Parent Problems

I knew they would come....it is always going to happen. 

 

The parents who aren't happy with their child's grade. 

 

Since midterms go out on Wednesday, I know the emails are going to start rolling in (but hopefully not).  There have already been a questions.

 

The first issue:

 

A 4th grade excel student gets a B- on his project because of a lack of neatness and not putting forth his best effort, and he wants to know why he got a B-.  Really?  It's a B- that's not even bad, and I was being generous!  I explained to him how I grade and why he got a B-, then I told him he could take it home and fix it up, which he did, but I don't know that it's even fix-able.  I'll let you guys know how this pans out. 

 

The second issue:

 

A parent emails me yesterday and wants to know why her daughter got an S-.  Well first off, I entered her S- on an assignment that we hadn't done yet, so she was confused.  Gotcha.  I fixed that, but she said that her daughter usually did pretty well in Art.  This problem is more of a flaw in the grading system.  I know the previous Art teacher gave everyone in 1st-3rd grade an S, which is as high as it gets.  We have S, S-, I (Improved), N (Needs Improvement), U (Unsatisfactory).  When a kid does a really great job, I give them an S.  There were some students who really excelled on the project we just finished.  Is it really fair to give the kids whose project is just okkkkkkk an S?  I (personally) think not.  

 

The way I see it, I only have 5 choices (really only 2 because an "I" usually isn't applicable, and I reserve "N" and "U" for those who are having serious problems), so I don't have a choice but to give an S-.  I ended up telling the mom that her daughter could fix her project if she wanted to.  Never heard back. 

 

I guess I'm a hard grader. 

 

And that's my rant for today. 

 

How do you deal with parents?  What would you do?

 

Happy Tuesday!