We, the undersigned, strongly urge the Camas School District to maintain the traditional grading system at Camas High School. We believe that keeping the traditional grading method is crucial for several key reasons:

1. Ensuring College Competitiveness:
Traditional grades provide a clear, widely accepted, and well-understood metric of academic performance. Colleges and universities use this system to evaluate applicants. Shifting to a new, unproven grading system could place our students at a disadvantage during the college application process. Traditional grades are a critical tool for ensuring our children remain competitive as they pursue higher education opportunities.

2. Preparing Students for College:
Traditional grading not only reflects the standards of performance that students will encounter in college but also helps prepare them for the challenges ahead. At the university level, students are evaluated based on traditional grades, and transitioning to such a system from high school can be challenging. By keeping the current system, we help ensure that students are fully prepared for this transition and equipped to meet the expectations they will face in college.

3. Avoiding Unnecessary Experiments:
Experimenting with a new grading system at this point raises significant concerns. We are already seeing the negative effects of standards-based grading in middle schools, where students are less prepared for the demands of high school. The idea of introducing an experimental system, especially one lacking sufficient data to prove its effectiveness, risks further hindering our students’ educational success.

4. Financial Responsibility:
Our district, like many others, faces financial challenges. Implementing a new grading system would require significant investment in terms of time, resources, and training. Instead, we should focus on strategies that have been tested and proven effective. Investing in an untested system risks wasting limited resources that could be better spent on enhancing proven educational methods.

In addition to these core concerns, we ask the district to make public the results of the survey conducted at the end of the last school year. Transparency on how parents, students, and teachers feel about potential grading changes is essential.

Moreover, many parents have expressed that they plan to pull their children from the Camas School District and enroll them in private schools if the new grading system is implemented. This is not a politically driven issue—parents from both sides of the political spectrum strongly oppose these changes.

We are open to considering such a change in the future if and when the district has fully mastered and successfully implemented the system at the middle school level. At that point, the district must also have a clear plan to ensure it will be effective at Camas High School from the start. High school students cannot afford for their transcripts to be compromised, as this directly impacts college acceptance offers and scholarship opportunities.

In summary, while we support innovation, we believe the traditional grading system is the best path for our students at this time. It is a proven method that promotes academic success, prepares students for college, and ensures competitiveness in the college application process. We respectfully ask the board to consider the long-term impact on our children’s futures and uphold the traditional grading system at Camas High School.