Same-subject classes should have similar policies, assessments and difficulty

Photo by Annie Liu

Students here are fortunate to attend a school with a wide variety of course offerings, from a multitude of language and science courses to a wide range of electives. Of course, these different courses all have varying levels of difficulty, but there’s a fundamental problem when classes with the same title are taught or graded markedly differently by different teachers. 

When it comes to tests, policies and methods can vary widely.

 One case in point: While some students under one teacher may face traditional closed-notes tests, students with a different teacher have the luxury of open-notes tests or even take-home tests. These discrepancies are more prevalent among non-AP math and history courses, which sometimes have two or three teachers spread between a single course.

Considering the weight of tests, especially in more rigorous honors and AP courses, differences in assessment policies between classes could mean the difference between a whole letter grade. Ideally, a particular student in any course should have the same grading policies regardless of who the instructor is.

Not only do inconsistent policies cause class results and rigor to differ greatly, but they may also tie into how well students actually learn the information and skills.

 Some classes, for example, are paced severely slower than others. Sometimes those slower-paced classes don’t cover all the material that a faster-paced class gets to in a year, putting these students at a disadvantage in future classes.
Not only are some classes behind, but others seem to follow different curricula altogether, resulting in different experiences for students, despite registering for the same class. This is seen in many non-AP math and history classes, where the material covered seems not to be standardized (as compared to AP classes). 

While a particular class may be learning something at the beginning of the second semester, a different class of the same subject may be covering the same material at the end of the second semester, or worse, may not cover the material at all.  

The issues are not as pronounced in classes taught by one or two teachers, like AP Calculus BC, English 10 and Chemistry Honors. Classes like these should serve as a standard for other departments that have multiple teachers instructing the same subject: The best method is a set curriculum with the same testing policies that ensure students have an equal opportunity to learn and perform regardless of the instructor. In our view, more communication within subject departments could help teachers create a set curriculum with standard tests and testing methods. 

Ideally, students’ grades — and the amount they learn — should never be affected by the teacher they are assigned to.