CMS to mull 'no zero' plan

Should a student who does no work get 50 percent credit?  "No zero" policies have been stirring up buzz in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools and across the country.

The goal of such policies is to remove barriers that can cause students to give up on a class  --  and eventually on their education.  On the traditional 100-point grading scale, anything below 60 percent is an F,  while the point ranges for passing grades are much narrower.  That means two or three zeros  (or very low grades)  can make it almost impossible to pull the average up to passing.

Some schools and teachers in CMS give no score lower than 50,  but it's not a districtwide practice,  says Superintendent Heath Morrison.   He said Deputy Superintendent Ann Clark had created teacher and principal work teams last year to talk about a  "no zero"  approach,  but he wants to wait and get more feedback from educators,  parents and students.

The objection,  of course,  comes from people who say giving half credit for no work coddles slackers and gives an unrealistic picture of the scene students will face when they graduate.  Under a  "no zero" plan,  a struggling student who worked hard to get half of the answers right would fare no better than one who didn't bother.

Ideally,  teachers using the revised grading scale encourage students to make up missed work.  If they've tried and failed,  the aim is to get them to loop back to the material and keep working until they master it.

But what about students who just won't work?

Morrison says schools need to work with their parents  --  "when schools and parents work together there's very few times when I've seen unsuccessful children" --  and look at what schools can do better to engage students.  For instance,  he said,  if students refuse to do homework,  is that because the assignments are tedious  "skill and drill"  exercises?

"I want us to own the things that we can own and change those things,"  Morrison said.  "After we've done our part, then we can say,  'OK, what else would you expect us to do?'  But I'm not sure we've done our part as well as we could yet."

Morrison isn't endorsing a  "no zero"  plan.  What he does want,  he said,  is a grading practice that's sensible and consistent from school to school.

An exchange on the Education Writers Association listserve last week showed many other districts are grappling with the same issue.  Washington Post education writer Jay Mathews says "no zero" plans are common in the Washington area.  The Montgomery County,  Md.,  district where Morrison got his start as an administrator switched about 10 years ago,  Mathews says.

"It was briefly controversial, but people came to realize that mathematically giving a zero for a failure to turn something in gave way too much weight to that one mistake, and setting a higher floor  --  I think they use 50 percent  --  did not represent an end to civilization as we know it,"  Mathews emailed.