All students from kindergarten to Grade 9 in British Columbia public schools will now be assessed with a proficiency scale instead of letter grades.
A statement from the Education Ministry said that starting in the 2023-2024 school year, only students in grades 10, 11 and 12 will receive letter grades and percentages so post-secondary entry requirements are met.
About half of B.C.’s students have been getting the new progress reports in a pilot program through a curriculum modernization plan that started in 2016.
The ministry said proficiency scale report cards use terms such as emerging, developing, proficient and extending to describe student learning, assessments that are supplemented with teacher comments.
The B.C. government released a plan to modernize the curriculum for kindergarten to Grade 12 in 2016, providing students with core learning in reading, writing and numeracy, while also teaching them communication, problem solving and how to use their knowledge in ways that matter for post-secondary education and careers.
Education Minister Rachna Singh said report cards will continue to update parents about their children’s progress, while also preparing students to succeed.
Tracy Humphreys, president of the Victoria Confederation of Parent Advisory Councils, said the new system will take time to get used to. “The tie-in of the proficiency scale to the new curriculum makes sense — people just worry about how they will know if their child isn’t doing well,” she said. “There’s going to be some getting used to how that looks.”
Others wonder why the proficiency scale doesn’t go all the way to Grade 12, said Humphreys, whose group represents parent advisory councils at schools across the Greater Victoria School District. “They feel like we should be pushing the universities to shift and work with this.”
Humphreys, who is founder and chair of the BCEdAccess Society, which advocates for students with disabilities and their families, said she also has concerns that the assessment isn’t specific enough when it comes to individualized learning plans for students with disabilities.
>>> To comment on this article, write a letter to the editor: [email protected]
