Asheville High and SILSA Grading Procedures

Board of Education Policy:

On June 9, 2025, the Asheville City Board of Education approved a revision to Board Policy 3400: Evaluation of Student Progress. The updated policy includes five core grading principles that must be followed in ACS:  

1. Accuracy: Grading calculations are mathematically sound, easy to understand, and correctly describe a student’s level of academic performance.
2. Reflection of proficiency on academic standards: Grades reflect proficiency of standards as measured by varied assessments and a body of evidence. Homework, behaviors, and essential skills can be recorded in the gradebook to monitor progress and provide feedback, but should not be used in calculating a student’s grade.
3. Supports a culture of revision: Grading practices should motivate students to achieve academic success, support a growth mindset, and give students an opportunity for redemption. By fostering a culture of revision, grades inspire a growth mindset where achievement is not fixed, but rather a process of learning through reflection and revision.
4. Provide students with timely and actionable feedback: Grades are transparent and understandable so that every student knows their progress towards mastering all standards. Timely and actionable feedback is provided on all learning tasks to support the learning process.
5. Distinguishes and connects the means for learning (habits of scholarship) from the ends (academic success.):  While measuring and reporting progress on academic standards is essential, equally important are the skills and practices that support student learning, also known as habits of scholarship. High quality grading practices separate the mastery of standards with the skills and habits that support high levels of learning such as perseverance, collaboration, goal setting, attendance.

Local School Procedures To Ensure Compliance With Updated Policy Language

• Accuracy
  • All grades and other assessment reporting must be an accurate evaluation of the student’s academic work and mastery of clear learning goals. Teachers are encouraged to develop grading formulas that support improved grades that reflect when student progress is observed in academic performance throughout the course or when a student demonstrates improved productivity after initially demonstrating poor grades that were more attributable to inattentiveness to work habits earlier in the course. 
  • While no minimum grade is established, teachers must make every reasonable effort to provide students with feedback and support rather than record grades that create a mathematical impossibility of passing the course. 
  • Extra credit assignments or other non-academic measures employed in the grading formula are discouraged as they do not accurately communicate a student’s progress toward clearly defined learning goals.  Instead of extra credit, revision and resubmission should be the focus. 
• Reflection of proficiency on academic standard
  • No student will have a grade lowered or raised or be penalized or rewarded academically as a disciplinary sanction unrelated to academic misconduct or based on other non-academic considerations. A student’s grade in a course may be lowered, however, due to the student’s excessive absences as provided in policy 4400, Attendance.
  • Students are expected to make up missed work. Teachers must make every effort to obtain incomplete or missing work from students rather than record a failing grade.
• Supports a culture of revision
  • Teachers should provide opportunities, wherever appropriate, for students to resubmit or reattempt assignments as a part of an iterative process for learning, especially in the case of any assignment indicating a student’s performance is below a proficient level. Teachers should provide feedback on student work and performance regularly with an expectation that students respond to feedback by demonstrating improvement toward mastery of learning goals. 
  • Homework is assigned to students as practice in order to reinforce concepts, content, or skills that have already been introduced or taught. If necessary to include in the course grading formula at all, homework should not exceed more than 10% in the final course grade for any student during any marking period.
• Provide students with timely and actionable feedback
  • Teachers are expected to provide additional learning opportunities through remediation and additional support or extended learning opportunities through enrichment that are focused on mastery of academic content standards and achieving student learning goals rather than extra credit tasks not aligned with clear learning goals.
• Distinguishes and connects the means for learning (habits of scholarship) from the ends (academic success.)
  • Grades should not be given for simple behavior and compliance measures such as returning signed documents, bringing instructional items to class, or other tasks that are not tied directly to student learning goals or academic content standards.
  • The primary habits of scholarship being focused on during the fall of 2025 in both schools are collaboration and responsibility. 

Local School Grading Scale

100-90 A, 80-89 B, 70-79 C, 60-69 D, 0-59 F (no course credit earned for F).

Local School Grading Formula and Weights

Each course's grading formula and weighting will be addressed in detail within the course syllabus distributed to students and families at the beginning of each course. Course syllabi will also be made available on the school’s website. While each teacher can determine the specific grading formula for a course, any course taught by multiple instructors should have the same general grading formula and weighting of assignments or assessments. 

Local School Grade Reporting Schedule

Grades should be updated in teacher gradebooks at the end of each week. Report cards should be available within 7 days after the close of each quarter per the school district’s distribution procedures.

 

Asheville High and SILSA School Promotion Procedures

On June 9, 2025 the Asheville City Schools Board of Education updated Policy 3420: Student Promotion and Accountability and Procedure 3420-P. The purpose of this policy is to provide guidance for the promotion of students. In providing these guidelines, the Asheville City Schools Board of Education demonstrates its commitment to our core beliefs and values: 

1. promoting high academic standards for all students; 
2. ensuring that each student has access and opportunity to a high quality education; 
3. district-wide accountability process is established in order to verify:
   1. that each student has access to instructional materials and high quality classroom instruction that is aligned to the corresponding  state, national, or local grade level standards; 
   2. that students have the opportunity to reach or exceed grade level mastery of standards; 
   3. early identification of students who are not on track to demonstrate mastery of grade level benchmarks and that the appropriate supports are in place to avoid retention 
4. ensuring that the District’s educational objectives are met in a fair and non-discriminatory manner. 

High School Promotion Criteria

High School Graduation Requirements are defined in Policy Code: 3460 Graduation Requirements and can be found here.

9-12 Promotion Benchmarks

The following credits and/or courses are required to advance 

 

Attendance Recovery

Students who exceed the number of absences to earn course credit must attend attendance recovery within two weeks of their last absence. Students cannot attend summer school for attendance recovery purposes.

High School Communication Timeline

1. Principals will ensure that parents and students receive ACS's Graduation Requirements, intervention steps that will be used if students are not on track to graduate in 4 years, and summer school recommendations annually before the 10th day of school. NOTE: This information is available via the Student/Parent Handbook.
2. By November 1st the principal will ensure that that parents of students with a failing grade at the end of the first quarter will be invited to a parent conference where the student’s teacher(s) will review current progress the student is making towards meeting expectations including a report on habits of scholarship that support learning (attendance, collaboration, and responsibility). During this meeting the teacher(s), parent, and student will develop a plan for the student to raise their grade to passing.
3. By November 1, each student and parent will receive a progress report. Principals will ensure receipt of the progress report by the parent/guardian.
4. No later than February 1st, the principal will submit a written report to the superintendent including a roster of all students indicating if they are on track to graduate in 4 years. The roster will include attendance data and semester grades.
5. No later than the last Friday in March the principal will ensure that all students who are not on track to earn the necessary credits to be promoted to the next grade are scheduled for a parent conference. At the parent conference the student’s teacher(s), parent, and student meet and review the student’s progress including a report on habits of scholarship that support learning (attendance, perseverance, …). During this parent teacher conference an outline of intervention steps will be developed in collaboration with the parent, student, and teacher(s) including the notification for the potential of attending summer school.
6. No later than the last Friday in March each student and parent will receive a progress report. Principals will ensure receipt of the progress report by the parent/guardian. Students who are not on track to earn the necessary credits to be promoted to the next grade will also receive notification of the potential recommendation to attend summer school.
7. Promotion status will be included on final report cards.
8. The principal will ensure that teachers and counselors have met with the parents of all students who have not earned sufficient credits to be promoted to the next grade level and discuss summer school requirements. 
9. Within 5 days of the last day of school, the principal will submit to the superintendent a roster of all students that contains final grades, assessment results, and promotion status.