Counselors and administrators plan to change how the grading policy operates following a student’s withdrawal and retake of a certain course.  Under the current policy, grades earned for both the withdrawal and retake are factored into a student’s GPA. Under the proposed policy, the GPA will take into account only the latter grades. However, the grades at the time of removal from the class would still appear on a student’s transcript, marked with an “R” to indicate withdrawal.

Counseling department chairperson Linda Skafish provided a hypothetical example

demonstrating the proposed grading policy: a student in Spanish II earns a B- and a D and decides to retake the course, earning a B and a C. The latter two grades will count toward GPA, and the former two will appear as “B-/R” and “D/R” on the transcript but will not affect GPA.

“Colleges told us, ‘We recognize that kids retake courses, and that’s good, but it would be helpful to have an indicator for a withdrawn class,’” Skafish said.

As such, the transcript and program of studies will reflect the changes to the grading policy. Barring issues with the Educational Services Center, counselors will enact the policy retroactively for students who withdrew from courses in previous years.

According to Principal John Williams, administrators agreed to update the withdrawal grading policy in order to be consistent with the cheating policy.

“It’s all to make grades an accurate reflection of what kids know,” Williams said.