Virginia District Elementary Schools Ending Letter-Grading

The Washington Post (9/24, Sieff) reports on a "bold change" in the Fairfax County, Virginia, school district, which is ending the policy of issuing letter grades. "For years, anxiety and ambition have hung on the letters, but educators now say that the metric is imprecise and does little to reflect a student's progress, especially in the early years of schooling. In Fairfax, officials will soon implement a detailed report card that instead uses numeric values from one through four and adds dozens of new categories in which progress will be measured." The Post notes that DC schools began dropping letter grades "years ago."