Should schools scrap A-F grades?

There’s nothing more terrifying than a big red F on a school exam paper.

Well that fear might be a thing of the past with the Australian Council for Educational Research is calling for an overhaul of the schooling system.

The proposal is to scrap A-F grades. 

They suggest students should be taught according to their ability rather than their age and conventional performance tools such as A-to-F grades.

They want school reports to be scrapped under a proposal to re­define what it means to be successful in the classroom.

The government is lukewarm about the idea saying, by basing assessment on individual progress it ignores the reality that students must be ranked against other students in terms of ability and performance. 

Being ranked against classmates prepares you for how you will be ranked in the outside world.

To me losing the A-F ranking is another case of students being treated like special snowflakes and not preparing them for the reality of life.

The 9Honey superstars Kerri Elstub, Jane de Graaff and Jo Abi didn’t necessarily agree with me, as you’ll see in the video above.