Inside B.C. schools' shift away from letter grading

Striving for an A won’t be a goal for students in B.C. next fall. Instead, kindergarten to grade 9 students will be marked by a scale system.

The change is part of the province’s 2016 plan to modernize the school curriculum and will go in to effect in the 2023/24 school year.

Education and childcare minister Rachna Singh says it will help students better understand each subject, instead of just striving to get a good grade.

“For them to not just to focus on the memorizing, but on the critical thinking and a lot on the self-assessment as well,” said Singh.

Teachers will use four outcome levels when marking grades:

• Emerging
• Developing 
• Proficient
• Extending

“The ideal would be for the students to reach the proficient scale. That means they understand the concepts and whatever they are being taught in class; they are up to date with it and fully understand,” she said.

The permanent change comes eight years after a dozen school districts were part of a pilot project. Now, about half of all students are using the new grading system.

Dan Laitsch, a professor with the faculty of education at Simon Fraser University, says the move will help teachers focus on each child’s individual skill level.

"It focuses much more the individual student’s abilities, their competencies, their achievements, their understanding, rather than the old system if you really think about it -- averages."

Grade 10 to 12 students will stay using the letter grading system. That decision is a strategic one, according to B.C.’s education minister.

"A lot of the post-secondary institutions are taking it that way, the letter grades, so we just did not want to jeopardize that,” she said.

Laitsch hopes that choice will change in the years to come.

"I'm hoping that as students who are very comfortable in that system move through the system and into high school and then into university that it will put pressure on those higher bodies about thinking about assessment differently,” he said.