Giving Compass' Take:

• Derrick Chau at EdSource makes the case that teachers must provide the support students need to meet higher standards and mastery and not have grades be based simply on the effort put in class. 

• This problem exists at every level of race and income and academic level, but Chau argues it is by far most prevalent and pernicious with lower-income kids of color. How other steps and measures can teachers take with their students?

• Read why grades are not paramount to achievement. 

Long before I became a district leader in Los Angeles, I had a transformational experience as a first-year principal that has driven me ever since. I had a student I’ll call Maria, a ninth-grader who’d made almost straight As in middle school. Imagine my surprise when I asked her English teacher how Maria was doing after the first month of school and the teacher responded that Maria wasn’t able to write a coherent paragraph.

I had run into one of the most pernicious secrets in education: Students’ grades on assignments and report cards too often are based on the effort they make in class, not the mastery of what they need to learn by a given grade.

Read the full article about revealing the mastery in student's grades by Derrick Chau at EdSource