Disrupting the report card pipeline

What grades do you remember from when you were a student? Do you glow with pride over your successes or cringe as you recall bad feedback?

I still remember my shame over the “C” I got for handwriting — in second grade. I’ve never quite been able to shake the feeling that my writing is subpar. By college, we’d gotten so obsessed over our grades that one night my roommate was near tears as she moaned she was “failing” a class. Turns out, she was getting a B.

We’re trained in the career ladder mentality long before we ever reach the workforce. For most of our lives as students, we were given clear indicators of how well we were measuring up to expectations. After 16-some years of report cards, exams and graded assignments, it’s no wonder that we crave specific, external validation of linear progress in our careers.

To really see how our desire to get straight A’s continues into our professional lives, look at the difference disrupting the report card pipeline makes.

Alverno College, a liberal arts school outside Milwaukee, is one of the schools that has cast aside the traditional letter grading system. Instead, since the 1970s they’ve been using an assessment-based system based on course criteria for effective performance.

One Alverno graduate told College Covered that instead of competing with her peers for grades, this system meant she pushed herself to improve. Once she entered the workforce, she was more easily able to reach out for feedback from her supervisors and colleagues.

“It is very beneficial to be able to not take criticism personally. Criticism is not always a bad thing and just shows where improvement can be made, which could make me a better employee,” she said.

It’s a sharp contrast to the bumpy transition many students make to the murky expectations of the professional world. How are we expected to know what success looks like if no one is giving us a grade outside of an annual performance review? It’s no wonder the “feedback vacuum” was named one of the biggest hurdles graduates face entering the workforce in the Harvard Business Review.

These expectations can linger for years. In my case, it took the pandemic lockdown and the perceptive advice of my therapist to “let go of the success bar” to realize that professional success isn’t about earning an A on every assignment. Your career is a marathon, and you need to invest skills and energy into the work with the greatest opportunity for impact while conserving your internal resources for the road ahead.

In this way, our success is as much about how we approach the work as what we accomplish each day.

Smiles and frowns

When high school English teacher Monte Syrie re-examined grading, as told on the MindShift podcast, he found the 100-point grading scale didn’t show his students’ progress.

Instead, he made some changes. Students self-assessed their work and had the chance to revise anything that needed adjustment. Feedback was an essential component, including five minutes at the start of each class where students would share something that was making them smile or frown. Much like the Alverno student’s experience, moving to a progress-based feedback system in the classroom allowed the students to connect as part of a community, instead of competitors.

As one of Syrie’s students shared, removing grades from the equation helped her feel more open to learning.

“It allowed me to ‘chill out’ in the best way possible. And you know what? That motivated me even more to get my schoolwork done.”  

If we can think differently about how to assess success in the classroom, we can certainly take a closer look at our careers. Instead of looking backward to see if we’ve aced the test, let’s celebrate our progress while looking ahead for where we can grow next.

Happy navigating,
Bridget

Thanks for reading Explore Your Career River! Subscribe for weekly insights and inspiration.