Part II of the forum is set for 12:30 p.m. and 6 p.m. on Thursday at Mountain Valley Middle School.
By Eileen M. Adams
Staff Writer

MEXICO – SAD 43 administrators launched Wednesday the first of several forums meant to explain a new, radically different grading system.

“We’ve always had standards,” said Superintendent Jim Hodgkin. “But they haven’t always been defined.”

Those standards, which rate students on an A, B, C, D and F system and often include student participation, effort, homework, extra credit and other work completed by students, have been in place in most school districts for as long as anyone can remember. People are comfortable with them, he said.

The new system will measure how well each student does on meeting state educational standards, largely based on the Maine Educational Assessment tests. These grades, set to appear on the first report card of the school year in early December for youngsters in grades kindergarten through nine, will have E for exceeding standards, M for meeting standards, P for partially meeting standards and N for not meeting standards.

The new system is the result of research, laws and input from businesses and state Department of Education officials and other educators conducted during the past dozen years or so.

The need to change the system is important, Hodgkin told the handful of parents who turned out for Wednesday’s forum.

“This is a very important issue. It’s one of the biggest steps we’ve taken in Maine in a lot of years,” he said. “Schools need to change as our society has changed in an informational age.”

No one can learn all the new information that comes out daily. The new way of assessing will measure not only a specific body of knowledge and recall, but also how well students can apply that knowledge to new ideas and information.

Because standards must be met on a regular basis, offering help to youngsters who don’t meet them must come sooner than in the past. Summer school won’t work, said Hodgkin. Instead, remediation must take place as soon as possible.

Additional staffing will likely be required, but the kind and amount has yet to be determined, he said.

District teachers have been working on the so-called standards-based reporting for a couple of years.

Their comments on each educational standard to be met for each grade level will be on the new report cards.

Hodgkin said such great change is bound to affect teachers, students and the community. He feels that students will likely adapt to the new system much more quickly than others.

“Students will be fine. They may be confused for a while, but they are the most malleable. They will get it sooner than their parents do,” he said.

A second forum scheduled to discuss the actual report cards, and how the new grades will affect honor rolls, college applications and homework is scheduled for 12:30 and 6 p.m. Thursday. A follow-up is also scheduled Nov. 12.

eadams@sunjournal.com

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