Editorial Board
Report Cards Are Sending Parents the Wrong Signals
It meant something once.
Photographer: Eric Bakke/Denver Post/Getty Images
Most students in the US aren’t proficient in reading or math — but you wouldn’t know it by looking at their report cards. Four out of 5 parents say their children are getting B’s or higher. Test scores, meanwhile, have hit multiyear lows. According to one study, 60% of grades don’t match standardized assessments.
One might hope such a discrepancy would set off alarm bells. Yet surveys show that parents are more inclined to trust report cards than test results. The upshot: Not only are measures of student performance diverging, but parents are also looking at the wrong signals.