect student learning
when learning was not necessarily present.

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Teacher Frustration with State and District Grading and Testing Policy Mandates
From March 2020, interviewed teachers were left with little or conflicting guidance with
regard to grading related to testing, placement, and retention. All ten teachers reported feeling
confusion and/or frustration with state and district standardized testing, grading, and grade
retention policies to slightly differing degrees. All the teachers struggled to adjust or adapt to
perceptions of inequitable or meaningless grading and testing policies that shifted in importance
as the pandemic continued.
Mike confided that nobody really knew what to do with grading, and the district said that
fourth quarter grades for 2019-2020 would not count towards a student’s grade retention
requiring them to repeat a grade. His school had a pre-COVID-19 grading and assessment policy
with a grade weighting breakdown of 10% homework, 20% classwork, 30% quizzes, and 40%
tests, but he said those percentages were invalidated once COVID-19 hit. Mike said that, preCOVID-19, Broward County had introduced a math program where students would complete an
“iReady” diagnostic test at the beginning of the year, and the test results would ideally place
students in a grade level for math. Students would then take the same test again at the end of the
year, which would help with grade placement or retention for the next year. None of the iReady
tests counted towards students’ grades; the test was purely diagnostic for placement. Mike was
initially concerned that his students’ fourth quarter iReady tests would be inaccurate or
inconsistent as a reflection of their learning for the year, but the state ultimately canceled iReady
testing for the final quarter of 2019-2020, leading to teachers’ questions on how students were
assessed for retention and grade leveling.
Ed, a high school English teacher at a Title 1 high school in Palm Beach County, railed
against the state and district guidance to teachers to “do no harm” to the students in testing and

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assessment: “There is nothing that should happen in my classroom that you'd be harming
anybody. That the district or state would have to say that is almost embarrassing, and it hurts me
to realize that … some teachers do.” Ed also expressed frustration over district testing and
grading policies that he saw as unnecessary, meaningless, and superfluous busy work that was
never checked by the district. He claimed that the district passed down a “two tests per week”
requirement that they did not explain or check, and at the school administrative level, no one
knew what those requirements meant, so they couldn’t explain them to the teachers. Teachers
grappled with how to administer testing that was not well defined by the district or school in
purpose or application: “What is that: two tests a week, two reading checks a week, two quizzes
a week? Because they don't know, they can't explain it, and … it's left up to the individual
teachers to figure that out.” Despite this “two grades a week” district policy, he said that his first
priority was always the students: “It just so happens that if I actually have enough grades to meet
the two grades a week requirement, great, but if I didn't then … sorry, district, but I do what I
need to do for my students.” He differentiated between his own perception of good teachers and
poor teachers in following district testing guidance: “Good teachers have figured it out for
themselves and applied that in a way that helps students, and poor teachers are probably doing
reading checks and meaningless quizzes…just so they meet the requirement of two grades a
week.” State and district testing and grading policies that were implemented pre-COVID-19
were questioned or ignored by interviewed teachers who felt they were out of line or out of touch
with student or teacher needs during COVID-19.
Participants also expressed frustration over the state standardized testing policies during
COVID-19. According to Robin, the state and district initially still intended to keep the Florida
Standards Assessments (FSAs), the official state assessment of Florida student learning pre-

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COVID-19 and during the pandemic. Therefore, the Palm Beach County School District also
kept the policy of teaching district mandated formative and summative assessments called
Florida Standards Quizzes (FSQs) and Unit Standards Assessments (USAs) meant to prepare the
students for the end of the year FSA, even though not every school in the district followed the
protocol. According to Robin, some schools’ administrators, mainly of Title 1 schools,
mandated their teachers administer FSQs and USAs, regardless of what content or curriculum
teachers were teaching, whereas other schools’ administrators chose not to administer them. All
state tests were ultimately canceled at the end of the 2019-2020 school year, even though some
schools had prepped for them during COVID-19. Robin expressed disappointment with the
inequity that, in the 2020-2021 school year, not all schools within the same district administered
the FSQ and USA tests during COVID-19, repeating the same trend of differing assessments and
grading policies within the same district and among different districts, especially in Title 1
schools.
Sherry spoke to what she saw as unfair assessment of students through COVID-19. By
the end of the 2020-2021 school year, although most kids were in her classroom, and only five or
six were at home, she said when they came in for the FSA tests, her students “were petrified,”
since some had never met her in person, and the first time they were setting foot on campus was
to take a major standardized test that would determine their placement. Ultimately, interviewed
teachers questioned state and district standardized and regular testing, placement, and retention
policies, and as with other grading, late work, and absenteeism policies, teachers followed the
state and district guidance to varying degrees.
Research Question 2: Teachers’ Perceptions Regarding the Purpose of Grading During
COVID-19

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The findings from the data indicated that two main themes emerged relating to Research
Question 2 in teachers’ perceptions of the purpose of grading before and during the pandemic:
1. Shift in Perceptions of Purpose of Grading Before and During COVID-19
2. Shift in Perceptions of Grading in Motivation
As COVID-19 progressed, interviewed teachers reported that student perceptions of the purpose
of grading changed in response to district and state policies that either removed grades entirely,
removed the fear of failing, canceled end of the year state exams, removed late penalties, and
counted attendance (on camera or not) as participation. Interviewed teachers accordingly
reported a shift in student motivation, one that moved towards a negative, transactional,
extrinsically motivational purpose with little to no intrinsic motivation for learning without a
corresponding grade. In response to this shift in student motivation and perception of the
purpose of school and grading, interviewed teachers were forced to shift, adapt, and modify their
own grading practices and their own views of the purpose of grading, assessment, and reporting.
Participants also reported frustration with other teachers’ grading policies that reflected a
different and often conflicting purpose than their own.
Teachers’ Perceptions of the Purpose of Grading Before and During COVID-19
In interviews, teachers’ perceptions of the purpose of grading, assessment, and reporting
varied before and during COVID-19. In a pre-COVID-19 world, the ten interviewed teachers
reported that they viewed the purpose of grading and assessment as:
● informational tools to demonstrate mastery of knowledge and skills learned;
● a method of social-emotional support;
● a means of holding students accountable and teaching accountability for their future;

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● information to help evaluate students’ strengths and weaknesses and methods of
improvement;
● a means of ensuring student success;
● feedback and reflection;
● a tool to help prepare students for future major assessments, future college classes, and
future career skills;
● and motivation to do well in the class and in school.
Once the pandemic hit, all ten of the teachers in the study changed their perceptions of the
purpose of grading, as they encountered students who were under stress, not participating, or
unable to meet standards.
Grading as Informational Tool to Gauge Mastery Pre-COVID-19
For six of the interviewed teachers, grading pre-COVID-19 served as a form of
informational tool to demonstrate the mastery of the subject material and skills. Sherry, a middle
school teacher in Broward County, saw the purpose of grading as an opportunity to gauge
mastery: “Have they mastered the benchmarks and goals that they, as teachers and the state, have
set out for the students? What percent of the knowledge did they absorb?” She said that there are
other aspects that are helpful in allowing the students to show their knowledge “besides a 90 on a
test,” like presentations and reports. She used rubrics, and she tried to be sensitive, both before
and during COVID-19, of her students’ anxieties, while gaining an accurate sense of what they
knew and helping them to succeed. Pre-COVID-19, Sherry equated student success with
students’ happiness and their demonstration of mastery of content.
Ira saw the purpose of grading as testing knowledge of facts, dates, and information. For
assessment pre-COVID-19, he did a combination of summative multiple choice or true/false

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tests, performances, and projects, all based on a standards-based rubric. He says he always gave
students the rationale for the project, what skills they should learn and demonstrate, and how it
would help them. With his rubrics, they either did the skill or they didn't, which was his version
of utilizing a pass/fail grade per skill. Like Sherry, Ira saw pre-COVID-19 grading as a method
to gauge what students know while attempting to provide an equitable means of assessment.
In a slight variation, Derrick maintained that the purpose of grading was to “test how
much knowledge they have acquired” with the codicil that grading should also show teachers
how to adjust teaching and reteaching to help the student improve their understanding: “If they
haven't learned material, then you need to either differentiate material and reteach it, or you need
to find some other way to make sure that you can get through to the students.” Derrick
connected the purpose of grading as assessing mastery but also a form of feedback for the
teacher to adjust teaching to aid student mastery.
Similarly, Ed asserted the purpose of grading was to know if he was teaching effectively,
to gauge whether they understood the material and, by correlation, if he was teaching it in a
useful method. As an IB teacher focusing on critical thinking, he didn’t use chapter tests, reading
checks, or quizzes. He relied instead on Socratic seminars and the quality of their response to
assess if the students had done the reading. Grading, to him, was an opportunity “to see whether
you're understanding the concepts of the basic themes and ideas that are in whatever text we're
studying.” He said the act of grading answers whether, or to what degree, they understood what
they were reading. He focused on the “end goal” in teaching and grading with regard to major
assessments: “Can they take an exam in May that IB administers and pass it, toward getting their
diploma, toward getting college credit, toward starting college not only prepared, but also armed
with some credits? … Right, that's the end goal.” Ed connected the purpose of grading pre-

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COVID-19 as a means of gauging knowledge acquisition and checking that they prepared
students well enough to be successful on the end of the year exam.
Robin saw grading as a form of quantifiable measurement of learning: “Measurement is
important. I think there does need to be some sort of standardized way to communicate
information to parents, to students, to myself, you know, so I do think grading does have its
place.” Like the other six teachers, she saw grading as “mainly an informational tool,” but in a
slight variation to Ed and Derrick and the value of grading as feedback to the teacher, Robin saw
grading as a method to help the students themselves understand their own progress: “Most
students struggle when it's completely open, so understanding the set of expectations is
important. What am I supposed to be demonstrating that I have learned and understood by this
task?” She viewed grading as a tool to help students understand the end goal and how to get
there. Robin was also an IB teacher, and she spoke about how she still carried IB concepts like
holistic and criterion-based grading and assessment as part of her teaching and grading
philosophy and practice.
Liz, who taught AP, AICE, and IB at some point during the pandemic, also saw the
purpose of grading as a means as a measurement to, “standardize and be able to evaluate where
students are and where they're successful, what they're getting, and where they're struggling.”
Like Robin, Liz saw the goal of grading as equally student-centered: “Number one, you can try
and help bring them up, but I do think [the goal is] also, especially teaching assessment-based
classes, to kind of give them an idea of where they're at and how they're likely to perform with
their exams.” Overall, more than half of the teachers interviewed connected the purpose of
grading to assessing what the students knew, preparing them for end of term exams, and helping
students understand their own progress.

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Shift in Purpose of Grading and Assessment as Social-Emotional Support During COVID-19
Over half of the teachers interviewed reflected that they changed their perception of
grading and assessment to a method of social-emotional support, out of necessity for the welfare
of their students. In the context of this study on grading, social-emotional support referred to
teachers’ realization that students were not able to meet prior expectations of grading standards,
due to stress, mental health challenges, fear, lack of adult supervision, responsibilities of taking
care of siblings, working while going to school, and lack of school structure. Liz spoke of a shift
in her perceived purpose for grades as social-emotional support during COVID-19: “A lot of
teachers were saying, “My students are struggling and kind of where can we step back, where
can we support them a little bit, what are we doing to help them?” Liz suggested that teachers
needed to take a step back and reflect on their practices and consider what they could do to “help
these kids to get them back on track.” For Liz, grading and assessment helped support student
learning and social-emotional wellness, so she needed to shift her perception of the purpose of
grading to support both the student’s emotional well-being and student learning.
In March 2020, Veronica adjusted her initially strict view of grading and assessments
from daily assignments that no longer worked during COVID-19 to weekly assignments in
response to the students’ social-emotional needs during COVID-19. She reported that her
students couldn’t log on every day, so she needed to be “super, super flexible,” and she adjusted
her attitude to “I'm happy if I hear from you at any point and if you turn in anything at any
point.” Veronica originally had a midterm and a final, since it was a high school credit class, so
she attempted to figure out how to balance the kids’ needs with a final, and then the state
canceled the final exams: “ I stopped teaching the journalistic standards because there was no
final exam for them anymore to worry about, and I didn't want to add any more stress or pressure

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to them.” Veronica pivoted away from a strict viewpoint of grading as preparation for the
realities of adult life towards the purpose of grading and assessment to include flexibility and
compassion during COVID-19.
Pre-COVID-19, Ira saw the purpose of grading both to assess the students but also to lift
them up from a social-emotional perspective. He said that he would initially tell his students that
his class was not a competition, and there were not a limited number of As. Once COVID-19 hit,
he tried to make it equitable and accessible and give them choices, despite the challenges. For
2020-2021, Ira’s grades all became participation grades, as that was easier and better for the
students from his perspective, and it helped him to meet the district and state requirements.
Derrick remarked on the social-emotional component to grading for his Title 1 students,
especially once the pandemic began. He said that everyone went into “survival mode” and that
education ceased to be a priority for students and parents. His attitude was that “if the students
did something, great. If they didn't do something, if they didn't do any work, so be it.” The
purpose of grading shifted for Derrick to supporting students’ home-life challenges and
emotional health to encourage them to turn anything in.
To combat some of the lack of work submission during COVID-19, Tony let the students
turn in late work, something he wouldn’t have done prior to COVID-19. To get students to
submit their work, he would send students emails and send their parents emails. All the teachers
interviewed ultimately modified the purpose and application of grading and assessment in order
to support their students’ social-emotional wellness and learning during COVID-19.
Shift in Perceptions of Grading as Motivation
Seven of the ten teachers interviewed spoke about grades as motivation, both as positive
and negative motivators for students. Sherry said grades were a motivator for some kids and, for

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other kids, they’re a “demotivator.” She asserted that there are so many different students,
personalities, and anxieties, and she tried to hold them accountable while being thoughtful and
respectful of their social-emotional individual needs.
Tony saw the purpose of grading as allowing kids to see how they’re doing, to give
students something for which to strive. He very much believed that grades are motivational, and
that kids wouldn’t care about learning without the grade to push them: “These grades are really
pushing them forward to something, because if there's no grades, what are they really doing it
for?” Tony remarked that the average middle school students “don't really care if X plus five
equals eight, that X equals three,” and he asserted that students wouldn’t care about math unless
they were graded.
Indeed, all interviewed teachers expressed surprise and exasperation that, when the
carrot-and-stick behavioral motivation of grades as rewards for learning demonstration was taken
away during COVID-19 due to state and district policies, students expressed little to no intrinsic
motivation to complete their work.
Grades as Transactional and Extrinsic Motivation
In the realm of extrinsic versus intrinsic motivation, Ira was surprised by how much
apathy there was on the part of students, especially once students understood how the state and
district “no fail” and “no late penalty” policies benefited them: “I'm not talking about the socialemotional issues. I'm talking about pure laziness, and then you always get the few kids at the end
of the quarter, ‘Can I get extra credit, can I get extra credit?’ Now, I gave you nine weeks to do
this, and you're coming to me at eight weeks?” He said he didn’t believe in extra credit, but if a
student did the assignments, and that student was close to the next grade up, and they showed
good effort, he might bump them up to the next level. Ira, like other teachers interviewed, spoke

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to the direct connection between the district’s grading and late policies to a lack of student
extrinsic motivation due to permissive late policies. Ira also demonstrated both a willingness to
change his own grading techniques in response to shifting student behaviors during COVID-19
and a willingness to artificially inflate his grades, if it benefited the students’ social-emotional
health associated with higher grades.
Robin commented on the problematic nature of grading once students returned to inperson class after a year of being home and earning completion and participation grades for
minimum work: “They are looking at me like, “I don’t understand. Why are you upset right now
with this? What's the problem?” And it's very transactional; it's “I completed the hoop. Where's
my A? Why did I not get an A?” She commented that parents were equally trained to focus on
the extrinsic grade without reflecting on the quality of the work submitted instead of completion
of the work: “I get a follow-up parent’s email: ‘Why did they not get an A? They said they did
it.’ I'll say, ‘Yes, they did do it, but these were the things that had to be met. They didn't meet
them.” Robin pointed out that not everything can be a completion grade, as students need to
master skills that would prepare them for end of year exams. She was dismayed that, in her
view, parents and students saw grades as transactional, and they did not really care that their
child was learning: “Their kid wants to go to Harvard, or you know, it's about the monetization,
if that's the right way to say it, or the A. ‘I need that A because I want to be the valedictorian.’”
Robin implied that students and parents had always been transactional and extrinsically
motivated by grades, but COVID-19 exacerbated the negative transactional nature, and that
students expected the output of grades by teachers with very little input of effort from students.
Liz spoke about the negative motivation of school-mandated completion grades for AICE
classes during COVID-19. After teaching during COVID-19, she claimed she would definitely

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use fewer completion grades, especially in the AICE assignments. She also didn’t like the way
she did participation grades, and although she wanted to use them to motivate the kids, she
wanted to rethink how she would do them in coming years. She said completion grades did not
motivate the students to do quality work; they only motivated them to complete the work.
Further, as much as she would love to get rid of end of the year tests, she said that, without them,
teachers and students fell apart; they lost their motivation and their reason for learning if they
didn’t have to demonstrate that learning at the end of the year.
Overall, interviewed teachers indicated that the transactional extrinsic motivation of
grades created negative effects on student learning once COVID-19 policies removed the grades
or expectations of work submission, even if teachers reluctantly felt that the extrinsic
motivational factors of end of year tests and norm-referenced criterion grading was necessary to
continue to motivate students post-pandemic.
Shift Towards Purpose of Grading to Create Intrinsic Motivation
After teaching through COVID-19, several interviewed teachers reflected that teachers
should deliberately rethink their grading and assessments, so students understand the purpose
behind the assignment, the “why,” so they feel engaged. Ed, a high school teacher at a Title 1
school in Palm Beach County, felt that teachers should be deliberate in their planning of
summative assessments, “assessing whether they're learning what they need to be learning, so
that they're prepared for whatever the final assessment is. Formatives are fine, as long as they
lead to the summative, but a lot of times, they don't connect.” Further, Ed asserted that the
students should want to understand the purpose of the test, how it connects to what they’re
learning, and how it will help them later: “If I'm giving you an assessment or an exam or
whatever, and you're not sure why I'm doing it, it's okay to ask. If I don't have a good answer,

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then maybe we shouldn't be doing it.” Ed referenced one main principle of Universal Design for
Learning (UDL), that students have access to assignments and assessments that are aligned,
engaging, and meaningful for the student. Ed recognized a benefit in shifting his purpose and
alignment in grading to create more intrinsic motivation through an understanding of the “why.”
Six interviewed teachers noted their shift in the perceptions of the purpose of grading
towards holistic grading and assessment and expressed a desire to move towards alternative
methods of grading. Veronica, who initially self-identified as a strict, traditional normreferenced grader pre-COVID-19, spoke of not being satisfied with traditional grading and
wished she could move to a more Montessori approach and/or pass/fail system to encourage
student agency, a love of learning, and initiative through assessment options and holistic grading.
She preferred a system of grading and assessment that allowed students to show growth and
mastery/demonstration of skills but without traditional one-size fits all testing.
Ira contended that the purpose of grading to the student is all about getting the highest
grade to get college credit, and he claimed that student perceptions about grading were due to the
school system putting entirely too much emphasis on grades and not enough on learning:
“Learning takes place at so many different levels. When we kind of box in the learning to a
numerical score, it's not always even, it's not always fair from one kid to the next.” Ira remarked
how students learn differently, and like Veronica, he wished secondary schools could take a
college approach to grading and do pass/fail: “If we could do it the way [universities] grade,
which is pass/fail, I think we'd be so much more on target. You know, this person demonstrated
their knowledge in a different way than this person demonstrated their knowledge.” In
removing the pressure of the letter grade or score, Ira aimed to shift the goal towards the intrinsic
value of learning: “If the goal of education is to impart knowledge and give tools to discover, not

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telling [students] what to think, but how to think, how to research and how to find things on their
own, let them do that.” He commented that pass/fail would never be a realistic option in
secondary schools, though, since there was so much competition and pressure to get into high
level colleges, and grades were everything.
Ed, a Palm Beach County IB high school teacher, advocated in his interview for
standards-based grading and the use of rubrics and rating scales, and he expressed an interest in
continuing to publish everything online ahead of time, as he learned to do out of necessity during
COVID-19, making it all accessible to students, and letting the students practice with it
beforehand, so they understood it. He also expressed the desire that grading and assessment
would be beneficial and motivating: “If my goal is to make sure that they understand the
material, and I need to give them some sort of an assessment to do that, it has to be done in a way
that's helpful and positive.” Ed advocated for a policy where exams cannot or should not be
given for punitive purposes but should be done instead with an eye toward assessing whether
students are learning or not. Once Ed saw the benefit of using rubric scoring and making course
content available online during COVID-19, his perception of the purpose of grading shifted to
student access, agency, and positive motivation and evaluation.
Robin longed to reevaluate how teachers assign grades and perhaps move to criterionscoring and get rid of the concept of the F and averaging with percentages: “You know, 50 to
100, and anything lower than that doesn't have any relevancy, really, so I would kind of get away
from that concept of “fail” and instead shift the conversation to “not yet.” Robin championed
the concept of an “I Contract,” which she said offered both the student and the teacher multiple
opportunities for them each to help the student improve: “I'm going to give you alternate things,
I'm going to give you another opportunity, I'm going to meet with you, and you're going to fulfill

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the obligations in some other way, and then that's the grade.” In shifting the purpose of grading
towards giving the student time and permission to redo their work, Robin hoped to create
intrinsic motivation in the students.
Hugh noticed that, during COVID-19, his students did almost none of the homework
since the points were weighted disproportionately towards the tests, and they were already
struggling to submit their work. He hypothesized that if he changed his grading system to make
all assignments of equal weight, they might do the homework assignments, since there were
more homework assignments, and it would ultimately boost their grade while helping them learn
the content. Due to his change in grading policy to make all assignments weighted equally, the
students began to do all the homework assignments; as a result, the students had a greater
understanding of the material, and they accordingly performed more successfully on the tests.
His change in the purpose of grading because of his students’ lack of motivation led to a shift in
the application of grade weighting, which placed emphasis on the importance of every
assignment.
Hugh reported that his colleagues in the Math Department also moved away from the
weighted categories to equally weighted grading during COVID-19, after he introduced them to
his new grading system. As a result of changing his grading system, he learned that his kids were
more responsible and both extrinsically motivated, since completing the work led to a higher
score, and intrinsically motivated, since they realized that completing the homework led to better
understanding of the content. Students understood that, even though they might lose one or two
points on an assignment, those points added up if they didn’t do the work, so they submitted
better work over the last year and a half that he graded without categories and weighting.

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Other interviewed teachers questioned how weighted grades hurt student motivation and
performance during COVID-19. Mike commented that the state standards should have been
lowered going into the 2020-2021 school year, and he felt that test and quiz percentage
weighting should have been lowered by the district or the state, because he had bright kids who
were really hurt by the weighting of the tests and quizzes. Shifting the purpose of grading
toward more opportunities for growth, independence, self-regulation, and practice, teachers
aimed to increase student intrinsic motivation and focus on the value of learning.
Purpose of Grading as Intrinsic Motivation Due to Program Pedagogy
For those interviewed teachers who taught national or international programs that
emphasized a demonstration of critical thinking and mastery of content as the purpose of grading
(such as in IB), participants claimed their grading stayed the same pre-COVID-19 and during the
pandemic, as did the consistent high quality of student response. In programs that emphasized a
“right or wrong answer” to determine the high score as the purpose of grading (as in AP) or with
programs that used completion grading during the pandemic (like AICE), students lacked
motivation and interviewed teachers struggled to adapt their grading practices to motivate
students.
Liz, who taught IB and who currently teaches AP and AICE, commented that, with AP
Psychology, though it was technically criterion-based grading, it was really a “right or wrong
answer” type of course: “As much as I love it, because I love psychology … it is a rote memory
course … even though we use rubrics, our rubrics are based on content, where IB is not as
structured in that way.” Conversely, Liz spoke about how the rubrics in IB focused on the
critical thinking skills instead of rote memorization, which shifted the purpose of grading with
rubrics to helping the students metacognitively assess their learning. Liz further contrasted

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grading both AP and IB with AICE, which she said was more challenging to grade, as she was
asked to grade with completion scores: “I know there's a push with a lot of AICE grading to just
give them completion, and I kind of followed that,” even though she was uncomfortable doing
completion grading. She could see where criterion-based grading applied better to the European
models like IB, but she struggled to bring it into AP and AICE. Ultimately, how Liz graded –
criterion-based or norm-referenced or completion – depended on the course she was teaching and
the style of course.
Other IB teachers interviewed also commented on how the IB pedagogy, which focused
less on large numbers of texts and more on critical thinking, standards-based grading, and
student agency, encouraged students to achieve more intrinsic motivation to dive deep into
learning, learn independently, and demonstrate a higher level of mastery. After grading through
COVID-19, Robin, a high school teacher with a strong background in IB, returned back to the
basics of why teachers teach and how they grade and what the purpose of grading is: “It did
bring home the idea that, ‘Why am I doing what I'm doing?’ You know, in terms of assignments,
in terms of content, even mandated content, really asking myself … What is the purpose of this?”
Like Ed, Robin questioned, “If my answer is ‘I don’t really know,’ then why am I doing it? Why
am I doing it to them, why am I doing it to me?” In an ideal world, Robin said she would “love
to go to criterion-scoring like a real IB program does, where it's less about the percentage of A,
B, C, D grade and more on the continuum: I started ‘here,’ and I need to get ‘here.’” Robin’s
background in IB offered her a different perspective on the purpose of grading and assessment
than other non-IB teachers, one that focused on standards-based grading, an emphasis on the
learning rather than on the score, and an intrinsically motivating path where students understood

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where they were now and how to get where they needed to be, a sentiment echoed by other IB
teachers interviewed.
Overall, due to COVID-19, teachers began to review and revise the purpose of grading
and how they could apply it as a result of shifting student behavior related to grading and
assessment. Most spoke of a shift towards policies that would increase student access and
engagement, creating intrinsic motivation to not only do the work but understand the purpose
behind what they were learning, so they could take ownership of their learning journey. The
majority of the teachers interviewed said, if possible, they would consider shifting grading
practices away from traditional norm-referenced grading to criterion-grading or even pass/fail
grading based on mastery of content.
Research Question 3: Teachers’ Perceptions Regarding the Accuracy of Grading During
COVID-19
The findings from the data indicated that three main themes emerged relating to Research
Question 3 in teachers’ perceptions of the accuracy of grades during the pandemic:
1. Teachers’ Perceptions of Grading Inaccuracies Due to Student Cheating
2. Teachers’ Perceptions of Grading Inaccuracies Due to Grade Inflation
3. Teachers’ Perceptions of Grading Inaccuracies on State and International Assessments
During the COVID-19 pandemic, all ten interviewed teachers widely reported grading and
reporting inaccuracies during COVID-19 as a result of state and district grading policies, grade
inflation, and omnipresent cheating. Overall, interviewed teachers reported high levels of
grading inaccuracy during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Teachers’ Perceptions of Grading Inaccuracies Due to Student Cheating

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All the teachers interviewed reported open cheating by their students as soon as the
COVID-19 pandemic hit and students went to virtual learning at home, and teachers saw an
immediate impact on the accuracy of their grades. Asked if she felt grades were accurate during
COVID-19, Sherry replied, “No, and I will tell you why … because you're on Teams, and you're
cheating. They are opening up a Google to find the answers, and we all knew that, but there was
nothing we can do about it.” Once she was back in the classroom in 2020-2021, the hybrid
model created different problems in accuracy and ethics. Sherry reported that if students knew
they were having a chapter test, they would stay home that day, so they could cheat on the test
from home. She did not have control of their screens or the ability to see their screens, so she
couldn’t see what they were doing, so students at home had different advantages than students in
person: “There was no way for me to ensure that the kids weren't [cheating at home]. So, in
answer to your question, no, the grades during COVID-19, they did not accurately reflect what
they knew because they cheated.”
Mike attempted to combat the cheating by enlisting the parents for support. Unlike
Sherry, he required parents to get a second camera that was pointed at their screen, so he could
see what they were looking at: “I said, ‘Parents, when your kid takes a quiz or a test, or a
classroom assignment, they have to have another camera angle on their phone that aims at their
little work area. That way there's no cheating involved.’” In addition to having multiple cameras,
he also attempted to correlate students’ grades with what they had already scored on the iReady
diagnostic tests they took earlier in the year. It was a way of checking up on whether they were
learning. If there was a question as to cheating, he would call the parents, and he would call the
kids online early or after class, and he would ask them math questions or ask them to take
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To attempt to control the environment for accuracy and academic honesty, Mike also
asked students to throw their phone behind them on the bed where he could see it, and he would
allow them to demonstrate their learning. If they knew the material, they would get the grade; if
they didn’t, they didn’t get the grade. For students who just didn’t know the material and who
were clearly cheating and failing in his class, he said that those were the parents whom he
begged to send the students back in person once it was feasible in 2020-2021, and they usually
did come back in, and he reported that those students did better. In this manner, he attempted to
hold students and parents accountable.
Mike also mentioned that his colleagues were all in similar situations regarding
combating cheating and a total lack of accuracy: “Our lunch times, our breakfast times, our
meeting times are just mostly, as bad as it sounds, it's mostly complaining about COVID-19
teaching and grading.” Mike felt that, once he implemented his strategies to avoid cheating, at
least 90% of the grades were accurate for the kids. Later in the interviews, though, Mike stated
that he altered his grading policies with all good intentions to make it easier for the students to
perform well in his class, which indicated grade inflation.
Robin, a former IB and current AP and AICE teacher in Palm Beach County, said that
when COVID-19 hit, the immediate impact was a significant increase in cheating: “I had high
performing students who were very grade centric who were cheating. Essentially, it led to just a
massive, massive amount of plagiarism, of malfeasance, of sharing work, and, you know,
Snapchatting to each other.” Once classes returned in person, Robin said her seniors were
brutally honest with her about their motivations in their decision to stay home: “Why would I get
up, get dressed, drive, fight traffic to do the same thing I can do right here on the computer with
this camera off and play Xbox and cheat and get better grades?” Robin struggled to find ways to

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create authentic learning and grading in an environment that provided easy access to academic
dishonesty.
Derrick, a teacher of gifted, advanced, and lower level students at a Title 1 school in
Broward County, reported that, even for his gifted students, cheating was a real problem: “They
cheated, and they cheated, and they cheated, so there was no accuracy … many of them just cut
and pasted what their classmates did, so because there was no way to really closely monitor it,
they cheated.” Tony reported that, pre-COVID-19, he felt that grades were accurate because
everyone was in class, so it was difficult to cheat, teachers were walking around, and kids knew
that. At home, though, kids were on the computers: “They would say, ‘My camera’s not
working,’ and they were cheating a lot, and there was only so much we could do to make sure
they weren’t.” Interviewed teachers tried to make sure the kids’ cameras were on, but again,
district and state policies prevented them initially from requiring the students to have the cameras
on.
During COVID-19, Tony felt that grades weren’t accurate due to widespread cheating.
He knew that another teacher in his department made the kids use two cameras to prevent
cheating, but he didn’t feel like he could get his kids to do that as sixth and seventh graders. He
also said that kids told him that they cheated in that other teacher’s class anyway – they found
ways around it: “Kids are ruthless these days; they don't even care anymore.” Tony mentioned
that there were multiple cheating sites for math (PhotoMath, MathAway, etc.), and kids were
pragmatic: “It's either I can learn this and be bored, and I don't really care about this, or I can
have this website do it for me, and I'm done, and I can do whatever I want.” He said the worst of
the cheating was during March to June 2020, when there was little accuracy. Making videos and
telling the kids to watch them and then take a quiz, they could be watching the videos while

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they’re taking the quiz. Tony was very frustrated by his inability to hold students accountable
and help them learn.
Hugh reported that, as in other interviewed teachers’ classes, cheating was a problem
during the pandemic: “When they're at home on the computer, you didn't know what they were
doing. I assume they were using their notes, I assume they were doing whatever … but you don’t
know what’s on their screen.” Hugh also noticed a lot of cheating once students returned to
school: “Someone would do the assignment, and then they would just send it to that friend; they
would just copy and paste it, and it was a lot more since we've come back.” In response to the
cheating, he now asks for more handwritten work.
Liz, an AP, IB, and AICE high school teacher, adjusted to the cheating by attempting to
incorporate the very resources students were using to cheat. Prior to the pandemic, she was
doing vocabulary quizzes, but she discontinued those during COVID-19, since they could cheat,
but even with AP Classroom, they were Googling the answers, so she tried to figure out what she
could do and is still trying. One strategy she attempted was to change her grading percentages, so
participation was 15%, and that was mainly studying and doing Quizlet Learn quizzes. She said
they’re still cheating, but more are using it to learn.
Teachers’ Perceptions of Grading Inaccuracies Due to Grade Inflation
Seven interviewed teachers changed their methods of grading, either based on district or
state policies or based on an earnest desire to encourage the students to submit work and engage
in the learning process. Ultimately, these grading changes led to grade inflation and inaccurate
grades being reported for student performance.
Sherry commented that, during COVID-19, there was guidance from administration to
“throw everything kind of out the door, like you understood that they were looking at notes, they

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were looking at other things.” She still pushed the kids to write responses, even though she
noted the kids were using notes and other references on tests. Liz echoed the same message: “It
wasn't the normal grading system, so in some ways that worked for some of them, and in some it
didn't … but my test grades were inflated, and I knew it, but it was like, what else do I do?” The
implication from both teachers was that both they and their administrations knew that grades
were artificially inflated.
Mike contended that his motivation in assessment and grading was to get his students
ready for high school, and he still gave out homework, but once COVID-19 hit, he lowered the
frequency to one assignment per week instead of one every other day per week, so they could
still practice. They had a classwork assignment and a test/quiz once per week, as well. He tried to
be flexible with the students while meeting the curriculum. Into the 2020-2021 school year, Mike
said teaching an honors high school class online was tough on the kids, and he was very sensitive
to the challenges of learning online: “I cannot blame the kid for trying to learn online, just
because of the fact that there's so many distractions, so I would drop their lowest quiz grade
every quarter.” He also reduced the amount of homework because “I know that the HRW
system we use is pretty difficult.” He changed to more application homework instead of word
problems, and if they got a 70 or above, they would get full credit; whereas, pre-COVID-19, he
wouldn’t do that. He also made the classwork assignments, quizzes, and tests easier for them
during COVID-19 (fewer fractions and decimals, etc.), and since there were fewer homework
assignments, and the classwork was worth more, it helped the students get better grades. His
changes in grading practices artificially inflated the grades, but his intention was to help the
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Other teachers, like Veronica, were very blunt in their assessment of grading inaccuracies
and grade inflation: “On a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being accurate and 1 being not, I would say…2?”
Veronica reflected that, from March 2020 on with COVID-19, she tried to grade students’ effort
instead of the mastery of their skill: “We had to shift our mindsets as teachers and stop looking
at, you know, the object is to be this perfection, right, this idea of mastery, into just are they
showing up, are they giving it a go?” Grading for Veronica went from accuracy or mastery to
inclusion of skills: “Did they…basically follow directions? You know, is the length requirement
accurate? When I would make rubrics for assignments I couldn't necessarily grade on, ‘Do they
understand literary devices?’ I was more or less, ‘Did they include literary devices?” She said
that teachers had to shift their mindset to a “participation trophy” mindset, and that they were
encouraged by the district and state to make that change.
Similarly, Ira changed his grading practices once COVID-19 hit, moving from mastery to
participation, which inflated grades; “Did you give me anything at all? Forget the rubrics.
Rubrics: out the window. Did you do anything? If you did anything, you passed.” Ira said that
they didn’t use Teams until fall, so March 2020 was “a mess for collaborative projects.” Even
into the end of the 2020-2021 school year, he said that if students submitted anything, he would
go in the system, override the F, and make it a D. If they submitted nothing, they got an F. Like
other teachers during COVID-19, Ira graded for completion rather than mastery, which inflated
grades.
Derrick, a middle school teacher of Title 1 students, was very forthright on the impact of
inflated grades on student grade promotion. He vehemently argued that the district should not
promote kids into the next grade who don’t have the skills to be in that next grade: “That's one of
the major problems, not just in Broward County but across the nation: we are dumbing down

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education. We are lowering our standards rather than bringing our kids up to meet the
standards.” He declared that we should be challenging the students and helping them to meet the
standards before they get promoted, and we should offer more vocational opportunities, as well:
“we seem to be preparing all our students to go to college, and not all our students are college
bound material. I think we need to expand on the vocational training we have … it's not being
stressed enough.” Derrick, like many others, argued for long-term change in grading and
curriculum to reduce grade inflation, improve accuracy and learning outcomes for better grade
promotion, and better serve student interests: “So how can we adjust the grading? We need to
change the entire curriculum.”
As mentioned above, Hugh changed his entire grading system because of cheating and
lack of work submission, in an effort to get the students to participate and learn. Pre-COVID-19,
he had categories with weights that were determined by the district. Initially, his tests were
worth 40% of the grade, and homework was only worth 10%, so if the student failed a test – and
there were only two tests per quarter – the student had a poor chance of passing the quarter.
During COVID-19, Hugh weighted everything the same (homework and tests), and he said
students began to realize that homework was as important as tests, so students began to complete
more homework. He graded with evenly weighted points, and he gave a point a question, unless
the question had multiple steps or components. He tried to ensure that the students could earn
some partial credit. At the end of the quarter, the students' grades were based on total points.
Hugh realized that he liked everything weighted the same, so he kept it post-pandemic.
Once the pandemic hit, Hugh was also more lenient with late penalties. Whereas preCOVID-19, he might deduct points for every day late, during the pandemic, students could
submit the work late, and he had to give them full credit due to district and state policies. After

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the pandemic eased a bit, he allowed a longer grace period before he began deducting points.
Hugh said he still attempted to hold them responsible for submitting their work on time, though.
Therefore, students who normally might have been penalized with late deductions instead had
higher grades.
Hugh also commented that he noticed grade inflation during the pandemic: “I believe it
because kids were getting a lot more points than they probably normally would have.” He was
surprised by the artificially inflated test scores, since teachers couldn’t tell what the kids were
doing at home during COVID-19. He tried to take into consideration what their home situations
were, and he curved tests more than he would have before, and that’s a method that stayed with
him. Now, if he sees that the kids don’t get a single A on an assignment, Hugh will find the
student with the highest grade and make that the A and curve off that grade for all of the other
grades. Overall, interviewed teachers both participated in grading practices that artificially
inflated grades, whether by district design or personal motivation to help the students succeed,
and some attempted to find ways to make grading more meaningful because of grade inflation
policies.
Teachers’ Perceptions of Grading Inaccuracies on State and International Assessments
After a month or so into the COVID-19 pandemic, the state canceled the FSAs for the
end of the 2019-2020 school year. Students were asked to take the FSAs for the 2020-2021
school year, although students had the option to “opt out,” and many students attended drove in
expressly for the FSAs. Robin commented that she didn’t feel like she knew what her students’
FSA results would be, and although her numbers were ultimately good, she was surprised by that
result. Robin also didn’t ultimately think the data was accurate, since only the kids who wanted

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to and were motivated to take the FSA came in to take it, while the other students who did not
want to or who did not have the skills to take it stayed home, potentially skewing the results.
Robin also contrasted the alignment of her FSA grades to her own classroom grades.
When asked to what extent she felt that her grades were accurate during COVID-19, she
answered, “Not to a very great extent. I will say that I never gave back work where I felt like,
‘Yes, they got it, they really understood this.’” Robin commented that there were outlier
students where she felt like the rhythm, the flow, or the content she was working on clicked, but
“in terms of the entire group, in my own reflection, in my practice, in what can I do better, I
never felt 100% like it was authentic.” Robin couldn't confidently assert that the students’
grades were indicative of ability and not just that they completed tasks and adhered to the
requirements. However, for her 2020-2021 FSA data, the kids who took the FSA only had 4
level drops out of 60 kids. Almost all maintained their level or went up a level; however, not all
of her students took the exam, so again, her overall numbers were skewed towards those students
who knew the material and who were motivated to take the test. She said the kids who took the
test have this mentality of “It doesn't matter, none of this [class] work matters, except that actual
assessment.”
Robin’s larger criticism of the FSA and its impact on students’ extrinsic motivation to
show up for that test while not applying themselves with integrity or effort on classroom
assignments is that success on the FSA does not necessarily transfer to success in intrinsic
motivation and more complex learning tasks beyond high school: “There are some kids who
write well, in that they understand academic writing, so they can fluff their way through content,
but for a lot of them, the cracks start to show when they move beyond the FSA.”

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Overall, then, despite Robin’s scores being good, not every student took the test, in that
the ones who took the test were the ones who were originally motivated by state assessments,
and the ones who weren’t good test takers or weren’t motivated to take the test simply didn’t
show up. Robin also emphasized that the state assessments may not be an accurate assessment of
students’ true writing and thinking abilities; rather, she commented that the state assessments
were a good way of gauging their ability to take the state test.
Liz, another high school teacher who taught AP, IB, and AICE in Palm Beach County,
was blunt in her assessment of the accuracy of her AP grades during COVID-19: “I think last
year was total B.S.” Since students would look everything up anyway, Liz gave her AP kids
everything they would need to learn, including all her materials: “Here's the PowerPoints. I
printed them out. Add your notes.” When faced with crisis, Liz intuitively practiced UDL
principles of accessibility and scaffolding techniques to help the students learn how to organize
their learning to better process content. She spoke to the necessity of reinventing how she
taught, assessed, and graded in classes that require critical thinking as a skill, like in AICE and
IB, and “not what you've memorized, like AP, so I definitely feel that [scores] were inflated and
even in AP, they were looking everything up.”
Liz commented specifically on the disparities in accuracy between the students who took
the end of the year AP exams online versus those who took them in person. Liz claimed that she
had proof that the students who took the AP exam online had an advantage over in-person
students. In 2020, the AP exams were entirely online, and Liz said the scores were worse than
usual during that first year, since students didn’t have advanced knowledge of the online format,
as it was the first year online, and many students reported technical glitches with the exam
format. In May 2021, the district gave schools the choice as to whether they would require

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students to take the AP exam in person or online or both, and Liz’s school opted for students’
choice: “In [High School A], we gave the AP exam, but we gave the kids the choice: you decide
what you want to do. Okay, so the majority of my students tested online.” At [High School B]
in the same district, they were required to take the exam in person, unless there were extenuating
circumstances, and the tests were administered in the traditional paper and pencil. Due to a lastminute twist in fate, Liz took her friend’s spot as an invigilator at the AP exams for [High School
B], and she was therefore able to compare the scores at both high schools. She spoke of her
unusual situation and her ability to analyze scores across the years: We've compared scores for
years. We've been friends since before teaching, and we've taught AP side by side, most years.”
Liz said that her friend’s class’ scores were usually scores just slightly above Liz’s school,
maybe like within 5%: “There was a 15% difference. I was at about a 65% pass rate. They
dropped down to a 50% pass rate.” Liz extrapolated that [High School B]’s requirement of in
person testing revealed the knowledge gap of the students, while [High School A]’s decision to
allow students to take the exam online demonstrated higher scores as the likely result of cheating
on the AP exam. Liz’s unexpected ability to compare scores at two different high schools
demonstrated to her the inaccurate nature of national testing in-person vs. online during COVID19.
Liz found a similar challenging situation with IB Scores, where the end of the year exam
was canceled for both 2020 and optional by school for 2021, but teachers were asked to predict
scores, and IB scores were based on those predicted scores and the Internal Assessments (IAs)
students had taken earlier in the year. Teachers routinely make predicted IB scores based on the
prior five years of data, but Liz was unusually lucky, since she had higher scores in previous
years: “I had one year where half my kids got a seven, and so you could [average] kids, like say

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you had so many people that could have a seven, you can have one more who had a six.” In
other words, because the end of the year exam was canceled, she was able to use prior year
averaged scores to essentially skew higher what might have been lower scores had the students
sat for the exam.
For the AICE course during COVID-19 specifically, Liz was dismayed that the other
teachers weren’t really teaching. They gave the students the material and expected them to learn
it themselves, and the students didn't: “If you're not going to walk them through things, you think
they're going to go read it?” She said she was pushed by administration and the other AICE
teachers to just give them completion grades for AICE during COVID-19, and even when they
came back during the 2021-2022 school year, Liz said that the teachers were not properly trained
in how to teach AICE, so some teachers continued to give completion grades. Overall, then,
even at the state and international level, COVID-19 created inaccuracies in grading and testing
that continued over the several years of the pandemic.
Research Question 4: Teachers’ Perceptions Regarding Equity of Grading During COVID19
The findings from the data indicated that five main themes emerged relating to Research
Question 4 in teachers’ perceptions of the equity of grades during the pandemic:
1. Teachers’ Perceptions of Equity in Grading Due to Learning Loss in Students
2. Teachers’ Perceptions of Equity in Grading Due to Higher Socio-economic Status
3. Teachers’ Perceptions of Equity in Grading Due to Lower Socio-economic Students
4. Changes in Teachers’ Use of Technology to Increase Access and Equity
5. Changes in Teachers’ Practice, Grading, and Assessment to Increase Equity

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Regarding grading and reporting inequity during COVID-19, interviewed teachers reported large
inequities by socio-economic level, academic class level, and across ESE and ELL students with
access to technology, resources, and support. Interviewed teachers also reported concern that
absenteeism and learning from home led to learning loss, so students were already behind every
year as a result of COVID-19, which led to inequitable grading and teaching for students who
were essentially a year behind in knowledge. Finally, interviewed teachers spoke to the need to
change grading and assessment practices and use technology to increase equity.
Teachers’ Perceptions of Equity in Grading Due to Learning Loss in Students
Despite the loss of learning that students experienced in COVID-19 and the state and
district grading policies, students were promoted to the next grade without really understanding
the content, leading to inequitable outcomes in the next grade. Hugh, a middle school math
teacher, commented on the learning loss that occurred during the 2021-2022 school year and said
that absence had its effects: “You saw it with their work, handwriting, and trying to get work
turned in on time. It's that year and a half of not being in school [that] took away from some of
them, from some of the work.”
Mike, another math teacher, also felt that the kids who came into the 2020-2021 school
year lost almost a year of math prior to getting him: “Because of COVID-19 last year, every kid
lost a year of math that year. I'll put it to you like that: that's how I put myself in that mentality
once I started teaching the first month.” Mike found that he needed to redesign his teaching,
Canvas page, curriculum, and grading to accommodate for the learning loss of an entire year of
math and to reteach the prior year that they didn’t learn. Mike further ruminated on the future of
these students experiencing the “COVID slide” as they moved up to higher grades, since state
and district policy required them to be passed, regardless of insufficient knowledge of content:

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“Those eighth graders are going to high school. I feel bad for them because a lot of people are
texting me for tutoring … because of how much of a gap there is from seventh grade to ninth
grade.”
Mike equated the lack of equity as a direct result of learning loss. To accommodate that
learning loss, he adjusted the content and grading down because the kids in the 2020-2021 school
year simply were not able to do the work: “Because of that equity question … I couldn't use
anything from before. It was too hard, plain and simple. It was at that same standard, but … my
kids were just not ready for that state standard.” Mike talked about putting himself in the shoes
of one of his eighth graders, especially a student with disabilities, and he felt he needed to make
the content easier for them to grasp. Therefore, he was grading his students at a lower level than
the state standards to help the students succeed and catch up in the content.
Teachers’ Perceptions of Equity in Grading Due to Higher Socio-economic Status
Five of ten interviewed teachers at affluent schools reported sufficient access to
technology and learning, and they said that students still experienced learning loss but for
different reasons than access. Tony reported that, during COVID-19, the students had equal
access to technology, since they had laptops at home, and if they didn’t the school gave them
one. He mentioned the discounts for internet and free internet the school district worked out, so
he didn’t really have an issue with traditional absenteeism with his population. His students
could get online, but he said they just didn’t want to turn on their cameras, and the state and
district didn’t require it initially, so they lost learning due to lack of participation.
Liz, a high school teacher at an affluent school in Palm Beach County, said that some of
her students didn’t have support at home because of affluence. Their parents weren’t around, and
they were raised by nannies, who did not support them academically or ensure their work was

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completed or that they attended class virtually. During and since COVID-19, these students
needed support for different reasons than low-income kids, but they still needed support.
Ira spoke regarding his school’s affluent demographic and high percentage ELL and ESE
population, and the shift in response to changes in equity and support for students during
COVID-19. He said his school had a large Hispanic population at his school, so ELL was
throughout the school, it was “every day,” as he put it. He had ESE kids, some who were autistic,
some who were nonverbal, one in a wheelchair, and he said that he needed to have highly
individualized teaching that extended beyond the IEP. Ira said he could give extra time and
preferential seating, but that didn’t teach you how to teach and draw out the student who is a
quadriplegic. Teachers usually had paraprofessionals or aids for lower functioning ESE students,
but he wanted to know from the parents what their expectations were for the course and what the
student capabilities were. He said the general population kids were very understanding and
worked well with the ESE kids.
Once COVID-19 hit, Ira was still working with his ESE students and their ESE
coordinators. He had one ESE student who didn’t do the work, and he said the student felt
backed into a corner and accused Ira of not giving him the assignment or emailing the student.
Ira had a plethora of emails, and he was going to contact the parents, and the ESE coordinator
said, ‘Please don’t,’ and that he would take care of it. The ESE coordinator spoke to the student,
and the student ultimately did the work. The ESE coordinator opened a meaningful dialogue with
Ira and the student about the importance of communication, especially regarding issues in
response to COVID-19. He said that his school had the most ESE students in south Florida, so
there was an overall ESE coordinator and then there were individual ESE coordinators, and they
stayed with the kids through 6-7-8, and they got to know the families very well.

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Teachers’ Perceptions of Equity in Grading Due to Lower Socio-economic Status
Ira’s comments of having enough ESE Coordinators at his affluent middle school in
Broward County stood in stark contrast to Derrick, who taught gifted, advanced, and lower-level
classes at a Title 1 school in the same Broward County School District. Derrick reported that
ESE Coordinators at his school were overloaded prior to COVID-19, and that COVID-19 only
served to worsen an already large gap in student services and equity. Derrick reported that the
gifted kids had a Magnet Coordinator who would work with them and were taught strategies that
helped them cope and function once they went virtual; however, the lower-level kids had no such
support system. There was an ESE coordinator only for those lower-level kids who had
identified needs, and even then, he said it was too much for the ESE Coordinators to handle,
even pre-COVID-19. Once COVID-19 hit, it got substantially worse for ESE kids across the
board, regardless of socio-economic status. He said the Magnet Coordinator would have 20 kids,
whereas the three ESE Coordinators would have five times that number pre-COVID-19. These
numbers and lack of support for lower socio-economic ESE students told a very different story
from Ira in the affluent school and his assertion of plenty of ESE support for students both before
and during COVID-19.
Derrick contended that the gap between the lower socio-economic students with relation
to food, computers, wi-fi access, home support, and school support was vast before COVID-19,
and that gap only considerably widened during COVID-19. Derrick drew the connection
between that socio-economic gap in resources and what the students were able to learn, how he
was able to teach, and ultimately how equitable his grades were for his students. He said that for
his 23 gifted students out of his 120 total students, the grades were fair. For the rest of his
roughly 100 students, the grades did not accurately reflect what they knew or could know, and it

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was directly tied to equity and socio-economic disadvantage. He strove to provide equity in
teaching and grading with the students who came to class virtually, but essentially two thirds of
his class, mainly lower socio-economic students, simply didn’t and couldn’t show up. Ironically,
Derrick felt that the very grading and reporting policies that were designed to ensure equity were
instead reinforcing systemic inequity in grading and reporting procedures, since students would
ultimately be promoted into grades and classes for which they were destined to fail due to lack of
knowledge and skills.
Changes in Teachers’ Use of Technology to Increase Access and Equity
Not every student had access to technology during COVID-19, but all ten of the teachers
interviewed said they did and would continue to use technology to increase access and equity in
their teaching and grading. Mike said that, moving into the 2020-2021 school year, the district
mandated that everything had to be on Canvas, and everyone had to use the Canvas Calendar.
The district said that math teachers could continue to use HRW, another online math app, to
continue to provide access and hold students to high math standards. Ira said that one aspect of
grading online through Canvas is that he didn’t “see” the student, so it removed an aspect of
potential bias. Ed noticed that grading went slower because he typed faster than he wrote, so he
was able to give more useful feedback, and students liked that feedback, although it took time: “I
felt like the kids got better and more meaningful feedback when I was reading online then when I
went to actually write comments.” These three teachers found that the district-mandated use of
technology early during COVID-19 allowed for more equitable access and differentiation down
the road as the pandemic continued.
Robin commented that teaching through COVID-19 helped her ability to differentiate in
teaching and grading, although she had to be creative in how to support students online during

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COVID-19. Google Classroom allowed her to select and deselect students from certain
assignments, so she could level and differentiate students in certain assignments without other
students knowing, allowing for privacy. She could also do an individualized Google Meet or
small group Google Meet to allow for further differentiation, feedback, and assessment of
student knowledge. During the pandemic, Google Meets breakout rooms as class wide group
assignments were less successful: “I would say breakout rooms didn't work for me at all, like at
all. The second they would go into breakout groups, they would all turn off their cameras and
nobody would talk.” Robin had much greater success keeping them together in the main virtual
“class” doing a class wide Padlet, doing a silent discussion on a Google Slide where everyone
was writing, or using PearDeck or NearPod and having them interact and type on programs like
that. Robin hypothesized that a creative task where everyone could see everyone else’s
immediate contributions in a safe space mimicked to a lesser degree the group work she did preCOVID-19. Robin pre-identified as a tech-savvy teacher prior to COVID-19, but even with her
own tech knowledge, she needed to constantly adapt her teaching and grading methods to engage
the students to impart knowledge and assess their skills.
Liz stated that, although technology meant that her students had access, being online
meant that she couldn’t pull some of the kids aside in the middle of a lesson like she might do in
an in-person class, so technology didn’t solve all the equity problems. To combat this issue, she
would offer to have the class log off early, so she could chat with those students who needed
extra support or teaching. Liz also found that some students found it difficult to admit that they
didn’t understand something in an online class, so she used the anonymous comments and
questions feature in NearPod to allow students the opportunity to ask questions that they might
normally be embarrassed to ask.

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Moving forward, nine of ten teachers said they would continue to employ technology to
increase equity in access to learning materials and in grading and feedback. Mike wanted to post
everything on Canvas and Pinnacle more for access and practice, so the students would know
where to get everything. He felt Canvas especially helped the lower-level kids with access and
practice. He intended to keep all assignments and grades on both Canvas and Pinnacle, so the
kids always knew where to look, and the information was consistent. He admitted that he didn’t
do that well in the 2020-2021 school year. He made a lot more assignments on Canvas for 2021-
2022 because it was easier for the kids to “grab the documents and have access to them,” and it
was much easier than HRW. He continued to make it easier, especially for the lower-level kids,
to increase access and provide equity in teaching and grading.
Ed, an IB high school teacher, said that he would keep Google Classroom, his new
running commentary and feedback, and the rubrics. He also liked posting the entire semester’s
worth of work and assignments ahead of time, so it was easier for him and the students. He
pointed out that, for some teachers, that decision might pose a problem if teachers wanted to
“surprise” the kids with work, but he didn’t operate that way: “I realized, partly for my own
benefit, so that I could stay organized, but also partly for the benefit of the students, I put my
entire curriculum on Google Classroom, so that they would have everything.” Ed questioned his
colleagues who were very particular about not posting everything because “they didn't want to
signal to the kids when they might have an exam,” or they didn't want kids to be “distracted” by
content they would learn three months from now, because they wanted them to focus on current
content. Ed found these arguments to be specious, however, and felt the benefits of posting all
the content, including assessments, ahead of time would create access and transparency and help
train students to organize and process the content, a UDL method of access, engagement, and

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motivation. Specific to IB’s Learner Profile, two of the ten traits IB students should develop is
that of “Thinker” and “Inquirer,” which integrate with Ed’s desire for students to increase
student agency: “IB assessments allow kids to make choices … I thought to myself, this is
actually a good opportunity. They could literally scroll through the study guides, handouts, plot
summaries, all the activities, [and] they could actually decide for themselves.” Being forced by
the district policy to place everything on the Canvas LMS, he ultimately decided that access to
all of the year’s information increased equity, access, and better student agency, which he felt
would increase student learning outcomes and aligned with IB principles. Overall, eight of the
ten interviewed teachers came to see technology as means of ensuring access and creating
opportunities for equitable teaching and grading, and the remaining two teachers were already
tech-savvy teachers who used digital means to increase equity.
Changes in Teachers’ Practice, Grading, and Assessment to Increase Equity
In the end, all ten teachers considered different options in changing their grading and
teaching practices moving forward through COVID-19 to increase equity for students, but five
admitted that it was difficult to change long-held systems of grading and assessment. Mike
intended to make the tests fairer with a mix of easy, medium, and hard questions. He said that if
he struggled to take the test, it was too hard for the kids. He said that he wished he could give
each student their own personalized test to their standards, but he felt that you have to meet a
certain standard by the end of the year. He wanted to find a middle ground where he met the
standards, met student needs, held them to high expectations, and provided a fair test/quiz for
everybody.
Veronica asked for state, district, and parent trust in teachers’ teaching and grading
expertise to ensure students had the skills to move up to the next grade level. She said that, if the

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state and district trusted teachers, the teachers could indicate through multiple modes of
assessment that the student was ready to move up, so she said that trust is imperative. She
expressed concern that districts were going to continue to move students on to the next grade
level without mastery: “They are going to be behind, a lot, and if we're passing kids that
shouldn't be passed, we're setting them up for failure. We're not setting them up for success, so
then where's the equity, right?” Ultimately, Veronica expressed hope that she could move
towards a system of grading and assessment that provided for more individualized demonstration
of mastery without standardized testing.
Derrick favored a flexible approach to grading and testing. The amount of technology and
the different platforms that they learned were useful, and he would keep them, since they helped
with flexibility. He also stressed the need for individualized, differentiated instruction: “You
have to meet the students where their individual needs are, and you're going to have to customize
for each student, and that's difficult, but that's something I've learned, and it's something that we
need to do.” He said administration and the district need to give up holding teachers to a
deadline for testing and what needs to be covered when in a particular time and let the teachers
work with the students at their individual levels, as long as they are achieving the goals. Derrick
exhorted that “the rigidity in the system as it is now needs to go.” Derrick also thought
administration and the district needed to have more flexibility in allowing autonomy and
professional deference to teachers’ knowledge and abilities to assess their students: “It’s so
complicated for teachers because the state and district set goals, but how do you meet goals when
students in eighth grade can’t read? How do you fix that?” He was very visibly frustrated, as he
struggled against what he saw as entrenched inequity and an inability or lack of understanding on

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the part of the district and state to be more equitable in goal setting and achievement expectations
for teachers and students.
Ed, a Palm Beach County Title 1 high school teacher, also learned that the rubrics helped
increase equity in both his eyes and the eyes of his students: “I saw the benefit of them, because I
realized that they really gave me a sense that I was doing things fairly, but more importantly, I
think it gave the students the sense that I was doing things fairly.” In particular, Ed saw the
combination of IB critical thinking, standards-based grading, and skills-based rubrics as the
winning and equitable strategy moving forward through COVID-19.
Robin, a teacher at a Title 1 school, maintained that, “in the interest of equity and
accuracy and really the purpose of education,” she wanted to give up standardized grading and
tests, especially in the interests of students who had taken on the parents’ role or those who had
no support during COVID-19. She had several students during the 2020-2021 year who would
stay on after class, turn on the camera, and say, “Look, I'm teaching my three brothers and
sisters, and my mom's not here. Can I do this later? I still have to go to work at Publix.” Having
to rethink teaching for students like this caused Robin to rethink her grading practices, to become
conscious of, as she said, “Okay, what's the point of all of this?” She admitted that true
differentiation is “really hard” and that she had “never been great at it, but that's one thing about
teaching during COVID-19, realizing that they're all coming from very different places, but they
have to all meet that end, you know, in terms of policy.” Following the evolution of Robin’s
thoughts on teaching, testing, and grading with equity, she declared, “Maybe that's what needs to
change. I mean, my big answer is do away with standardized testing, such as it exists because it
isn't fair.” Robin spoke earnestly of rethinking the purpose of grading and assessment from an

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equity standpoint but also rethinking what level of work she expected from students and how she
could equitably differentiate while meeting standards.
Hugh said that he would give up being as hard or strict on the kids as he used to be in
teaching and grading. He simply felt it wasn’t fair to the kids. Hugh proposed that he would be
more likely in the future to investigate a possible background situation or circumstance that
caused a student to not submit or understand the material, using empathy to drive better teaching
and grading outcomes.
Finally, Liz found the answer to equity through in-person instruction and teacher support,
quality pedagogical alignment between curriculum and assessments, and feedback, both teacherto-student and peer feedback. She mentioned several times that being in person has helped with
equity, especially for students who need help the most. Specifically, priority learners who
needed more support, students with varying learning levels, minoritized students, or students
who needed reinforcement could get that support better in person, since they could come up to
her in class, stay after school, or ask for help. She asserted that being in person made a huge
difference in access to learning.
Liz also wanted to dive deeper into the schema work that AICE puts out. She was
impressed with the alignment between the criteria and their assessments, and she wanted to
continue to find more ways to provide quality feedback, “so they know what they're doing well
and where they're struggling, so that, as they go into their essay and presentation, they can see
the value in what we've done and how they can apply and learn from that.” Like Ed, she wanted
the students to understand why they were learning what they were learning, and she wanted to
encourage her students to give each other feedback on their learning. Liz also wanted to
continue the Google Docs feedback, and although she didn’t put grades in Google Classroom,

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she did like that Google Classroom saved her comments, and that made it easier for her to use
some comments over again, increasing efficiency in grading.
From an equity perspective, COVID-19 forced teachers to examine inequities that had
already existed prior to the pandemic but which intensified, especially for lower socio-economic
and ESE students. All the teachers interviewed claimed that COVID-19 irrevocably changed
their views and practice of teaching, grading, and reporting, although many struggled to devise
equitable solutions to what they saw as the challenges to traditional assessment, grading, and
reporting. Still, every teacher reflected on changes in teaching and grading they had already
implemented and would keep post-pandemic.
Additional Insights
The interviews for this study took place during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic,
and the experiences of the interviewed teachers with grading and reporting reflected the almost
daily challenges and stressors they experienced. In addition to reviewing all the difficulties
associated with grading, student motivation, accuracy, and equity in grading, it was noteworthy
that teachers also talked compassionately about the need for substantive and multi-leveled socialemotional support for their students. All ten of the teachers interviewed gave plentiful examples
of the sometimes Herculean efforts they made to provide comfort, support, and kindness to their
students, who were frequently anxious, fearful, overwhelmed, and sometimes alone. Ed
commented on one of his students’ inability to do the work due to his home situation: “The kids
who were struggling…it was heartbreaking in some cases, because they said, ‘I wanted to read
the book, but I was so busy taking care of my little brother that I didn't have a chance to do it.’”
For one student in particular, Ed said, “I told him this all the time … God bless you for just
getting up in the morning.” Sherry gave all her students her cell phone number, and she also

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made the students give her their cell phone number, all 200 of them. She texted them and called
them to remind them to do their work and check in on their health and well-being. The teachers
interviewed were sometimes the only adult presence for some of their students, as the parents
were working and could not always be at home. These social-emotional efforts from the teachers
were outside of the scope of the study and grading, but these experiences were particularly
palpable and illustrative of how caring, adaptive, and dedicated all ten of these teachers were to
their students during a challenging and chaotic global pandemic.
Summary
Overall, state and district policies on grading, assessment, late work, attendance, and
completion grades forced teachers to pass students who would otherwise have failed. Though
the state and district policies were chosen with equity in mind, the unintended domino effect had
the consequence of removing the entrenched extrinsic motivational factors that students
associated with schoolwork. When the transactional extrinsic motivation of grades or failing was
removed, student behavior changed correspondingly to include decrease in work submission,
failure to participate virtually in class, and significantly increased late work. All teachers
interviewed spoke of rampant cheating, academic dishonesty, and grade inflation; furthermore,
these teachers indicated that the districts were complicit in acknowledging grade inflation but
passing students anyway. Interviewed teachers spoke of the existing inequities, especially for
lower socio-economic students, often minoritized in Title 1 schools, who experienced a very
different lack of equity and access than students in wealthier, more affluent schools, even those
within the same district. ESE students also received the same inequity of support depending on
which socio-economic level in which they found themselves. To combat these levels of
inaccuracy and inequity, interviewed teachers found that they reevaluated the purpose and

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practice of grading to shift towards grading that was aware of the social-emotional health of their
students; encouraged students to understand the meaning and purpose of the content they were
learning; and increased the use of rubrics, peer and teacher feedback, and the use of standardsbased grading over traditional norm-referenced grading, which many teachers felt contributed to
the transactional nature of grades for students and parents pre-COVID-19 and during the
pandemic. The majority of interviewed teachers said that they would continue to use the aspects
of technology that increased access, equity, and better learning and grading outcomes. All the
teachers interviewed called for a thorough reexamination of how we design curriculum, assess
student learning, and grade equitably, although several expressed doubt that meaningful change
could occur.

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CHAPTER FIVE: RECOMMENDATIONS
Chapter Five will address the discussion of findings after analysis of the ten interviewed
teachers, how the results connect back to and inform the four research questions, how the
findings align with the literature review and conceptual framework and address the problem of
practice. I will make recommendations for future research and practice resulting from the
study’s findings.
Discussion of Findings
As of December 2023, although COVID-19 cases still occur, the global pandemic
is over for all practical and educational purposes. When looking at teachers as the center of
Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model during the pandemic, interviewed teachers were highly
impacted by every system level of influence. The most immediate system level to impact
teachers and grading was the macrosystem level with the global pandemic itself causing
interviewed teachers to move their classrooms online, develop new methods of online instruction
daily, and find ways to both try to assess students accurately and to motivate students to attend
virtual class and participate.
The next system level in order of immediacy and impact on teachers’ grading and
assessment was the exosystem level, due to the significant impact of the state and district policies
on grading. The findings and analysis of the study demonstrated a chain reaction effect of state
and district grading and assessment policies that asked teachers to inflate grades, pass students
based on attendance and completion grades, and disregard rampant cheating, which led to
inaccurate, inconsistent, and inflated grades during COVID-19. Interviewed teachers were
blindsided by the effects of state and district grading policies amid a global pandemic.
Interviewed teachers at Title 1 schools identified pre-existing inequities and overburdened

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support systems for lower socio-economic level students at Title 1 schools. Interviewed teachers
also commented that the mesosystem level of ESE and ELL coordinator support varied based on
the socio-economic level of the school. Also on the mesosystem level, half of the interviewed
teachers were frustrated with inconsistent grading practices across their colleagues in their
schools; a grade in their class did not consistently mean the same thing for students in other
classes. Interviewed teachers described widely varying purposes and applications of grading
across product, process, and progress both prior to and during COVID-19, which led to a lack of
consistency in grading practices. These findings supported the literature which claimed that
grading prior to COVID-19, particularly norm-referenced grading, was already inaccurate,
inconsistent, and inequitable, especially for priority learners who were already marginalized and
under supported, and that COVID-19 exacerbated those inequities, inaccuracies, and
inconsistencies (Brookhart et al, 2016; Darling-Hammond et al., 2020; Guskey, 2002, 2006,
2009, 2013, 2015, 2020b; Guskey & Brookhart, 2019; Hill et al., 2017; Hooper & Cowell, 2014;
Jung, 2009; Jung & Guskey, 2007; Mattern et al., 2011; Marbouti et al., 2016; Sahlberg, 2020;
Sampson, 2009).
At the microsystem level, students’ levels in motivation, which were already arguably
extrinsically transactional in nature, worsened in large degree to demonstrate a complete lack of
motivation, or when solely motivated by returning FSA tests and grades in the second year of
COVID-19, students felt that they should be compensated with high grades for minimal work or
product. Interviewed teachers reported a total lack of intrinsic motivation on the part of students
and, by extension, a lack of evidence-based grading accuracy on the part of interviewed teachers.
Despite artificially inflated grades, learning outcomes and grades dropped dramatically for many
students, as a result of absenteeism, lack of intrinsic motivation, lack of connection to any

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meaningful learning, and lack of support systems in school and at home, especially for Title 1
lower socio-economic learners. The lack of intrinsic motivation that resulted from a removal of
the “carrot and stick” extrinsic motivation of numerical grades underscored the literature’s
findings that for complex, deeper cognitive tasks, extrinsic motivation failed to create intrinsic
motivation long term (Black, 2017; Csikszentmihalyi, 2008; Feldman, 2019; Immordino-Yang et
al., 2012; Immordino-Yang et al., 2019; Pink, 2011; Ryan & Moller, 2017; Tomlinson and
Moon, 2016). Students who had been essentially trained to see the numerical grade as their goal
either cheated to attain the goal or simply did not do the work at all, since they would pass
anyway (Feldman, 2019; Toro, 2021).
Perhaps the most consistent impact of the pandemic was felt by interviewed teachers at
the chronosystem level, that is in changes over time. All ten interviewed teachers recognized
that, as the pandemic continued, traditional grading as they understood it prior to COVID-19 did
not work in their classrooms and alternate forms of assessment and grading were necessary.
Interviewed teachers all commented that shifts in how students perceived learning and grading
during COVID-19 caused teachers to shift their perceptions regarding the purpose and practice
of grading to contemplate alternative forms of grading and assessment, when possible, focusing
especially on accuracy and equity. Interviewed teachers moved back towards the mesosystem to
examine alternate forms of grading and assessment to compensate for students’ lack of
motivation and academic honesty. Interviewed teachers explored the mesosystem level to learn
from online professional development, teacher experts, colleagues, or their own departments.
Specifically, teachers were interested in grading practices that helped students at the
microsystem level understand the purpose behind their learning and to create a student-centered
learning environment to help learners move towards intrinsic motivation and a love of learning.

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All expressed the desire to change their systems of grading to increase equity and accuracy, and
all said that technology they were mandated to use during COVID-19 was one method of
providing access and transparency to their students. Some interviewed teachers said they wished
they could permanently cancel standardized testing, although one teacher commented that
students would always need the motivation of an end-of-term test or a grade. Other interviewed
teachers expressed the desire to move towards standards-based grading or minimal grades. One
teacher longed to shift to Montessori-style holistic assessment, and several said they would like a
pass/fail system like some colleges use. Another teacher shifted his grading system to make
every assignment worth the same number of points to create a motivation for students to do all of
the work. All the teachers interviewed commented that they wanted the students to understand
why their learning mattered and to help them love to learn, all functions of reflecting on their
grading practices over time through COVID-19.
Moving forward, the findings from this study present several opportunities to improve
our grading practices to increase accuracy and equity. This study suggests that the state and
districts can work with stakeholders, namely teachers, students, and parents to rethink our
grading systems to provide more motivation, accuracy, and equity. Stakeholder groups can use
best practices based on the literature and the effective methods teachers discovered during the
study. Finally, stakeholder groups can implement the new changes to grading district by district,
guided by state goals and standards.
Recommendations for Practice
Recommendation 1: Build a Stakeholder Coalition to Assess Gaps in State and District
Grading Systems and Policies

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Based on the findings of the research study, the first recommendation would be to advise
state and district administrators to build a stakeholder coalition by including teachers, students,
and parents to help shift perceptions of the purpose of grading for all stakeholders. The
exosystem level was by far the most immediate influence on teachers’ grading, in that the state
and district administrators’ mandated grading, attendance, and late work policies created an
immediate and wide-reaching negative impact on teachers, students, and parents. By omitting
teacher, student, and parent input, the state and district administrators missed vital pieces of
information from stakeholders about already existing gaps and challenges in clarity, accuracy,
equity, and consistency of grades, especially for priority learners. Including the stakeholders in
the process of assessment and grading design creates agency and buy-in for reforming the
grading system towards engaging, meaningful, and accessible content.
State and district administrators could move toward an image of empowering and
inclusive leadership by creating a macro level stakeholder coalition at the state level. By inviting
teachers, students, and parents to contribute to reforming grading practices and by considering
their needs, administrators could also employ Pink’s (2009) three foci of autonomy, mastery, and
purpose to empower teachers, students, and parents to contribute their own expertise and lived
experiences to the state/district’s grading practices. The goal of this stakeholder engagement
would be to shift the focus of grading toward clear and equitable communication of learning
goals and renew a sense of purpose in creating accurate assessment of student learning outcomes.
Towards the goal of building what Kotter (2007) calls a “powerful guiding coalition,” the
state and districts could create a stakeholder survey and Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities,
and Threats (SWOT) Analysis for stakeholder experiences with grading, accuracy, equity, and
motivation. Valencia (2020) argues for an inclusive demographic and stakeholder population

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that reflects the diverse student populations in Florida, a population that should include priority
learners and their parents. Garcia et al. (2020) and Izquierdo (2020) recommend dual-language
options to aid inclusion, and the stakeholder coalition workshop could include survey and
resource materials in multiple languages to include multi-lingual parents and students.
Tomlinson and Moon (2016) recommend that teachers complete a gap analysis of their
current grading systems and for the further inclusion of students in course and grading design.
Toward this gap analysis goal, once the SWOT Analysis is complete, administrators could hold a
stakeholder coalition conference at the state level, where administrators could invite teacher,
students, and parent representatives from each district to hear and understand the results to the
stakeholders and address next steps in grading redesign. Administrators could use Clark and
Estes’ (2008) KMO Theoretical Framework with the stakeholder coalition to analyze gaps in
knowledge, motivation, and organization to identify next steps in reforming assessment and
grading practices and policies.
Recommendation 2: Identify Best Practices in Grading and Reform Grading Systems to
Support Neuroscience-Based Learning, Differentiation, UDL, and Motivation
The second recommendation based on the findings in the study would be to redistribute
power and focus back on to the individual, microsystem, and mesosystem levels by increasing
participation, focus, and support for teachers, students, priority learners, and parents across the
state educational system through the stakeholder coalition conference. According to DarlingHammond et al. (2017), one commonality among the highest performing school systems in the
world is a high social regard for teaching, where teachers are part of the design solution. The
FDOE can acknowledge that teachers have had historically little participation and agency in
FDOE grading policy; however, with the application of these recommendations, teachers will be

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central and equal in educational grading policymaking in the state of Florida. Viewed through
the chronosystem level, ESE, ELL, minoritized, and lower socio-economic level students have
been historically ignored, undervalued, and under supported at a macrosystemic level. Teachers
and administrators can likewise acknowledge that priority learners have been historically
marginalized, and placing these and all students at the center of their own learning increases
intrinsic motivation, engagement, and equity. Administrators and stakeholders can shift power
from traditionally teacher-centered assessment, grading, and reporting to student-centered
feedback and participation in rubrics, assessment, and grading design.
Creating a coalition between teachers and students in the development of rubrics and
assessments will encourage Fisher and Frey’s (2011) principles of the Gradual Release of
Responsibility and further build student agency. Administrators can begin with a review of the
Florida BEST Standards currently in use in the state to create a common understanding among
the stakeholders of the skills and content appropriate to each grade level. To facilitate
meaningful understanding and processing, Mayer (2011) recommends learners attend to the
content, organize the content into manageable component parts, and integrate that content with
relevant prior knowledge. In the stakeholder coalition conference, standards experts can break
the large group down into smaller groups by grade level and discipline. Reviewing the
standards will create better understanding for teachers, for whom the Florida BEST Standards
were introduced in February 2020, right before the onset of the pandemic (FDOE, 2023b).
Students and parents would receive a stronger foundation in the skills they would need to
evaluate in the later assessment, rubric, and grading design portion of the conference.
Once stakeholders have a good understanding of the skills, participants can move on to
redesigning the assessment and grading frameworks to encourage practices that help build

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biopsychosocial development, UDL, and differentiation which, in turn, build intrinsic motivation
and student agency. The starting points for the revisions to grading practice would be based on
the findings from the SWOT gap analysis and stakeholder surveys combined with best practices
covered in the literature. The FDOE and stakeholders would work collaboratively in an ongoing
commitment towards creating assessment and grading that encourage a culture of critical
thinking, reflection, experiential learning, play, rest, and accessibility, as Immordino-Yang et al.
(2019) recommend for biopsychosocial development. Like the overview of the state standards,
this grading design reform phase would ideally begin with training and certification from FDOE
content experts in biopsychosocial developmental stages, UDL, and differentiation. Stakeholder
groups would be charged with creating rubrics, assessments, and grading frameworks that
correspond to the state standards and incorporate these best practices.
Working off Chardin and Novak’s (2020) equitable UDL framework, stakeholder groups
could approach assessment, rubric, and grading design asking themselves four main questions:
1. What do you think you need to know or do to be able to meet this goal?
2. How would you best like to learn it?
3. What materials can I provide you that will help you to meet this goal?
4. How will you share with me that you met it? (p. 71).
Teachers, students, and parents could brainstorm to create choice assessment boards to offer
students an accessible, engaging, and meaningful menu of options in which students can
demonstrate their learning. Collaboratively, stakeholder groups can design rubrics that reflect
the state standards and skills in student-friendly, age-appropriate language in multiple
translations. Grading could assess learning in multiple modes: auditory, visual, and experiential,
using UDL principles (CAST, 2016). Additionally, as Muñoz and Guskey (2015) suggested,

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rubrics and grading could evaluate learning demonstrated on assessments through separate
product, process, and progress categories, reducing the likelihood for inaccurate, inconsistent,
and inequitable grades and supporting ESE and other priority learners.
Throughout the process of the conference, administrators and teachers can model
reflection, creating opportunities for students and parents to reflect on the process of assessing
and grading skills, as well, creating what Ritchart and Church (2020) call a “culture of thinking.”
To increase intrinsic motivation, stakeholders can construct assessments and corresponding
rubrics and grading frameworks that are challenging, novel, culturally meaningful, and enjoyable
(Ryan & Moller, 2017). The assessments should establish clear goals and be organized with
room for practice of skills, self- and peer-feedback, and timely feedback (Csikszentmihalyi,
2008; Feldman, 2019; Fisher & Frey, 2011; Hattie & Timperley, 2007).
The summation of each stakeholder grading design group would be collected, compared,
and collated by administrative teams into a digital database of state standards-based exemplars
for assessment, rubrics, and grading that could be housed on the FDOE’s existing website and
home of the state standards and resources, CPalms (Florida State University, 2019), for later use
in teacher training and classroom integration.
Recommendation 3: District Teacher Training and Stakeholder Meetings to Disseminate
New Grading System Practices and Policies
The third recommendation would be for the FDOE to create a statewide system of
district-level stakeholder trainings that, similar to the state stakeholder coalition conference,
would include teachers, students, and parents. The goals of the district-level informational
training meetings would be to recreate the collaborative process for district stakeholders around
the state to create agency, clarity of grading goals and policies, and understanding of best

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practices philosophy and pedagogy. Similar to how other professional organizations recognize
the system-wide benefit of an educated workforce and compensate their members to receive
training and certifications accordingly, the state and districts could offer teachers certifications
and training free of charge, creating value and desirability to learn and participate in the new
grading procedures.
Districts should encourage stakeholder groups to engage with the assessment and grading
exemplars that incorporate dual language principles, alternate assessment strategies, hands-on
and experiential activities, and real-world applications of content for all priority learners.
Teachers trained in UDL can help guide colleagues in playing with and creating resources to
assist students in assessments that engage and motivate students through meaningful activities.
Students will learn and practice executive functioning skills to help with scaffolding,
organization, time management, and goal setting and realization, especially for priority learners.
Teachers can also engage parents and students to make a deliberate effort to learn about and
celebrate families’ cultural heritages, backgrounds, and lived experiences while being attentive
to social-emotional learning and processing of content (Feldman, 2019). In this manner,
stakeholder groups will engage meaningfully and practically with the content, so assessment and
grading systems become familiar and comprehensible prior to the school year.
To avoid “one-off” thinking that adds accommodations for ESE and ELL students after
the course is already designed, administrators should model UDL and Understanding by Design
(UbD) Backwards Design principles to illustrate the importance of alignment between formative
and summative assessments to skills for all learners. Districts would also highlight the
importance of allocating time and pre-planning prior to the next school year to allow teachers
time to understand, design, and apply the principles of UDL and differentiation in their grading

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(CAST, 2016; Tomlinson & Moon, 2016; Wiggins & McTighe, 2005). By creating space and
consistent attention to the evaluation of learning for all stakeholders, district-level participants
will have time to practice their understandings of assessments and grading to engage all three
UDL networks of Engagement, Representation, and Action and Expression without fear of
failure (CAST, 2016). This distribution and application of the new stakeholder-created grading
systems will help to foster what Kotter (2007) calls Communicating the Vision and Empowering
Others to Act on the Vision.
Finally, state and district administrators should collect and assess feedback data on the
stakeholder learning outcomes with a focus on grading design differentiation, UDL, and intrinsic
motivation. Teachers can model self-reflection skills by first reflecting and then asking students
and parents for reflections and feedback on the assessments and grading frameworks.
Accordingly, administrators should build time into the district trainings for stakeholder self- and
peer-reflection. Working with priority learners and their caregivers, districts can include ESE
and ELL coordinators, paraprofessionals, and IEP team members at checkpoints throughout the
trainings to ensure the assessments and grading are aligned to equitable, achievable, and
reasonable standards, and if adjustments need to be made for alignment and equity, students and
parents are involved in the process along with the teacher. The state should collect, assess, and
disseminate to the state stakeholders the data on the stakeholder grading reform outcomes with a
focus on reflection, motivation, agency, and equity. The FDOE can periodically check
alignment of grading practices and policies to performance by sending out feedback surveys at
intervals and adjusting more fluidly to future crises like the COVID-19 pandemic.
Limitations and Delimitations

132
The greatest limitation on this study is the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, which initially
dissuaded teachers from participating in the interview, due to time demands of working from
home, stress, and attempting to renegotiate teaching in a virtual environment. Alternatively, the
COVID-19 crisis could provide impetus for educators to re-envision how grades could and
should function, as well as how they are reported. In this post-COVID-19 environment, schools
across the country -- public and private, primary, secondary, and higher education -- continue to
revise how schools function, based on the repercussions from the pandemic. Many educators
question how the COVID-19 crisis will ultimately shape K-12 education policies.
Delimitations to this study originally included too narrow of a focus in the interview
instrument design on standards-based grading and reporting. Upon suggested revision from my
dissertation committee and with guidance from my dissertation chair, I revised the interview
instrument to focus more broadly on the four main research questions related to environmental
impacts, purpose of grading, accuracy of grading, and equity of grading. An additional
delimitation was having study participants from two counties and two school levels, middle
school and high school. Due to the impact of COVID-19, which was a limitation, the study
could have included more participants and perhaps teachers from Miami-Dade County Public
Schools, the third largest school district in the country. More participants might have provided a
broader sample of the teacher population.
Implications for Future Research
Future studies might include opportunities to address partnerships in grading and
reporting design between teachers and state and district administrators; student perceptions of
extrinsic and intrinsic motivation with regard to academic honesty; a pre-test/post-test
implementation of standards-based grading in conjunction with higher-level versus lower-level

133
socio-economic student learning outcomes; a pre-test/post-test implementation of UDL in
conjunction with student learning outcomes in priority learner populations; a large-scale sample
size survey of teachers in the tri-county Miami-Dade Public School District, Broward County
School District, and Palm Beach County School District as to perceptions of grading; and
perhaps a longitudinal study of students in classes where teachers implemented a standardsbased, UDL-infused, neuroscience-based course of study, assignments, and assessment.
Questions that the study addressed while the pandemic was still ongoing could be
answered in the future as the pandemic comes hopefully to a close. Specifically, future research
could address the importance, role, and continuation of standardized testing at the state, district,
and in college admissions levels, especially with regard to priority learners; how, if, and to what
extent the state and districts were able to address the learning loss that occurred as a result of the
COVID-19 pandemic; the extent to which teachers exited the profession as a result of
environmental factors due to the stress of the pandemic; and the methods, if any, which the state
of Florida and the districts attempted to modify, revise, or reform grading post-pandemic.
Conclusion
In moving beyond the immediate ramifications of the impact of COVID-19 on south
Florida teachers’ grading practices, we can perhaps extrapolate and examine country-wide rates
and impacts of traditional grading policies and practices on extrinsic vs. intrinsic motivation of
our students. All the interviewed teachers expressed a desire to change the way we grade in this
country, but many expressed doubts that such changes would ever occur. This study indicated a
clear relationship between the removal of extrinsic motivation, which had immediate and
widespread negative and transactional influences on student academic behavior, which therefore
directly influenced interviewed teachers’ perceptions and practices of grading and assessment. If

134
teachers were given the opportunity to shift their grading practices towards a standards-based,
differentiated, UDL-infused, and neuroscience biopsychosocial informed method of inclusive
course, assignment, and assessment design, it would be interesting to study academic outcomes
for students and perspectives for teachers. If school provided meaning, engagement, and support
for students, would teachers also feel more meaning, engagement, and support in the classroom
and in their profession? For our students and teachers, it would be a question well worth
investigating.

135
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Appendix A
Protocol
Interview Instrument
Introduction: Thank you so much for taking the time to be interviewed. Your time as a teacher
is valuable, especially in these times, and I appreciate your generosity in answering these
questions.
1. In your opinion, what is the purpose of grading? (Q1: individual)
2. Tell me about how you have approached grading during the COVID-19 pandemic. (Q1:
individual; mesosystem; macrosystem)
3. To what extent is this different than how you approached grading before? In what ways?
(Q1: individual; mesosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem)
4. What are the primary reasons for the change in your grading practices? (Q1: individual;
mesosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem)
5. What kinds of messages are you receiving about grading/reporting from… (Q2:
individual; microsystem; exosystem; macrosystem)
a. The state
b. The district
c. Your school
d. Other colleagues
e. The parents
f. Students

150
6. What policies, if any, have changed regarding grading practice at: (Q1: microsystem;
exosystem; macrosystem)
a. The school level,
b. The district level,
c. The state level.
7. In your opinion, to what extent would you say the grades you are providing during
COVID-19 accurately reflect student learning and outcomes? Why do you feel this way?
(Q1; Q2: individual; microsystem; mesosystem; exosystem; macrosystem;
chronosystem)
8. In what ways - if at all - would you say that COVID-19 has affected equity in your
grading practices? Why do you feel this way? (Q2: individual; microsystem;
mesosystem; exosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem)
9. What have been the challenges to grading during the pandemic? (Q2: individual;
microsystem; mesosystem; exosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem)
10. To what extent have you been able to mitigate those challenges? What would help/would
have helped you mitigate them? (Q2: individual; microsystem; mesosystem;
exosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem)
11. What methods of assessment, grading, and reporting - if any - would you like to continue
post-COVID-19? (Q1: individual; microsystem; mesosystem)
12. What methods of assessment, grading, and reporting - if any - would you like to
discontinue post-COVID-19? (Q1: individual; microsystem; mesosystem)

151
13. If you could change a grading or reporting policy as a result of your experience over time
with grading and reporting during COVID-19, what change would it be? (Q1;Q2:
individual; microsystem; mesosystem; exosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem)
14. What surprised you about assessment, grading, and reporting during COVID-19?
(Q1;Q2: individual; microsystem; mesosystem; exosystem; macrosystem;
chronosystem)
15. What did you learn as a result of grading and reporting during COVID-19? (Q1;Q2:
individual; microsystem; mesosystem; exosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem)
Conclusion: Thank you so much for participating in this interview. As a fellow educator, I
appreciate all that you have done for your students, especially during the COVID-19 crisis. I
value your feedback and responses, and your responses have helped to shape the narrative of
how COVID-19 impacted teachers and assessment.
Interview Instrument Design Matrix
Interview
Question
Number
Interview
Question
RQ 1:
Impact on
Grading
RQ 2:
Impact on
Purpose
RQ 3:
Impact on
Accuracy
RQ 4:
Impact on
Equity
1
In your opinion,
what is the
purpose of
grading?
X

152
2
Tell me about how
you have
approached
grading during the
COVID
-19
pandemic.
X
X
X
X
3
To what extent is
this different than
how you
approached
grading before?
In what ways?
X
X
X
X
4
What are the
primary reasons
for the change in
your grading
practices?
X
X
X
X
5
What kinds of
messages are you
receiving about
grading/reporting
from: ● The state ● The district ● Your school ● Other
X
X
X

153
colleagues
● The parents ● Students
6
What policies, if
any, have changed
regarding grading
practice at: ● The school
level
● The district
level
● The state
level
X
X
X
7
In your opinion, to
what extent would
you say the grades
you are providing
during COVID
-19
accurately reflect
student learning
and outcomes?
Why do you feel
this way?
X
X
8
In what ways
- if
at all
- would you
say that COVID
-
X
X

154
19 has affected
equity in your
grading practices?
Why do you feel
this way?
9
What have been
the challenges to
grading during the
pandemic?
X
X
X
X
10
To what extent
have you been
able to mitigate
those challenges?
What would
help/would have
helped you
mitigate them?
X
X
X
X
11
What methods of
assessment,
grading, and
reporting
- if any
-
would you like to
continue post
-
COVID
-19?
X
X
X
X
12 What methods of
X
X
X
X

155
assessment,
grading, and
reporting
- if any
-
would you like to
discontinue post
-
COVID
-19?
13
If you could
change a grading
or reporting policy
as a result of your
experience over
time with grading
and reporting
during COVID
-19,
what change
would it be?
X
X
X
X
14
If you could
change a grading
or reporting
practice related to
the purpose of
grading as a result
of your experience
over time with
grading and
reporting during
X
X

156
COVID
-19, what
change would it
be?
15
If you could
change a grading
or reporting
practice related to
accuracy as a
result of your
experience over
time with grading
and reporting
during COVID
-19,
what change
would it be?
X
X
16
If you could
change a grading
or reporting
practice related to
equity as a result
of your experience
over time with
grading and
reporting during
COVID
-19, what
X
X

157
change would it
be?
17
What surprised
you about
assessment,
grading, and
reporting during
COVID
-19?
X
18
What did you
learn as a result of
grading and
reporting during
COVID
-19?
X

Abstract (if available)

Abstract This study assessed the impact of COVID-19 on secondary teachers’ assessment, grading, and reporting practices in south Florida. The study included a review of the literature on the history of traditional versus criterion-based grading and reporting; accountability and equity in grading prior to COVID-19; challenges in implementing alternative grading prior to COVID-19; challenges in inaccurate grade alignment to standardized testing; grading alignment to standardized testing; ideal components of assessment, grading, and reporting practices; and priority learners and grading with equity. Using the Bronfenbrenner Bioecological Model of Development as its theoretical basis, the study evaluated teachers’ perceptions of environmental influences on purpose, accuracy, and equity in grading and reporting practices, as a result of COVID-19. This study employed an interview protocol to address the research questions. The study found that grading policy mandates implemented by the state and districts impacted the interviewed teachers’ accuracy and equity in grading. As a further result of the grading policy changes, student extrinsic motivation dropped resulting in lower grades due to significantly higher amounts of academic dishonesty, late work, incomplete work, and absenteeism, severely and inequitably impacting lower socio-economic level priority learners. This shift in motivation in students created in interviewed teachers a shift in the perceived purpose and practice of grading in order to shift students towards more intrinsic motivation, accurate pictures of learning, equitable access to content, social-emotionally aware connections to learning, and scaffolding of executive functioning skills to motivate students to submit quality work.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Berne, Jennifer Louise (author)

Core Title Grading in crisis: examining the impact of COVID-19 on secondary public school teachers’ grading and reporting in south Florida

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Organizational Change and Leadership (On Line)

Degree Conferral Date 2023-12

Publication Date 12/05/2023

Defense Date 11/29/2023

Publisher Los Angeles, California (original), University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag assessment,formative assessment,grading,reporting,standards,standards-based grading,standards-based reporting,summative assessment,traditional grading,traditional reporting

Format theses (aat)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Malloy, Courtney (committee chair), Rosenthal, Jane (committee member), Stowe, Kathy (committee member)

Creator Email jberne@usc.edu,jenniferlberne@gmail.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-oUC113782433

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Legacy Identifier etd-BerneJenni-12522

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