Dear I.S. Families and Students,
I hope all is well with you and your family as we continue to work close together in improving our experiences and learning how to navigate our world.
I'm taking this opportunity to share a letter from the NYC Department of Education regarding changes to grading policies for the 2020-21 school year which were just released. You may find the letter by going to the link here and finding the letter in English and other translated languages.
With this information our school has decided it would be best to make some changes in report card grading as well. Effective for this school year we will only have three marking periods and a report card will be distributed in December, March and the end of the school year in June. This change was necessary for several reasons and we believe it will allow for more time to be used for assessment, learning about students and concentrate as much on relationships as we do on grades. For many of you in grade six you are not surprised as Elementary School used three marking periods as well. Our seventh and eighth graders will need to make a small shift to understand this change.
We will still maintain a numerical grading system from 65-100 in the core subjects and use a P(Pass)/NX (Course in Progress) for non-core subjects (Health, Physical Education, World Language, Talents). All grades below a 65 will be reflected as a "NX" as described in the letter from Chancellor Richard Carranza.
Thank you in advance for taking the time to read my message and for following up with the letter from the Chancellor regarding grading policy changes and our school's change to report card dates.
Respectfully,
Lenny Santamaria
Principal