So the geniuses who run my school district put out an email/phone call yesterday with the following paragraph:
Please know that third quarter grades and report cards are being suspended due to the school closure. We are awaiting guidance from the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction on grading and grade calculation. Students will continue to receive assessment of their online work. Teachers may make note of incomplete or missing work, but at this time there is no grading. We want students to stay engaged, not stressed or worried about online instruction grades.
First two sentences make sense as some students sill don't have internet access so it would be wrong to finalize quarter grades this weekend. After that though it is a complete cluster fuck, obviously written by people who haven't been in a classroom in a long time. I understand the arguments for equitable grading, but the moment you stop grading is the moment students stop turning in anything. This is not a utopia.
I've had about a dozen students message me last night and this morning to ask me why they are still doing work if nothing is being graded. Which is a totally reasonable question. From what I've been told this was a "miscommunication" and they will correct it with a phone call and email later today retracting that part of the message. But still who in the actual fuck thought this was a good idea?