Leon County Schools will no longer be assigning the letter grades D and F to students in kindergarten and first grade due to the anxiety and esteem issues those grades could pose at an early age.
To avoid students feeling pressure and to discourage overtesting, kindergarten and first grade students will receive As, Bs, or Cs, and if he or she is struggling a lot in one area, an N for “not meeting expectations.” Leon County Schools Superintendent Rocky Hanna says he looks forward to this switch, and believes it will encourage students to work on problem subject areas.
"I just strongly believe that for 6 and 7 year olds, there’s no need to issue a kid a grade of a D or an F," Hanna said. "Kids, that they’re trying to understand school, figure school out…for them to have that label, or stigma, I believe was uncalled for."
Hanna believes the new grading system gets the message across without harming the students. He says, initially, the letter grades were instilled to get rid of the previous grading scale of satisfactory or not satisfactory, giving parents a more specific gauge as to how their children were doing.