School Letter Grades: A Starting Point, Not the Final Word

 

"Grades aren't everything.  They don't tell the story.  I have made A's and didn't learn squat, and I have learned a LOT and failed.  A bad grade doesn't mean you are a screw up.  That being said, don't screw up your grades, they're pretty important."

    - Harry O. Alvis (my father)

Arkansas has released its official school and district letter grades for the 2025–2026 school year, and once again, Two Rivers has a lot to celebrate. 

As happens every year, educators, parents, community members, and probably a few people who have not been inside a school since their own graduation will examine those letters and offer opinions about what they mean.

That is not necessarily a bad thing.

The letter-grade system has value. It gives the public an easily understood measure of school performance. It creates transparency, encourages accountability, highlights areas of success, and helps districts identify where improvement is needed. When a school earns a strong grade or improves significantly, that accomplishment should be celebrated. Students and educators worked hard to produce those results, and they deserve recognition.

However, a school’s letter grade should be the starting point in a conversation about school effectiveness—not the end of the conversation.  Much like the typical grades that we give to students, it only tells a small part of the story.  

What the Grade Measures

Arkansas’s current accountability formula examines achievement, student growth, growth among the lowest-performing students, and—in high schools—graduation and postsecondary readiness. The formula includes nine equally weighted measures. Achievement accounts for one-third of the overall calculation, while most of the remaining measures are also derived from student performance during the annual ATLAS testing window. High schools additionally receive credit for graduation and readiness indicators. Arkansas Department of Education: School Letter Grades

Those are important measures. Schools should know whether students are reading, solving problems, understanding science, and growing academically. We should be willing to examine the results honestly, celebrate what is working, and address what is not.

At the same time, much of the grade is built around one state assessment administered during one testing season. That assessment provides meaningful information, but it does not represent the entire body of work completed by a student, teacher, or school during an entire school year.

It is a snapshot—not the entire family photo album.

What the Grade Cannot Show

A letter grade cannot fully measure the teacher who stays after school to tutor a struggling student. It does not capture the counselor helping a child through a family crisis, the paraprofessional patiently building a student’s confidence, or the bus driver who may be the first encouraging adult that child sees each morning.

It does not measure a student performing in a school play or concert, developing leadership skills through FFA or FBLA, completely reading their first novel, learning to weld, joining the band, or finally developing the confidence to speak in front of a class, or read a passage out loud.  It does not measure the student who, for the first time, feels confident and capable in math class.  

It does not show whether students feel safe, supported, challenged, and known by the adults in their school.

Those things matter too.

In fact, they may matter more to the long-term success of a student than anything that can be recorded on a standardized assessment.

The Factors Schools Cannot Completely Control

Student performance is also influenced by circumstances that extend beyond the schoolhouse.

Poverty, housing instability, food insecurity, chronic health conditions, student mobility, family crises, trauma, mental-health challenges, limited internet access, and inconsistent attendance can all affect a student’s readiness to learn. Some students enter school several years behind their peers. Others change schools multiple times in a single year. Some arrive after caring for younger siblings, working to help their families, or simply trying to navigate circumstances no child should have to manage.

Schools do not control all of these conditions.

That does not mean schools should use them as excuses. Far from it.  Our responsibility is to meet students where they are and help them move forward. But acknowledging the circumstances surrounding student performance is not making excuses; it is recognizing reality.

If two runners finish a race at the same time, but one began several yards behind the other, the final time does not tell the complete story of the race.

Growth matters. Context matters. The starting point matters.

Celebrate the Grade—Then Study It

When a school receives an A or a B, celebrate it. Hang the banner. Recognize the students and staff. Thank the families who supported the work. There is nothing wrong with taking pride in success.

When a school improves from a D to a C, or from a C to a B, celebrate that too. Improvement does not happen by accident. It requires focused instruction, thoughtful leadership, hard work, and persistence.

When the grade is disappointing, schools should resist the temptation to dismiss it. Instead, leaders should examine the results, identify patterns, ask difficult questions, and determine what changes are necessary.

But communities should also resist the temptation to reduce an entire school—and everyone inside it—to a single letter.

A grade can tell us where to begin asking questions:

• Are students achieving at the expected level?

• Are they growing academically?

• Are students who began behind their peers catching up?

• Are graduates prepared for college, employment, or military service?

• Which instructional practices are working?

• Where do students need additional support?

Those are worthwhile questions. The mistake occurs when the letter itself is treated as the complete answer.

Schools Are More Than a Score

Accountability is necessary. Public schools serve their communities and use public resources. Families deserve honest information about how schools are performing.

But meaningful accountability requires more than simplicity. It requires context, professional judgment, and a willingness to look beyond the most convenient number.

The best evaluation of a school considers academic achievement and growth alongside attendance, graduation, career preparation, student engagement, school culture, extracurricular opportunities, safety, relationships, and the success of students after they leave.

Arkansas’s letter-grade system gives us one useful piece of that picture. It should be taken seriously, but it should never be mistaken for the entire portrait.

Celebrate the successes. Confront the weaknesses. Study the data. Ask questions. Visit the school. Talk with students, parents, and educators.

Let the letter grade begin the conversation about school effectiveness.

Just do not allow the letter grade to end the conversation.