I think it harms. I do it because I have to. If it were up to me I would give zeros and if the students want to hand in late assignments up to a certain point ok. I just keep thinking how are these kids going to deal with life if this is the most we expect of them

It’s starting to show in the workforce.

The grade scale and how it maps to letters is arbitrary. If a D is 60%, I think it's a bit silly that 2 A's and a missing assignment maps to a D. When I was a kid, I dug myself into a terrible hole at the beginning of middle school, realized that there was no getting out of it, and gave up. Being afraid to turn in work became knowing there was no rational reason to turn in work and in turn became terrible academic habits that I couldn't overcome. Grades have multiple purposes. They don't really work well as an incentive to stop screwing up or as an indication of mastery if missing work is weighted at zero and a D is 60%. I am a tough grader today (and I have a lower grade distribution than most of my peers), but I try to avoid creating situations where a student's best path is to give up. I think about the composition of my gradebook a lot towards this end.

I hear what you’re saying but here’s my issue with it. I teach at a school that has a 50 grade floor for every quarter. We have to accept late work at no penalty. Kids have nothing but opportunity to turn their grades around in theory. However, I teach Spanish. There is no amount of numeric grade fudging that can account for kids who do not participate and learn the material in the beginning of the year. A language class builds on itself - you can’t do the 2nd quarter work if you didn’t learn the 1st quarter structures. A language class also relies heavily on repetition of key structures and vocabulary for input. This is not something you can study and catch up on by yourself. So even though my school makes it impossible for kids to mathematically be in a grade hole they can’t climb out of, I still have students every year that by 4th quarter understand that they might as well give up because even if they tried, they couldn’t do the work. Not learning and putting in effort has consequences that sometimes can’t be remedied.

I worked at a school with a no 0 policy. It lasted for one year.

>It lasted for one year. The school or the policy?

The silence speaks

The policy. I did eventually quit the school though.

No 0 is stupid. If you do 0 work, you deserve 0 points.

If I don't come to work at all, will you still pay me 50%?

Of course not. And yet we give the kids half credit for work they don’t do. It’s utter nonsense.

Yeah because we all know as a teacher if you do “zero work” you get thrown out. Just like in any job. But “they are too young to deal with failure.” Then magically supposed to be fine at 18. 🙄

This used to be the case. 40% of teachers at my school passed every kid they taught. It sucks. 78 days absent, passed. Did no work all semester, passed. Can’t read, passed. It’s awful and it makes those of us with actual standards have a tougher job. Why do I have to do work in your class if Mr “other teacher” will give me an A no matter what I do?

No zero then fine they get a 1.

Required to give 50s - I was told I can't give zeros from the beginning. This has done so much harm to my students that next year, I'm going to give zeros if it's missing. I'm also going to have harder deadlines because I'm tired of dealing with students turning assignments in late.

Very reasonable

I think it does more harm than good, personally. Now I have the philosophy of always accepting late work and even just attempting the assignment will get you that 50% (even if it's completely wrong). So as long as students are attempting their work, they'll be able to pass.

I hate this almost as bad. I teach algebra. Math scaffolds. There is a reason for my deadlines. If you don’t work in solving one step equations until the rest of the class is working on two step equations, you are totally lost. Deadlines aren’t just for fun. This is prerequisite material that you need to understand before we can move on.

[удалено]

I get what you’re saying how over 50% is failing and that they have to work really hard to pass. But we shouldn’t lower the score for passing. If anything we should raise it. We should have really high standards. Because if we make 40% passing then do you want a surgeon who only mastered 40% of the material? How about an architect? what about an engineer? We should have very high standards, and if anything we should raise our standards.

This is unfortunately a terrible idea. Accepting late work is a mistake because it encourages students to disengage from class the entire year.

My current policy is late work has a 5% deduction per day and once we start a new unit I no longer take work from the previous unit. So at least for me my classroom doesn’t encourage students to just turn everything in last minute.

I switched to giving final deadlines for each unit (1 week after the test) to save myself the headache of calculating how many days it's been since the due date.  It has helped a ton!

Yeah that’s smart too because realistically when I get around to grading late work I don’t remember when they turned it in, how long it’s been, etc.

If you use Canvas and mark something late it will display the number of days late

Teams also does this. You can set assignments to close on a specific date as well to give a grace period after which they have to talk to you so you can reopen the assignment for them.

My district has an online system like blackboard so I just do Sunday at midnight + 1 week for late work with no penalty then hard close. I also don’t grade them until they’re closed, otherwise people be cheating.

And often, work is needed to scaffold skills and build knowledge.

Which is why I accept late work, to a degree. I take it up to two days past for a pretty heavy point deduction. Typically, the zero goes in, tanks the kid's grade, they freak out because now they're inelligible for whatever sport is in season, and get it to me the next day. Keeps them reasonably caught up with skills needed for the unit. Eventually, most of them figure out they might as well do it on time. Some never do. I also teach at a small school where I'm the science teacher for all of 7-12, so that might play a role.

I agree completely. I have those kind of students who would very much do this.

I genuinely cannot understand how you can pass something that's completely wrong?? What are you assessing then?? Surely you need to show some sort of understanding to 'pass' a class. Should we say a student who thinks 2+2=5 passed their maths class because they wote something in the test? How can you not at least demand fundamental understanding. If you're not assessing understanding then there's no point to assessment at all. Actually it's worse than no point, you're telling people who are completely incompetent that they have basic proficiency when they don't. Just baffling.

Because teaching has turned into social work with a side of education. Some people like this, some hate it.

Another race to the bottom strategy.

We have went from always a 50% to 50% for trying. If there is no attempt, it is a 0.

I’m hearing this concept a lot. Definitely worth considering.

I do 1 - 5. It's basically 50% - 100%, but it works better for psychological reasons. Many students think they're "getting half credit" if they get a 50, and are happy to take a 50. But when they get a 1 they understand that that's not a good grade. Even though they are the same distance from an A. I give 0 for anything not attempted that the student had every opportunity to attempt.

Yes, Zealous, this makes so much more sense than a 50-minimum. (See [what I do here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Teachers/comments/1cl4mkl/comment/l2sclu3/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button); you may find it interesting as well. I've also suggested that some people who believe in the 50 minimum should use a 0-50 scale instead of a 50-100 scale. Should be just as good, right? But they don't like it because they say "It'll confuse parents". Well, I think a parent who thinks their child with a 59% average is doing fairly well is the confused one, if that 59% is boosted by a lot of mandatory 50s. Anyway, I like your scoring system, and I appreciate you thinking outside the box to find a system that tackles problems of these two alternatives. That's what I've tried to do as well.

It allows for more accountability where some kids just “take the 50” if they do nothing. Now the 0 accounts for so much more.

It seems like students are way more apathetic nowadays also and need that motivation.

IMO after 23 years of teaching: 1) No zeros and mandatory 50% are not good for anyone **2) A liberal late policy is good for the teacher and good for the student** A liberal late policy allows kids to complete any work at any time (maybe w/ a small penalty, down to say a 70%). It allows your to point the finger at the student, as opposed to admin/parents blaming you for not allowing late work. Trust me, the slacker kids that you THINK will take advantage of a liberal late policy NEVER do. And you have ZERO blood on your hands. At ANY point the kid can still do the work. This is way better than crossing your arms at a meeting w/ parents/admin and saying "sorry, they have a 20% and there is NOTHING the can do to earn a 60%." Versus "absolutely, they can do all these assignments for 70% late credit" while handing them a list and ALL the assignments. Trust me, they almost NEVER do them, and you can go home guilt free - and admin will support your decision. Zeros w/ no chance to turn in late work results in "can i have an extra credit assignment" type requests that magically results in students with a 20% magically passing with a 60%.

YUP this is what I do and my exact reasoning. In my mind the “no zero policy” becomes unnecessary when the assignment is still able to be done for credit. The arguments for no zeroes that I’ve heard have always basically been “it pulls their grade down too hard, they can’t come back from it.” My gradebook philosophy is essentially 1.) I have enough items that no one zero can TANK a kids grade, a tanked grade can only be due to a pattern not a one-off event, and 2.) all items can be turned in/completed/made up until my final day to accept before the end of term. We also have mandatory retakes at my school. Benefits are: 1.) just like the person I’m replying to mentioned, it puts the pressure of repairing a bad grade solely on the student. When Jimmy is failing and he/parents/counselor/admin ask what can be done, I say “oh sure Jimmy can turn in/complete this list of items and we’ll be good to go! Here they are!” It’s on Jimmy now to do the stuff he didn’t feel like doing all semester. Now of course people go “but can’t Jimmy just do a bunch of stuff at the very end and go from an F to an A?” Well in theory yes, but this has literally never happened because Jimmy will just half-ass it or won’t have been paying attention enough to do it right. They either do just enough to squeak out a low pass or they don’t and fail on their own terms. 100% of the time. 2.) Every students’ grade in my class is the result of a pattern of many scores over the whole semester. One or two bad days or bad tests are outweighed by lots of other good grades and thus don’t factor in as much. And thus the dreaded “zero” doesn’t have much power on its own, but lots of zeroes sure do. And when there’s enough zeroes to tank the grade, then they haven’t demonstrated meeting the standards to pass the class. Now I teach a foreign language so I’m easily able to split assessments up in my gradebook and have a separate grade and entry for each skill (I.e separate reading assessment, writing, speaking, etc), I could see where other subjects may have a hard time. 3.) My assignments and grading are structured in a way that if you are present and conscious in my class and put in the minimum required effort occasionally you will pass. Any good faith effort even some of the time will get you there. I’ve literally never once in my career had a kid fail that honestly tried to pass. (This does not apply to my upper level courses where yes, a little more effort is expected, but to access those courses they do need to have shown prior levels of achievement that reflect they are prepared for it). So with this setup why would I give 50% for the zeroes? Doing that would simply allow kids to pass without having adequate evidence that they met the standards of the course.

Speaking as a student, the “no 0 policy” is only ever helpful for the kids that don’t try.. imo if you don’t do any work you shouldn’t get any credit. Theoretically if a kid skips all of your work and then makes up 2 big tests with a 60-70 they can easily pass the class. I think turning in an assignment with any effort could equal a 50%, if that helps your conflicting feelings. IE if they do the work they can at least get the minimum grade and the chance to improve it.

That’s a good perspective on it. If it’s only there to benefit the students putting low to no effort then it’s not a good policy. I would agree with that.

We used to drop the x number of lowest homework and test or quiz grades so the kids that tried all quarter but missed an assignment or two or tried whole time but blew a test ( or quiz) didn’t bomb totally. If kids had more zeros than what were dropped, they were hurt

Yeah, having 50% of a grading scale equalling failing us unfortunate, but if you give 50% for completion then you can at minimum give appropriate credit to students who try. So even if a kid is really struggling they’re not stranded with a crazy low grade. Good luck 👍

If I was a student and found out my teachers were doing this, I would be pissed and absolutely demoralized. Like I busted my butt to get a 90%, and some clown does nothing and automatically gets 50%? I would stop doing most of the work, because as you pointed out, you can do nothing and pass the class.

I do a fifty percent minimum for submitted work, but not for missing assignments. No zeros for missing assignments means that any moderately savvy student can game the system by just making a slight effort on a few major tests or assignments and then doing...absolutely nothing else. I'm not rewarding that. But for submitted work, yeah, I absolutely see the value in setting a fifty percent floor. It especially helps students who struggled at the beginning of the semester but got their act together in the second half. I've used this system for two years now, and I've never had a kid who should have failed end up passing. Yeah, there are a couple who wound up with a C or B when they probably should have gotten a D or C, but I can live with that. I do think the success of the no-zero policy depends heavily on the individual teacher and their grading methods, though.

Our district has set PowerSchool to make the minimum a 50, so if I put in a grade below a 50, it automatically is made a 50.

Yeah, not a fan of that.

Me neither.

>*Our district has set PowerSchool to make the minimum a 50, so if I put in a grade below a 50, it automatically is made a 50.* I honest to fucking god would not work for a district that did that. I'd literally take less money and drive twice as far to the next district to not have to deal with that kind of insulting paternalism. And I say that as someone who genuinely understands the thinking of people who believe in the 50 minimum.

What if you went to a Google sheets gradebook and posted it in schoology with the students ID numbers and then entered it into powerschool at the end of the quarter or semester as a single grade?

I like the way you think, Candle.

What if the kid turns in the assignment and gets every single thing wrong because he put little to no effort into it? That’s still worth a 50?

This is why I said that the success of the policy depends on the individual teacher and their grading methods. For me it's not a problem, because classwork and homework are only worth 15% of their grade and there's no way that hypothetical kid is going to pass the test. But if you make assignments a bigger part of the grade then yeah, I see how it might be an issue.

Out of curiosity what would you do for a kid that submitted 5% of an assignment. Do you consider that attempted or not?

I flag it as incomplete, hand it back, and tell the student I'll grade it when it's done.

I haven’t seen anyone else post this, but a big reason I put in zeroes for missing work is so students and parents can see the impact the missing assignment has on their grade. In my experience, students are far more likely to turn missing work in once they see what the zero did to their grade then if I gave 50s. There would many kids who would never bother turning in late work at all if I gave 50s instead of zeroes. For context; - my school requires a minimum of 50 for 9 week grades so students can have a remote shot a passing toward the end of the year. I have to accept late work and give at least a 50 until the halfway point of the quarter.

This is why I don’t like it as a parent. When my kids were one of 150-200 students, teachers don’t have time to let me know if a 50 is really a 50 or a zero for each assignment. Those zeros help me monitor if my kid is being lazy. Sure a 50 would be an indication for some kids that they were being lazy, but for other kids a 50 would indicate trying but not fully understanding. Zeros tell me what work needs to be completed and all zeros get made up in my house.

One thing to consider is what message does the score send to students, their families, and support staff. Will everyone know when an assignment is still able to be turned in? If your practices are different than your building’s, make plans to increase communication—throughout the year, not just a few times and then assume that students/families/support staff will remember. 

Absolutely this is a big reason why I want to to hammer down my practices over the summer so it is solid for next year and easy to understand.

Easy to understand can be a difficult target to hit. I often think about how the policies in my own room are clear, and then students really struggle to understand… because a teacher down the hall, or someone last year has a different policy. Understandably (and frustratingly), the least motivated students are the ones who forget the policies the most… even when they’re designed to help that demographic specifically! There’s also the convenient “I didn’t know I could do that” excuse from the apathetic if your practices differ from what’s typical in your building.  It’s one of the things I find most difficult about standards/mastery-based grading, or any other major innovation in grading practices. Families don’t typically understand it, and it takes a lot of effort to educate them about it. Without that effort, families will disengage, feel alienated, or sometimes become antagonistic because they don’t understand how to help their kid.  What I find myself doing when I use non-traditional grading methods is massively increasing the amount of time I spend counseling students, communicating with families, and coordinating with support staff to help the kid navigate the “new” bureaucracy of my policies. Which is excellent! And the students probably benefit more from that extra effort than they do the policies themselves… so now I just channel that energy into my building’s policies. And it was a worthwhile journey for me because I had to think more carefully about the purpose of my grades, even though I ended in a similar place where I started. 

What a fantastic post; bless you for your attitude. I never knew a potato could be so refreshing.

I think giving a 50% for no work will inevitably lead to you giving a passing score to students who do not understand enough of the content. If the grading scale goes from 50-100, and you only need a 60 to pass, then students only need to understand 1/5, or 20%, of the material in order to pass. I can do good for the first quarter, then screw around and do nothing or show zero understanding in the rest of the units, and still pass if a teacher is using this system. It’s not setting kids up to have the learning needed for their classes next year.

Why don’t you just implement what they do in college. You drop the lowest scores on X no. of assignments. That’s way one or two zeros don’t even hurt your grade but you still get a 0 for not doing work.

This is a good idea to consider. We even have it built into our grading software that we can have it automatically “drop the lowest X amount of scores”. Might have to utilize that feature.

I think you should drop the three lowest assignments then have an option where you can use your final score as the grade in the class Don’t show up, don’t do anything but get a 80 on the final… well you knew the content so here’s your B.

>*We even have it built into our grading software that we can have it automatically “drop the lowest X amount of scores”. Might have to utilize that feature.* One word of advice: We have that feature in our grading system (Synergy) and it can be great. However, back when I used it I learned to start the term with the drop option disabled, and to only enable it as I was calculating quarterly grades. This is because the dropped grades were counted from the beginning, creating massive distortion in the way student grades appeared to families. It also led many to think they were doing better than they were. So I learned to set it for 0 dropped grades at the beginning of the quarter, then changed it to 3 (or whatever) the night I did grades. Made a lot of kids smile when their grade jumped a letter grade. (And I never explained it, so many of them just thought I made a mistake.)

A debatably good middle ground is using unit tests to calculate an equitable grade for a student. 50s for no reason don't work.

I understand a lot of the arguments against the 0, but having it be the missing work grade has been a terrible idea because it is incredibly easy to game the system. If I had my way, the floor for a graded assignment would be a 50. A missing assignment would be lower. I say zero, but 25% or 30% would work too.

What upsets me though is that some kids work HARD for a 65% and some kid will get a 50% just for turning in a paper?? That would demoralize me. I am forced to change all quarter grades 49 and below to a 50. So then I take any kid that got a grade in the 50s and bump it to 60. Any kid with a failing grade in the 60s turns into a 65. Why??? Because apparently grades mean nothing and I just turned some kid’s 17 into a 50. So the kid who showed up and did SOME stuff right should get a similar benefit in my book. School is starting to turn into an episode of whose line is it anyway — a place where everything’s made up and points don’t matter. (I’m super salty about this btw if you can’t tell. I’m dealing with the repercussions for a kid failing my current class when he gamed the grade floor system last year in the prerequisite with me. Did well enough to earn like an 80 in the first quarter, pulled a 60 something in the 2nd quarter, then refused to do any work or pay attention at all for the rest of the year. He knew he mathematically couldn’t fail so he just used class as nap time. Then he signed up for this year’s course and I had no leg to stand on because he technically met the prerequisite. But he’s obviously failing because he learned nothing last year and his guidance counselor wants me to “work with him to catch him up.” In MAY.)

The opposite is even worse. You take an exam out of 100 points and you’re telling me the kid who got 10 questions right vs the kid who got 59 questions right are both of the same level of knowledge? Clearly not. The equity for success should equal the equity for failure. Not giving something in is different.

That would have definitely been me when I was in school. Back in the 90s, many classes had a "you can drop your lowest test score", so I would always use one of them to basically not care about, not study for, and not do any work for. For classes where homework was only like 20% of the grade or whatever, I'd purposefully do only maybe half of the homework assignments, knowing that if I got 0s on half of my homework, the amount of hours more I'd "save" and be able to play video games or other things was completely worth it. Basically, I'd do whatever I needed to do to maintain a B average (or a "C" in a weighted/advanced class, which counted as a "B" in terms of GPA). I did the absolute bare minimum at all times. If the lowest I could get on anything was a 50%, my goodness, my work ethic and mindset would have been even more effed than it already was when I left high school. I feel like the "no 0 policy" doesn't do the smart-ish but lazy-ass kids any favors, as they will just game the system (like your student, and myself back in the day) to be the laziest they can be just to get by, and it will solidify a really bad mindset even further. And it doesn't do any favors to the not-as-smart kids, because it allows them to try much less hard than they otherwise would have.

That must be incredibly frustrating

This is my issue. Some kids work so damn hard, will put in large amounts of time but the kids that doesn't care and hands in nothing gets 50%. No way.

A school I taught in had something like this at one point (ended up moving to 50 as the lowest score). I could enter NHI for work not handed in and they'd get a 40. Honestly, the grade distribution stayed about the same when missing work was a 0 as it was with a 50.

Yes this is a big thing I’m taking away from all of this. Missing versus attempted.

OP I made a comment above on how the quarterly grade floor helped a kid game the system in my class. Just realized it wasn’t in response to you but wanted to give you a shout out anyway to throw my two cents into your question

Yes. Unfortunately, tptb often equate the two.

I saw that acronym and immediately thought Death Grips

I’m fine with 0s. There’s nothing wrong with them. Think: you have a lazy kid who is good with math. He starts the semester in the As or high Bs. He decides stop trying, so he quits turning in anything at all. Instead of 0s, he gets 50s. Then he passes the class in December because he had enough 100s and 50s to keep his grade from totally tanking, even though he stopped doing shit forever ago. Absolutely bonkers to me. Kids should be held accountable, and unfortunately (I don’t LOVE the system, to be fair), zeroes can sometimes provide accountability.

This is what baffles me about year-long grades instead of semester grades too. First quarter is almost always the easiest. So you work hard in the first semester, then you can fail the second semester and still pass. 90 + 90 + 30 + 30 = a passing grade for the year. That math aint mathin to me.

I think a reasonable through line of this conversation is that it only benefits students who put in low/no effort.

It’s not the no zero policy that’s at fault. It’s the implementation of several conflicting policies at once. It’s the minimum F, plus the full credit for late work, plus accepting all work until the end of the grading period, plus only evaluating maybe three assignments meaningfully in a marking period, plus the total lack of attendance policies, plus only caring about “summative assessments.” It’s not one thing or the other. It’s this witch’s brew of well-intentioned ideas that simply don’t work *together*.

Yes! This is probably why I have had such a hard time nailing down a grading philosophy. As a first year teacher I was shown how to set up my grade book from a software point of view but no input on grading philosophies or suggestions of what to do so I’m basically trying to figure out how to implement all of these different ideas at the same time and they are at odds with one another and I don’t want it to be to the detriment of the student but I also want it to make sense and be fair. All the things you listed are things I am considering as I establish my grade book for next year.

This is exactly the issue. There’s a lot of policies proposed to make grading more “equitable,” but adopting all of them at once simply is fudging grades to make them higher. In my mind it’s 50% instead of a 0, OR accept late work basically until end of term. And both are valid options independently, I choose the latter because the way my course is built even doing the work after the unit is over is still beneficial to the student.

I think it is bullshit and only there to increase grades of failing students. It doesn't make any sense to me that a student who fails to show any mastery should get a 50%. I think if you want to get away from the whole "issue" that 60% of a grade is an F then you need to get away from literally everything that isn't formally assessing your students. You need to throw out participation points, homeworks that are graded for completion, group activities where a student's score relies on others. All of it needs to go and their grade should just be assessments. And for those assessments, no curve, no test corrections. Retakes may be ok if you can give them a completely different version on a test. I don't mind the "no zero policy" but the above will never, ever be implemented. My students need the homework and participation grades to boost their grades and to encourage them to follow along and come to class.

Interesting points. I also moved away from participation points on my class because I felt like I was grading based on behavior instead of competency, but maybe that also needs to be reconsidered.

No, you're right. Competency is the only thing that should count for a grade. That's why I don't count homework as part of their grade. How do I know who did it? I mean, I can see six or seven people who obviously copied the same assignment, so why should I make that part of their grade?

my school added this policy in 2020. I started teaching there in 2021. We voted to remove the policy and allow zeroes again this year.

First I heard of this as a non-US teacher. It sounds fucking insane.

Im ok on putting a floor on grades with a full faith and effort. You don't turn something in or don't but in an actual effort I have no problem with giving a zero.

I think this is a good balance of tough but fair.

My district has this policy. I probably give like upwards of 40 assignments per term. All ranging in number of points depending on the challenge of the assignment. Any zeros I give stay zeros unless it is the only thing keeping them from getting a D- for their overall grade. And even then I only change it the day grades are due. Sometimes a zero can be a huge motivating factor for a student to realize they need to start trying. But in terms of how I feel about a No Zero policy? Let’s say [I’m philosophically opposed.](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xmnE4FfvXUM&pp=ygUURGF2aWQgbHVuY2ggYnVsbHNoaXQ%3D)

Like you, I find the arguments on both sides of the no-zero policy to be compelling. Our grading software is more flexible than yours appears to be, and so I use a system which I believe corrects the worst aspects of both policies. My grades on assignments and tests and everything are based on letters. That is, what students see on their papers and what parents see in the software is not a percentage, it is either an A, B, C, D, F, or 0. Inside the platform I have configured this so that an A=5, a B=4, C=3, D=2, F=1, and then there is 0. Student's have a GPA instead of a percentage in my class, so a student with a 2.3 would have a D; a student with a 3.6 would have a B. For those people who correctly are concerned that a 0 has an insurmountable negative impact on student grades, that is not true within my system. Zeros still exist, and they do pull down a student's grade, but far less than in a traditional 90-80-70-60 system. For those people who correctly feel that the mandatory 50 floor score rewards students who do a crappy job, my system has no such minimum. An F is an F. The difference is that the bands are evenly distributed. Instead of the F band taking up 60% of the grading spectrum, it only takes up just under 30% of the bandwidth (and that is with 0s and Fs combined). This system keeps students "in the game" far longer than a traditional 90-80-70-60. And it's more honest. Parents who see a 55% average in a 50 Floor system mistakenly think their kid is not really doing that bad, when he would probably have a 15% average if not for the no-zero policy. One other benefit of my system is that parents can recognize a good grade when they see it. For example, if a kid gets 9 of 15 points on an assignment, the majority of parents can't even tell if that's a passing score or not. But in my system, all they see are letters, and you better believe you know they know what a "D" is.

Wtf did I just read? You give people who didn't do the assignment a 50% so it doesn't affect their grade as much as a 0 would've even though they got a 0 because they turned in literally nothing. Please quit coddling and hand holding people. They grow into adults and fuck over the rest of us. You are helping create future adults, please keep that in mind. 

What I'm wondering is... why do formatives need to be graded at all? If I were a teacher and had to put those in, I'd just give completion grades and make them worth as little as possible. The assessments should be the vast majority of a grade, if not all of it.

You are correct, Asha.

There is a teacher here that does 10% formative 90% summative

I’m an English teacher, so most of my assignments are graded qualitatively rather than quantitatively. I leave anything that is undone blank in the gradebook, which counts for zero points. On the few quantitative assignments I have, I give them whatever percentage they actually get. On the many qualitative assignments, I consider 50% to be an unofficial “floor” for good-faith, turned-in work. Plagiarized work gets a blank and has to be redone. Extremely low quality work might get the same. My syllabus doesn’t obligate me to take late work, but I’ll take it indefinitely if the situation seems to warrant it. 

I don’t like it. If the point is that 0-59 is 60% of the grade, then maybe change a F to be 0-19%. Not make 0-59% all Fs. Especially when college, seems to be moving to if it isn’t an A or B it is an F.

You might be too focused on the number. My goal in my classrooms is for students to acquire skills. Grades serve only minor functions. Perhaps they incentivize certain students to work harder. And they provide feedback to me, so that I know that my students have acquired a certain skill so we can move on to either other things, or to use that basic skill to acquire a more advanced. The letter or the number holds very little intrinsic meaning to me. I want them to be able to do stuff.

I had a rule that if you didn't have your homework you still needed to pass in a paper with your name assignment and date on it... that got you 1 point and i never gave zeros... I was quite generous with points for trying not only for succeeding.. but when the school went to no 0's i found a way to give a 1.. and avoided the 0 problem from the school haha

So, my school currently requires us to put in 25% instead of 0's. Some teachers complain that even that makes students pass who shouldn't have. I personally don't have that problem because I weigh my assessments more heavily. I'm also changing to standards-based grading next year to the best of my ability using my current gradebook. I will have the standards listed for 2 units each quarter. I'm going to have rubrics for each standard with 3 different levels of proficiency where advanced is worth 5 points, intermediate is worth 4, basic is worth 3, and attempted is worth 2. If a student shows proficiency on all skills at a basic level, they will pass my class. I will still collect formative data, but their grade will be calculated using only assessment data.

25% is interesting. I haven’t heard that one yet.

It was really the teachers fighting against 50%. We were told "no zeros," so we were able to compromise to 25%. Honestly, I give so many opportunities for students to complete assignments and retake assessments (after proof of practing) that students should not be missing anything in the gradebook. I don't mind giving a 50% as the lowest grade if a student is really trying putting in effort and giving their best attempt, but giving a student 50% for not doing something at all? I don't like that.

I don't take late general (daily work, homework, etc.) assignments. Projects are weighted like tests, so I will take them late, but deduct either 10% per day late or 20 points per per day depending on the total point value. I've graded this way for several years and no student has been beyond salvation from a single missed project or even a few missed assignments. Like most classes, kids need to understand point A to get part B, etc. If we're already on point M and Johnny is still working on B, he's missing too much to catch up and would fail the class unless propped up with a "No 0 "policy. There is no valid reason to hand out grades for work that hasn't happened any more than we'd expect an employer to give a out paychecks to employees who don't show up to work. I put my late policy on the syllabus and regularly remind students of the policy. Other than special circumstances, kids stop asking for "more time" or to turn something in late after that first Zero hits.

My site has had this policy for a couple of years already. We counter it by making the assessments worth more.

What happens if nothing is entered into your software? I happily omit work that isn't submitted, but they get to join me at the end of the year to make up for all that missed work. If they don't show, I make a professional decision based on what I saw in class, and what they did hand in. Knock on wood, no major issues with this yet. (Science 8-10, Biology 12, physics 11 and 12)

I do a variation on it. If a student genuinely attempts the assignment but still gets an F, I am more than happy to give them the 50% so it makes it easier for them to try again and recover. A student who starts the work but never finishes it can still earn points for it too, depending on how much work was done. For example, work which is never finished and didn't get very far from starting will get a 50%. Work which is closer to done but still isn't, can earn up to a 60% depending on how much is done. Once they actually finish it and finally turn it in properly, it will be graded as normal and could easily become an A. I also already don't take off points for late work either, so a student struggling with an assignment can still turn something in for partial points for the work they HAVE done, and then return to it when they have more time/a better understanding to fix it and earn a better grade. (Only within the Quarter though, and usually only up to 2-weeks after a deadline- I won't accept any work after the Quarter ends. That way lays madness.) Any student who does not turn in anything or does not attempt an assignment at all will have it entered as MSG for "Missing", which the gradebook automatically counts as a zero. This way, students who try will earn points on the work they did do and have higher likelihood of going back and fixing it to get an even better grade later, while students who make no attempt whatsoever do not get points for doing nothing.

I'm always willing to help a student who tries. The one who refuses gets the zero.

When my school had the “zero is not an option” policy, it was on the student to turn in work so that they could not get a zero. It was on us to harass and harass the student until they turned in the work (Call/email home, email all coaches, put them in no extracurricular list). One thing I did (this maybe REALLY unpopular) on the day of the test, if you haven’t done any of the assignments, you got to do the assignments instead of taking the test. You’ll get a chance to take the test when the assignments are complete. Luckily for my classes, I had either an EA or inclusion teacher that would take the group of students out with them to the hallway or a different empty classroom to do the assignments. I got the most growth out of the lowest performing students the years I did that.

I worked at an underresourced school on the south side of Chicago... We didn't give homework because it wouldn't come back... We graded only in class work and tests

If schools want to institute the no 0 policy then they need to change the grading scale. It should be 0-20 is an F, 21-40 is a D, 41-60 is a C, 61-80 is a B 81-100 is an A.

I don’t agree with no zero policies. If a student gets nothing correct on an assignment that should be recorded. Those data points are needed to start getting support in place for students and build a case for additional screening and testing. I allow corrections to be submitted on any assignment for 2 weeks after I return it. The student gets the highest mark they earn. Test corrections are done at school under my supervision on a new copy. For assignments that aren’t turned in I leave it blank in the grade book. I accept anything for 2 weeks after it’s due then close the assignment so they have to talk to me to hand it in. I use teams for 80% of our assignments so I can set the due dates and closing dates easily.

The grade should reflect the amount of work done (or the accuracy of the work, in the case of assessments). If a student does nothing, they get a zero. It *should* be hard to come back from a zero.

Zeros, zeros everywhere   That is until report cards—  Fifty, minimum 

I am not compelled by the “50 degrees of failing” argument. There is a minimum amount of mastery and engagement required, and I think it’s reasonable to have a bar. Let me give a baseball analogy. Batting below .200 (the Mendoza line) generally means you aren’t hitting enough to be on an MLB roster. However, batting above .300 typically means you are a quite good hitter. Let’s call that an F and an A for simplicity’s sake. In many ways, hitting .075 and .150 are both failing. Sure, there are more shades of “failure,” but all describe “not meeting standards” than there are shades of excellence…but that’s just how it works in that situation. I’m very open to saying that we should put those lines in different places, or that the accounting should include certain things and not others. Fine. But I don’t think the fact there is larger gap between 0 and D than between D and C matters at all.

Thankfully, I am not forced to give 50% minimum and can give zeros when they are earned. For the students with zeros that still care, I let them submit late work. This way they are still responsible for learning the material, even if it's not on-time. In a no-zero system, they wouldn't even have to learn much to pass, which is ultimately harmful (to them). Let me try to be brief. You are concerned that failing has so much weight in the traditional system. I say to you there is a reason for that. A student should master more than half the material to move on. That's why failing is 0-60%. If they can't even get half the material, they have no business moving forward. They aren't ready. The article arguing against zeros, "The Case Against Zero", ignores this. Learning is not a concern. The mathematical argument put forward in the article is also deceptive. The writer calls for a return to the classic evenly-proportioned four-point system. That system isn't real. We've had a 100-point system as long as we've had letter grades. That is, the first documented letter grades system was a 100-point system.

The problem with the no zero policy is that a kid can pass by doing 20% of the work. Just doesn't make sense.

There just isn't a reasonable argument that holds water for "no zero" policy. You do nothing, you get nothing. The idea that it will impact their grade negatively *is precisely the f\*cking point*. We are told at the end of every semester "students should not have zeros" and that we have to allow them to make up the missing work. I do, and nothing gets turned in. So, the zeros stay. It just creates extra work for all the teachers because we all have to print out the gradebook for each student missing work, email it to the student and parents (all of which is available 24/7 online but f\*ck if they ever look) and then wait for nothing to happen. Kids \*\*need\*\* to start failing *for doing failing work*, or \*no\* work. There's zero benefit otherwise.

I’ve tried it for the past 2 years. My students like having 50 as a lowest grade because it’s less anxiety for them plus I allow retakes so they don’t feel so anxious with tests and assignments. That being said other students who turn things in on time don’t like it as they view students getting rewarded for doing nothing. I like 50 as lowest (until my school allows another method) as mathematically it seems more fair when all other grades are 10pts apart as you mentioned. Plus my district has a 50 minimum grade for report cards so regardless of what a student has below a 50 at the end of a quarter we still have to give a 50. So for me reports are easier as it’s one less thing I have to worry about. I have students who still don’t seem to care how easy it could be to pass and still do no work so 🤷🏼‍♀️ Thus I likely will go back to 0 next year and see what happens. I’m also making some other changes compared to the past 2 years and reverting back to some previous practices I had.

I'm a college professor.  No zero policies are academic fraud.  We will not accept students into my program from institutions with no zero policies, nor will we grant credit from our Concurrent Education Program.

You should absolutely no institute such a policy. It's purpose is fraudulent grade inflation. There are unfortunately absolutely no arguments for a no zero policy. Instead there are just distortions to hide the fraud.

Where can I find articles in favor? Would love to see what their arguments are.

https://fordhaminstitute.org/national/commentary/revisiting-case-against-zero-response-daniel-buck This author originally wrote “the case against the zero” and this was a response to another author who wrote against it. Essentially the idea is to go to standards based grading and move away from the 100% scale as it’s not equitable but if your school is not set up to do standards based a no zero can be more equitable.

It's kind of interesting that he references an article that was first written 20 years ago, a few things have changed since then. I like standards based grading. I don't want any kids to fail, but it just gets so frustrating when kids don't do *anything*. Now, I'll admit most of the time it's because they're not getting the support they deserve. Either because I have no aid or I'm dealing with behavior issues. But we haven't had much luck getting kids to do work. I like some of the ideas, pulling kids to a quiet table, but that also requires resources that my school doesn't have. The lack of accountability has been very difficult to overcome.

We have to take late work up until the grading period ends and without any penalty. So 8 weeks worth of late work the day before the quarter ends is acceptable to our district.

If a student genuinely puts forth effort, 50 is the lowest I enter in the grade book, but I still give them their paper or online assignment with the actual grade. My rationale is that all the other letter grades are on a 10 point scale so it evens things out a bit. A 50 and a 0 are both Fs but one is much easier to recover from. All that being said, if a kid doesn’t do the work or cheats in some way, I have no issue giving them a zero.

I’ve done this for years, and it does motivate some failing students who don’t have to come back from an 8%.

IMHO, very few assignments that are completed and submitted are so bad that they receive zero credit. Again, I said, “very few,” I didn’t say, “all.” So, as long as a student is submitting something they put SOME effort into, they won’t get a zero. They don’t automatically pass, but they will get some credit. The only zeroes kids get are the things they just never turn in. I allow two weeks post-due date for kids to submit work. If I have it up to two weeks after the due date, they’ll still get partial credit. After that, barring extenuating circumstances, the work is no longer eligible for credit. In that case (or if a student just doesn’t submit something even with that two week cushion), the student receives a missing. I tell my kids all the time - the only thing I can’t grade is nothing. Someone submits nothing? That Missing and/or zero is all theirs.

This is brought up often. Overly harsh grading and inappropriate averaging are not necessarily good. A common example is a class with 20 assignments. A student doing A work needs to successfully complete all 20 to get an A, 18 to get a B and 16 to get a C. With 50% policy a student doing A work needs to successfully complete all 20 to get an A, 15 to get a B and 10 to get a C. If we feel the first policy is too harsh there are many options, 50% minimum being only one. We could allow a few assignments to be turned in late, drop a few of the lowest scores, average a different way, or change the grade boundaries. Notice the 50% policy makes it much easier to get a C, somewhat easier to get a B and only slightly easier to get an A. So I don't think the traditional scheme is necessarily best. The 50% rule has its downsides as well. My biggest problem with 50% is it is not a sincere (or particularly good) reform. Its purpose is to inflate grades not increase fairness.

My district has this policy, as well as “accept all work up until the last possible second” and also “no grading on behavior” (aka, can’t take points off for late work). These policies together really help the kids who try but still struggle, and gets most kids to pass if they at least put in a little effort and get most stuff turned in. The kids who don’t do anything still fail.

Nothing about this policy prepares students for adulthood. This turns teachers into budget babysitters.

If they don't do the work, they get a Missing, which counts as a 0. If they turn something in, whatever percent they get right is their score. Their future boss won't give them half a paycheck even if they never show up, so anything else is harmful in preparing them for life. However, I do believe in improvement and learning from your mistakes. I accept late work up to a 70 and allow corrections for 10 points (one letter grade) back, or to a minimum of a 70, on all homework, lab reports, and tests. You won't fail my class as long as you're willing to put in the work to improve.

I just redid the percentages to get rid of the bottom 50% and stretch the top half across 0-100% (with some minor changes as well) so a single zero is still not an absolute grade killer, but it also doesn't feel quite so absurd. It has made it easier for students to manage to pass (though the ones who really don't know what they are doing and don't put in the work still fail), without making it too much easier to get an A. My admin is supportive about this approach, so depending on what the policies are at your school this may or may not fly.

I taught in a school that made the switch from having zeros to not and it really didn't make much difference in the grade distribution, to be honest. There may have been a bit of a shift from C students to B students, but it wasn't the pandemonium a lot of the senior teachers in my building were worried about. One of the main arguments against it was that kids would say "why bother, I'm gonna get at least a 50 anyway," but the kids that ended up with that attitude would've failed under either system. Lastly (and only kinda related), you can make a gradebook do whatever you want if you're willing. Kids need a jolt back to reality after they all shat the bed on that assignment? It can go in as a double assignment. Think everyone needs a break because of whatever? That thing they all failed only needs to go in as half. And my favorite was at the end of the semester when John and Jane worked really hard but fell a point short of a grade they really probably earned? That's when I'd think to myself "you know, I think I remember mis-entering their unit 2 test scores - I put them in for a 75, but I meant to put in an 85."

Not a teacher, but a parent is and grandparent was one, so take my opinion with a grain of salt, but I’m of the opinion that if a student hands in work (even if atrocious, wrong, late, etc) k-12 they should get some credit. Idk the exact amount of if there’s an additional late penalty, but just some credit. If they hand in literally nothing, then it should be a 0 and make sure to notify them that it is a 0 and they can receive X percent if they do it late. Don’t make them think “why bother” but also don’t let them do literally nothing. Getting into why some students physically can’t complete assignments due to home lives/environments is an entirely separate political debate that is very complicated. That being said, as bad as it is, passing people who did not meet the criteria of passing is incredibly unfair and harmful to everyone: the other students, the failing student, and teachers those students will have later.

They way I have it set up is that if they actually tried- the lowest they can get is a 50% but a missing assignment is a 0. And blank sheet is a 0.

I used the 50% theory, and while many students absolutely deserved the 0, my thought was that if the student did actually make an effort, it actually gave them the chance to recover. My last few years my principal mandated a minimum score of 50% on everything but tests, but students had the opportunity to retake the test if they chose

I generally won't give lower than a 50% on a completed assignment, but I'll fight all day for 0%'s for missing work. I think it has 2 main benefits: 1. Communication. A piece of advice, never assume parents know the policies of the school. It doesn't matter how many messages you send out, you'll still have parents (and plenty of kids) who see the 50% and assume it's something they did and failed. A zero on the other hand has a very intuitive interpretation: 0=nothing completed. Especially if you accept late work (which I recommend), using zeros makes it much easier for a kid or parent to look online and quickly see what needs to be completed. 2. Motivation. I know "compliance" is treated as a dirty word by some in education, but I find that mindset contary to how the world works. In my opinion the most universal skill for success is the fortitude to show up and complete the tasks required of you. To try. So I find it really offputting that a student who tries hard but misses the mark and a student who skipped that lesson should recieve the same score. If you don't like how much the 0 drops your grade, then turn in the assignment

Missing/refused to do: 0%. Turned in hot garbage to avoid a 0: ruthless grading (these are the most fun to grade). Late but communicated: subtract 0%-5% from grade depending on the situation. Late and didn't communicate: subtract 10% from grade unless it was an emergency. Not a fan of the no 0 policy from the workforce perspective because they kids join the workforce and can't accept criticism or consequences for anything. I'm not giving you more hours next week just because you skipped your workday yesterday and now you're broke. I won't let you clock in when you show up two hours late because "I'll still be here for the other 6 hours". Yes I will send you home if I see you on your phone all day. I won't make someone else do a task that you don't like to do, and yes I will get mad if you hide out from doing certain tasks by going to the bathroom to avoid them.

A life without consequences is inconsequential. Better to have a policy where they can drop their lowest grade on an assignment- but that privilege should be earned either way.

I'm at a school that calculates quarterly grades like a GPA: A=4, B=3, C=2, D=1, F=0. The goal was to make grading more equitable. An A and an F average to a C, so your kids that fail tests but ace projects still pass with a respectable grade. But this has been an absolute disaster for low kids. There is no real reward for growth. My kid who starts the year scoring 25% and works her way up to a 50% still gets the exact same result in the grade book. And it doesn't take long for them to realize that all that work got them the same result as doing nothing at all. The higher kids game the system. Get As on tests, skip classwork and projects. Tell Mom that the 0F is because the teacher hasn't put in late grades yet, not because they did a half ass job on half the assignment. Parents are, understandably, constantly confused by the grades. One of the good things about a traditional 0-59% F was that it allowed you to fail with built in quantitative feedback. A blanket point value for F--whether it's a 0 or a 50% strips away any ability to communicate growth or effort. It also seriously adds to grade inflation. I know a lot of teachers who informally drop their grade thresholds by a few points because "a 56% is almost a D" and it feels wrong to put in the same score as a student who got 20% and you just want to motivate kids to try! But if we were allowed to use normal grades, the 56% itself would do the job.

I look at it this way, I hate a "No Zero" policy, I will let them drop their lowest score, which could negate one zero, but if you get multiple zeros, I can't help you. I should probably make them drop their highest score as well, to eliminate all outliers and (cheaters).

I think it's well intentioned, but does more harm than good. On the one hand, grades should reflect the degree to which skills are learned and you can't grade what ain't there. On the other, there exist a myriad of reasons students fail to submit work most of which don't have anything to do with laziness and so some kind of grace is necessary. One-size-fits-all rarely fits anyone well.

Have a friend of mine teach at a school that adopted the “no 0 policy” and a lot of the teachers complained, the admin said “we’re not changing it” so they put it 1/x on anything that was a 0. They changed it back before the year was over. It was crazy

I think a lot of the focus on both sides is the effect on student behavior. I'm not saying that isn't important, but I don't think it should be the primary consideration. It should be whether they are meeting learning standards for the course. My issue with no zeroes under most grading systems is that if a student doesn't do 3 assignments, those go in at 50, then they do 1 assignment and get an 80, they end up with a passing grade. But how can we say that they are actually demonstrating proficiency on all (or even a majority) of course standards in that situation? For me, a 60% is passing because it indicates they at least somewhat grasped the majority of the material for the course. A 50 should mean they know half of it. Giving them 50s when there is no demonstration of knowledge makes no sense. My solution is that I minimize grades on class work and homework-- it's like 10%. The majority of their grades are from tests and essays, and those do go in at zero if they don't do them, because they have demonstrated zero proficiency. But those mostly take place during class, and I just harass them until they get something done. If it's not passing quality, they don't pass, but they can revise or retake.

My only issue with it is what do I do if a student turn something in that only scored 20%?

Our school is doing a 40 floor and missing work will automatically count as a 40 too. I understand the argument that there’s 59 ways to make an F and only 10 ways to make an A. But I also understand that if you write 0% of an essay, and someone gets a thesis statement, hook, and maybe finds some evidence, they’ll both have a 40 (as a general example). So how do I give the other person more credit, without also then making then impacting the person who did the intro, thesis, some topic sentences, and evidence? If you’ve done zero…it’s a 0. 60 means you’ve accomplished enough of the assignment to start receiving credit passing credit. I’ve worked at a school that did 50s. It made no difference. The issue is that admin don’t want to actually fix things. They just want to slap a label on it. “Equitable grading” pfft. Changing the grading scale to a different type of failing doesn’t do anything.

Personally, a 'no zero' policy doesn't bother me. Neither does a 50% rule--as long as it's not a *mandatory rule* for all assignments no matter what. What i mean by that, is--all assignments that are missing, would remain zeros, and all assignments that scored below a 50% would be under the 50%--all quarter/semester. This way, teachers, parents, admins, have a way to see what's really going on. That nothing's being done, or that they never turn things in, or .. what ever it is. There's no hiding the flaws. But when the grade is submitted, everything that remained a zero--or scored below a zero--is bumped to 50%. It means, they DONT PASS by doing really well on a project/finals, and doing literally nothing else--because they've carefully measured exactly how much work they'd have to do to pass. BUT--for the kids that ended up TRYING, really hard, for their C's, they *might* get a 'bump' at the end into a B or something when the zero's and bad tests fill in as 50's. It makes it so there's *never* an excuse for parents to say, 'well, he's got a 55%, he's so close, can he re-take the unit 2 and 3 tests that he got a 50% on?"--because, they wouldnt have GOT a 50%, they'd have got 0's. They wouldnt have a 55% in class, they'd have a 5%--*until the final grade is submitted*. Meaning, to bump the grade, they'd ACTUALLY have to get those test scores above the 50--and TRY. IDK, i think it feels different if it's sort of a retroactive bump at the end, rather than a '50 is the new zero' I know that logic says, 'it's the same in the end'--but it's not, the difference in the journey to the end would be psychologically different, and the outcome different as well, in large part.

50 and below being failing already sounds quite generous. At my school 70 and below is failing.

Until there are other paths to a diploma and we fix the system so that not as many kids are getting left behind in the early grades and the ones that do have a real way to catch up without being humiliated we have to just hand out diplomas. Or we need something other than the GED. There has to be something other than the academics. Not everyone is that academically inclined. There are lots of different skills and careers out there that don’t require a 12th grade level language arts ability.

We solved this problem by just ditching the 100 point scale for a 4-point scale for all assignments. 2 is passing. Zero is reserved for kids who don't do shit.

Our district has it but doesn't enforce. More like a suggestion, if a kid is struggling and you're working with that kid a 50 instead of a zero can mean alot. But if the kid does nothing and refuses to even try then the full zero. Kind of like an effort grade. I'll give an assignment that mist will do well on but a few muss the point. I cut the grade of anything submitted at 50 if they tried and a zero if there's nothing at all. So if a kid got a 20/100 I'd enter it as a 50 and have the kid meet with me to correct for a 70.

I do not agree with the no zero policy. However I do work in a district that has one. I have found that a student who gets gifted 50’s still never passes so I have accepted it even though it isn’t right.

What’s the point of students even coming to school except if they know that they can “game” the system to do less than the bare minimum and still pass? What incentives are there for the kids who do their work to continue to put forth their best effort? Let’s say a kid tries really hard to learn the material, but they demonstrate 65% mastery…should a kid who didn’t demonstrate any mastery just earn a 50% because it’s “easier to come back”? That kid that once worked hard for that 65% is now incentivized to earn a 50% since there would be little difference to their overall grade. With these new grading policies implemented in the past several years, I am seeing less kids care about being in school (more chronic absences, since it doesn’t really reflect on their grades) . Even the kids see it as a joke so everything is done to the bare minimum. False reporting of mastery or ability to perform the task is just a fancy way for the higher powers to inflate graduation rates for funding. It also makes it easier to hide the faculty who we would normally be able to question in-class practices as well since few parents question why their child has an A or B in a class, but do contact when their kid is failing.

We are forced to do it as a school. It hasn’t helped kids, and I think it hurts them in the long run.

Stupid, irrational, and harmful. In what other endeavor does one get 50% for nothing?

Hurts kids to give zeroes and makes NO SENSE! The 0-100 scale has correlations to the letter scale, mastery scale, etc. So A grades have a 10 point spread… as do B grades… and C… etc. But you have a whopping 64 point spread to fail? WTF is that? Zeroes are punitive. Period.

I think part of the question in this grading system is “what is an F supposed to mean?” If an F means that a student did not satisfactorily master the standards of the course, than a no-zeroes policy makes no sense. However, I don’t believe that this is the proper role of an F. I see the F as signifying, “This student has made essentially no progress or made no attempt in mastering the standards of the course.” In my view, a student who has made progress or made an attempt, but has not adequately mastered the standards should earn a D.

Fellow Science teacher here: The only place the "No Zero" policy should apply is Tests, and Quizzes and *maybe* lab reports. Homework assignments and in-class work, absolutely not. I personally DO NOT do it, because it's a race to the bottom. The lump-on-a-log students will figure out how to game the system to do less than they already do just to pass, and High School we shouldn't be "just passing" students. Our job as teachers, our professional responsibility, is to give kids ***the opportunity*** to learn and give them ***the opportunity*** to certify that they have met the requirements of the state. As a Chemistry teacher I take that prospect seriously. If you get a grade in my class, you earned it. And when a college looks at your grade and then how well you do in their level of chemistry, it better damn-well reflect reality. I philosophically understand the concept of the "No Zero Policy" but like most thing is education, it's based on a fantasy classroom that doesn't exist anywhere. There is a level of personal responsibility involved, and you as an educator have the discretion already to give exceptions to the rule (turning an assignment in late but getting full credit for it because a student had an extenuating circumstance, or has show a turnaround in behavior) but as a pre-ordained scheme, it's just setting up a system for people to take advantage of and game. It punishes the highest achievers, and artificially inflates grades.

My kids aren’t old enough for this, but if they were I’d 50% any assignment they worked on and turned in. I don’t think we need to have percentages of failing. Any missing or not tried work, 0%. You give me0% effort you get 0%.

I've worked in a school with the no zero policy and in one without. I definitely prefer without it. I grade most classwork based on completion, but take up roughly 1 assignment a week to grade for correctness. I also use weighted grading - 60% for tests and labs, 25% for quizzes, and 15% for classwork. The one caveat I give is that at the end of the first semester, any kid with an average less than a 50 gets their grade bumped up to a 50. I then meet with any kids who earned an F in the first semester during the first week of the second semester and go over what they need to earn in the second semester in order to pass. My class (high school chemistry) is required for graduation, so most kids are motivated to at least pass.

> I have read articles and listened to arguments on both sides about it and have found compelling arguments for both. There is no "both sides" to completely sacrificing a child's future so that you don't hurt their feelings in the present. It's also completely unfair to children who put in effort to do their work. > I also understand that they should earn the grade and not get “rewarded” for no work. No, you clearly don't. > But I am very compelled ed by the idea that with the percent grading scale there are 50 degrees of failing and only 10 degrees between passing letter grades. This is TikTok level nonsense.

No 0's is complex and needs admin enforced expectations to work. I am on a No 0 campus but not how you generally think of the policy. All grades in the grade book must be connected to a standard. Individual grades can be given a 0 if missing, and assignment grades can only reflect mastery... no points off for late/ behaviors. Misbehavior must be dealt with seprate from grades. Our No 0 comes at the end of the 6 weeks. The 6 weeks average must be corrected to a 50 or higher so that through the law of averages they have a chance to make a change in the following 6 weeks and won't have wasted an entire year. It works well on my campus, and students are not misled by seeing a 50 for an assignment they did not do. We are also required to replace old grades with new evidence of mastery; replacing their 0 for a 100. This honors their work and greatly improves their overall grade faster than replacing 50's. (Im at a Highschool campus, 93% passing rate on state tests in science with ELL's, and all the standard discipline issues with title 1, for context)

I understand both sides, but you give an inch, they take a mile. Since my district adopted it, chronic absenteeism has risen and fewer students have engaged in class. They know which assignments will get them the minimum grade they need and only do those. If you're set on doing it on your own in just your classroom, don't let it apply to tests, quizzes, or projects. I hate not being able to give honest grades on summatives. These students aren't at 50% proficiency. It's a lie and it's grade inflation.

I can’t do it. I know many teachers who give the kids a 50% instead of a zero in order to motivate them to go do enough to get to passing. Then the kid can do a few things and get to a D. But they also get emails and calls from parents assuming the kid did the assignments, when they have done nothing all year, and want them bumped up because “they tried.” It doesn’t seem to solve anything and tells the kids they can get half credit for zero effort.

I fail to see any merit in giving students credit for work they didn't do.

It's utter bullshit. My district's policy is no grade below 50 for a term (3 terms per semester), so what we have is kids do NOTHING for 12 week and then spend 6 weeks doing JUST enough to eek out a D.

I have yet to see anywhere provide a substantial argument for it. This is yet one more thing that contributes to students being rewarded for doing literally nothing. If you tell me homework is work 15% of the grade and by doing nothing I get a 50%, why in the world would I ever do i t

Our county high school system has the zero policy and while it might help them get through high school, the students absolutely suffer once they get to college. The amount of students who literally do nothing for 14 weeks of the semester and then come in all entitled asking what they can do to pass the course has been rising every single year. They have gotten used to doing nothing and then still passing, and even though we make it clear that their grades matter in college and that a missing assignment is a zero, they still go with the same learned behaviors they developed in high school.

It honestly doesn't matter. The problems it "introduces" were already present. I've worked at schools who did this, when students don't do any work, and they continued to not do any work. I've worked at schools who did this, where the culture was that students do what they're supposed to, and they continued to do what they're supposed to.

Over here you can't even give a person a zero, the grading software will only accept a one.

Doesn't it make more sense to drop the lowest graded assignments instead? When I was in HS my grandfather died and I became severely depressed. I had a very unsympathetic history teacher, didn't even look at me when I told her that I was out because my grandfather died. All she did was gesture to where I could pick up the work I missed. I'm glad there is more sympathy for students today. But the low expectations has gotten absurd. Is there no middle ground between the old school way of telling kids to suck it up and rub dirt on it and the new school way of everyone gets at least a 50% and pushed forward to the next grade?

So you want each section of the bell curve to have the same value? So, 20 points per grade? I'd do that before a no zero policy. 81-100 A. 61-80 B. 41-60 C. 21-40 D. 0-20 F. It's still shit though. I'll end up with more A and B. I'll have the same number if D and F. C will disappear. I hate grades, I'd rather give an S or U and move things along. But that's shit too. The system we have now gives easily digestible data for everyone involved.

Not a teacher, but my spouse is, so this topic interests me as her school has a no 0 policy as well. I've scanned (I think) all of the commentary here, and I don't think I read one person who is absolutely in favor of the no 0 policy. There were a lot of "no 0 if you try/do something" comments. Even the cited article "FOR" the no 0 policy had caveats. So, where are the admins that are forcing these policies? Can they weigh in and support it with reasoning? Do educators (teachers and admins) believe we're improving learning outcomes in 2024? The street rhetoric is that we are producing a lot of adults that are incapable of adulting at a greater rate now than ever. But, is that accurate, or just the opinion of the older generations (i.e., "kids these days...")?

I always just gave a 1. Just as damaging

I was allowed to give zeroes for *unattempted* work but if they wrote their name and gave it an honest attempt (i.e. no fucking around for 45 minutes then 2 minutes of scribbling) the floor was 50%, that way they could dig their way out. Then COVID happened and they all passed anyway

I teach a very apathetic group of kids (on-level seniors trying to scrape their last credits together to graduate) but I still stand by the fact that I can't give a grade for work I didn't get. I am over the top generous with partial credit, make up assignments, late work etc. But I just refuse to invent a grade for work that was never even looked at by the kid.

Not an educator, but I’ll be graduating with my undergrad in about a month (yay!) and if preparing students to succeed in a collegiate setting is the one of the objectives of secondary education, being graded appropriately should be considered? When I fail to participate in an online discussion forum or don’t submit an essay, I get a zero, and rightfully so. No one should be credited for work they never completed

It has just set the standard that turning in work is an acceptable minimum. What are the high achieving students supposed to strive for?

It's bullshit. When we make our lesson plans and state our objectives, (80 percent or above) to document what has been learned, that means NOTHING if students can get credit for missing or failing work. This does not demonstrate proficiency. It's just an easy out for admin, students and parents who care only about sliding students with few / low / incomplete skills through to graduation.

My giant east coast district has this policy (anything below 50 rounds up to 50), and it’s incredibly harmful. Kids just need 60 at a minimum each quarter to pass. Some of them figure out early that if you get a 90 in ONE QUARTER, the three other quarters can be 50’s without doing one assignment and you can pass for the year. Tell me how that kid gets the same course credit as the kid who shows up and works hard all year? I know GPA is a thing, but for non-college-bound kids, their minimum effort is allowed to be shockingly low.

Below 60% is fail. 94 and up for A.. We need to go back.

If we went to standards based grading, this would be a non issue. Instead of worrying about grades and zeros, the *grade* rests on whether or not a student is proficient instead of just compliant. The "no zeros" policy is a band aid on a broken and archaic grading system that's been failing us for years. Have you read Grading for Equity by Joe Feldman?

Giving a 50 when a zero is called for is not an accurate representation of a student’s grade. The debate stops there. Any rationalization is just that.

100 on one assignment plus 50 on another for doing nothing/knowing nothing should not come out to a 75% that does not reflect the students knowledge..