Grading Policies

There are two kinds of grades at BUHS: 1.) habits of work and 2.) academic scores.

Habits of Work—The Habits of Work Rubric is our school’s way of grading progress toward our core values. Think of it as something that contributes to your C.P.A. (character point average) rather than your G.P.A. (grade point average). Habits of work will be scored separately from academic grades and will not be included in your final academic grade. But they are as important as your academic grades. Maybe even more so. They determine your eligibility for sports and other co-curricular

activities. They determine your eligibility for scholarships. They appear on your report cards and your transcripts. Colleges and future employers will use them to determine whether to hire or admit you.

Here’s how HOW works in this class:

Every other week, you will use a HOW rubric to assess yourself.
You’ll turn that in to me.
I will give my scores and feedback and enter my score into PowerSchool. (They will not be attached to specific assignments. Your score will represent your work over the entire two-week period.)
Work completion on assignments will be logged on PowerSchool whether or not those assignments receive an academic grade. Work completion is used to determine your HOW participation score.
Participation, homework completion, and classroom behavior are separate from academic scores.

Academic Grades

I have a lot to say about grading, and if you’re interested, you can find some of my thoughts on my website. Suffice it to say--in this course, grades are different. My academic grading system has three parts.

Facts and Vocabulary--This part of your grade will reflect your ability to remember and use important facts, words, procedures, definitions, equations, and ideas. Quizzes, tests, midterms, and final exams are scored with a percentage correct, zero to one hundred. Percentage scores are probably familiar to you. Often, I will test you several times on the same content. In that case, your scores will NOT be averaged. Instead, newer scores (higher OR lower) completely replace older ones. Fact and vocabulary assignments will make up a small, but important parts of your overall grade.

Proficiency with Scientific Ideas (DCIs and CCCs)--In this class, you’ll develop interrelated groups of ideas called models. Using models to explain things that happens in the real world is our course's main goal. To see how well you do this, I’ll show you some real-world phenomenon and let you try to use our models to explain it (usually in writing with illustrations or diagrams). When you do, you'll earn a merit badge. You'll need to earn nineteen merit badges in all. I’ll score your work on each badge with its own rubric.

There are some features of proficiency grades that it’s important to note . . .

There are no points. I use a rubric to determine whether you can't use the model yet (0), you can (85), or you're awesome at it (100). See the rubric below.
Your grades will probably start low and then get higher as you master something. Old work has a much lower bearing on your final score than recent work.
I don’t grade assignments. In fact, you won’t even see assignments in the grade book. Instead, you’ll see the learning you’re supposed to master. Nothing is averaged. Instead, I look at all your work work and ask, "Do you get it or not?"
The expectation is that you master all of the models. There is no safety net grade like a “C”. To pass, you need to own the whole thing. You can’t settle for partway. That’s on purpose.
The list of nineteen specific models (each with their own more-detailed rubric) can be found on my website. You can think of these nineteen models like merit badges. Earn them all to complete the course.

Here's the basic rubric I'll adapt to each merit badge.

Proficiency with Science and Engineering Practices (SEPs)--In addition to learning how to use important scientific ideas, you’ll also be learning about how to figure out scientific ideas. The last type of grade in this class describes your ability to use eight science and engineering practices (SEPs) to figure things out. Like the proficiency grades for scientific models, these are scored with rubrics, on a four point scale that translate to percentage grades of (0%, 85%, or 100%). What’s different is that they won’t be added to your final score until the second semester. It takes time to get expertise in these practices and it wouldn’t be fair to score you until you’ve had lots of practice.

Putting it all Together

I do not like averaging scores, but I am required to report your grade as a single number, so some averaging is necessary. Here’s how I do it.

Facts and Vocabulary--These assessments are scored with a running total of all the points for the quarter. That final percentage will comprise 20% of your total score for the course, half of which is the final exam.

Proficiency with Scientific Models--The percentage score for each of the nineteen topics (plus a percentage score for a final essay on the guiding questions of this course) will be averaged together. The essay and the nineteen topics will all be of equal weight. (The first quarter will only include the topics we’ve covered by that point.) That average will comprise 60% of your total score for the course.

Proficiency with Scientific Practices--The percentage score for each of the eight SEPs (plus the score for a capstone scientific investigation) will be averaged together. All will be of equal weight. (The first quarter will not include ANY of these scores at all.) That average will comprise 20% of your total score for the course, half of which will be your capstone investigation.

Second Attempts (and Third and Fourth and . . . )

Get it wrong. Get feedback. Try again. Get it right.

That’s my whole philosophy of education. Second attempts aren’t some Plan B for when you bomb a test. They are the heart of what we do. You should retry EVERYTHING that you’re not proficient on yet. That being said, there is only so much feedback that I can give. To ensure that I have time to give quality feedback and to minimize the temptation to misuse the second attempt privilege, I have adopted the following limitations.

Some facts and vocabulary assessments aren’t eligible for individual retakes because I’ll be giving the whole class a second attempt at the same thing. It’s like a guaranteed retake for everyone.
You are not eligible for second attempts until you have completed ALL assignments in that unit. (School policy)
You must clearly communicate your intent to make a second attempt on merit badge assessments or tests within two school days of getting your score.
You must complete correction credit to be eligible to retake a test. Usually this will involve a correction credit form. Occasionally, a different assignment may be substituted for correction credit, but there will always be something you have to do. (It’s a lot more work to earn credit through a retake than it is to do your best the first time around.)
You must complete your second attempt within ten days or before the marking period ends, whichever comes first. (This is a school-wide policy.)
Final exams, the final essay, and the capstone investigation are not eligible for second attempts. (school policy)

At least one second attempt is available on all assignments that will count toward the final grade (and on many assignments that aren’t). You must schedule time with me during ACE or my office hours within 2 weeks (or before the end of a grading period). The score for the second attempt will be entered as your grade. Your first score will be deleted.

Graduation Requirements--Core Proficiencies--To graduate, you must be proficient in the three core content proficiencies of this course:

- Big Bang
- Landforms
- Technology to Reduce Impact

Powerschool--You and your parents should check the online PowerSchool gradebook weekly! (Mondays are best.) It’s worth emphasizing that passing Earth science is a requirement to graduate from BUHS.

MR. LORD'S EARTH SCIENCE

Grading Policies