Accountability vs. Opportunity

June 1, 2022June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal ~ 3 Comments

One of the coaches in my district approached me last week and asked if I had a moment to talk about a few students. Each of them had come pretty close to passing my class but had fallen short largely due to things entirely within their control – not turning in study guides for easy points, not participating in review sessions, etc.

While my interactions with this particular coach had always been friendly enough, we don’t really know each other all that well. He was clearly concerned about how he came across, repeatedly reassuring me that he wasn’t asking me to do anything I didn’t think was appropriate. Once we got past the pleasantries and multiple disclaimers, his basic question was this: would I be willing to revisit these students’ grades and see if there was some “wiggle room”… if maybe they might be made eligible to play ball next year?

I can hear some of your reactions even as I type. How dare he! That’s what’s wrong with high school athletics! How will these kids ever learn responsibility with these sorts of people enabling them?!? The gall! The moxie! The fruvous! And I get it – that’s probably how I would have reacted only a few short years ago.

Three things stopped me from immediately saying no.

The first was how graciously he approached the issue. He wanted to make sure there was nothing suggesting pressure from him or anyone else to do anything I might be uncomfortable with or consider unethical – and I think he meant it. These kids weren’t athletic superstars or anything. I teach freshmen, and while they may have potential, none of them are critical to the success of anything happening on a track, field, or court next year. In his mind, it was about what being involved and playing sports MIGHT do for them overall – including, but not limited to, academically.

He was genuinely interested in listening to and answering my questions and hearing my thoughts on the issue beyond “yes” or “no.” Once I understood what he was asking me, I think I said something like, “So… I guess what this comes down to is what has the best chance of being good for these kids. Is it the tough lesson of failure and natural consequences thereof? Or is it the potential learning experience that occurs when part of a team struggling together to get better?” That’s the point at which he relaxed. Even if I said no to some or all of them, he seemed relieved that we at least shared a basic conception of the issue.

The second reason I considered his question is that the kids in question are genuinely good kids, at least most of the time. They’ve each shown flashes of far more ability than their grades would suggest. I know something of their hopes and visions for their futures, and while ambitious, they’re all certainly plausible. (None of them are counting on the NBA or YouTube stardom to get them through adulthood.) These weren’t kids with a 12% or a history of serious discipline problems; they just didn’t always show the focus or determination one might hope.

These were also kids who might have made better academic choices if they had a bit more of a foundation of good decision-making on which to build. There’s nothing stopping them from being that success story who prevails against the odds, but not everyone lives on the front end of the Bell Curve. Some kids respond to their circumstances by fitting into their circumstances. Maybe they could use a different sort of nudge.

Finally, there was my stubborn belief in the power of extracurriculars in kids’ lives. I’ve had the honor of working closely with too many coaches to buy into most stereotypes of their priorities or abilities. Sure, there are some bozos – but that’s true of any position in public education. Thankfully, those are generally the exception rather than the rule. Educators sign up to coach for the same reason others sign up to teach English or AP Calculus – they want to help kids.

The district I was in for many years in Oklahoma had a massive athletic program, a huge marching band, a semi-professional drama team, and so on. There were certainly a few times I could have lived with fewer pep assemblies or some more balanced scheduling. For the most part, however, one thing was all but certain about students involved in extracurriculars: they passed their classes and they graduated.

I can’t guarantee they always loved learning in all its forms, but they cared very much about grades and doing well academically. Some of this was about eligibility, but it was also about the culture of being involved. It was a positive sort of peer pressure – a “be true to your school” kinda vibe. I don’t want to oversell it; there were still problems here and there. Overall, though, I’d rather push for kids to get involved in SOMETHING than hope they’ll spend an extra hour a night doing homework instead.

If that were even a real dichotomy, I mean.

So the question before me was one of probabilities and teacher philosophy. Coach was quite transparent about the fact that he couldn’t guarantee anything either way. While he hoped he’d be able to work with these kids as they continued through high school, there was no certainty they’d stay on the team. Playing or not, there was no way to know if they’d take advantage of the extra support and improve academically going forward. It’s possible I might nudge their grades up a few percentage points and all I’d be doing was feeding their delusions about how school works.

On the other hand, I could hold the line and they’d fail a required class, rendering them ineligible to play. I’ve had students for whom that would be a painful but powerful lesson – pulling a 58% in a class they could have easily passed, then taking the natural consequences. It’s just that I’m not sure these are those students.

That sort of resilience requires a support system, or at least some personal experience with overcoming obstacles or riding out the storm or whatever. One of the most difficult things about working with kids from marginalized backgrounds is that they haven’t all developed much resilience because they haven’t experienced true “winning” very often – if ever. One of the biggest struggles my district faces is getting kids to come to school in the first place, especially if they’re not passing anything.

Failure can be a powerful teacher. I believe in the positives of failure. But it doesn’t work the same way or mean the same thing to everyone. Sometimes it’s just one more failure.

There was one other reality to consider. While there’s no doubt in my mind any of these kids could have passed my class with a little more effort, the true difference between a 57% and a 61% is painfully subjective and impacted by any number of factors. I’d love to tell you that my English instruction and assessment is so data-driven and pedagogically holy that every tenth of a percentage point reflects a very specific level of skills and knowledge in each student, but in reality most of it’s just a matter of showing up, turning in work, and being receptive to teacher suggestions so that next week’s writing is a bit better than last week’s.

English matters. Grammar and effective communication and close reading are all important, not just in academic contexts, but in life and in many professions and in terms of personal fulfillment. Then again, teamwork also matters. Learning the importance of individual effort while remaining part of a group matters. Persevering and struggling to get better at something matters. The thrill of victory and the agony of flying off that ski slope week after week matter. The unique relationships kids have with coaches which are never quite the same as they have with other teachers – those especially matter.

So what would be best for these specific kids? What would have the greatest chance of setting them up for success – not just next year, but in years to come? What’s the ethical thing to do? The professional thing to do? The right thing to do?

If the answer seems obvious, I respectfully suggest you’re missing something.

If I do it, I told my colleague, the students would have to be fully informed of the decision (as opposed to thinking they’d somehow “slid by” at the last minute). This isn’t about wanting credit for the decision (I’m not sure enough of myself to feel too pious about it). It’s about wanting them to understand the reasoning behind it and the opportunity they have to take advantage of the moment. “There are adults in this building who believe you have better things in you than what you’ve shown so far and who want to give you the chance to express them. We’re trying to open the door a bit; what you do with it is up to you.”

Apparently this was already part of his approach. Go figure.

I don’t like different rules for different kids, even if it means opportunity for some of them. On the other hand, if I’m going to be wrong, I’d rather it be because I was too hopeful – too optimistic about the possibilities.

I chose the lady over the tiger this time. I nudged the grades up a few points. I’m comfortable with the decision, but not overly so – certainly not enough to insist it’s what anyone else should do. I hope they make the most of it.

I’m Not Sure I Want My Students To Succeed

December 16, 2020June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal

I’m not sure I want my students to succeed.

How’s that for an attention-grabber? Now I’ll skillfully jump back and lay the foundation for such an outrageous claim and hope it’s enough to keep you reading until we reach it again further on.

Four-Point Scale or Back Hoe?

The question of how to grade, what to grade, or even IF to grade isn’t exactly new in the world of public education. Sometimes it’s set by building or district policy (although enforcement is problematic at best). Other times it’s at least discussed within departments. By and large, however, it’s something no two teachers seem to do quite the same.

Many of the differences are cosmetic. Categories or total points? Are quizzes worth 10% or are they worth way more points than daily work and the math ends up with pretty much the same results? Other differences are philosophical. Completion or accuracy? Effort or quality? Improvement or achievement?

Things quickly get messy. If I grade entirely on objective standards, the kid who rarely shows up and never participates but has a great memory might pull a solid ‘B’ in my class without actually learning anything or becoming less odious to the world at large. The girl who does everything I ask and shows massive improvement still fails if she started off with less knowledge and fewer skills. On the other hand, points for effort sometimes seems like we’re rewarding mediocrity – or worse, giving pity points to kids who have no business moving up a level academically.

In other words, you don’t have to go very far before you realize several things about grades in high school. First, they don’t usually mean everything we hope and pretend they mean – particularly not from one class to another. Second, they’re almost impossible to get rid of. They’re so baked into the system that even districts bold enough to try alternatives usually end up using some form of an A – F, 4.0 scale when communicating with the state or post-secondary institutions.

Finally, and perhaps most significantly, any discussion of grades or grading quickly becomes a discussion about priorities and overall teaching philosophy as well. It reveals our assumptions about kids, about education, about “the system,” and about our own ability to accurately observe and assess specific skills or chunks of learnin’ in otherwise complicated beings – teenagers.

Our Rubric, Which Art From Heaven…

I’ve worked with amazing educators who believed that a 59.4% was the highest ‘F’ you could earn, so congrats on that. This wasn’t some sort of revenge for being bullied as a child; it reflected a larger conviction regarding expectations, opportunity and responsibility. I’ve heard anecdotes about teachers who announce on Day One that everyone’s getting an ‘A’, so let’s just focus on learning! I can’t imagine this actually working very often, but it’s not founded on laziness; it’s founded on a set of ideals about what education should look like.

Emphasizing quizzes and tests over daily work is more than a calculation; it reflects a philosophy about how things work (or should). The opposite is equally true. Prioritizing completion and effort and showing up every day over performance on formal assessments is about underlying beliefs. The whole “standards-based grading” movement is merely a variation on this theme – are we actually measuring whatever it is we think they’re supposed to be learning?

This means, of course, that we can’t really talk about grading until we talk about what it is we’re trying to measure. This is standard edu-blogging clickbait; I’m not breaking any new ground here. But it’s always worth revisiting the question of what, exactly, it is we think we’re supposed to be teaching. Only then can we wrestle with whether or not our grades actually correlate.

Birth of the Blue

My very first blog post opened this way:

If you want to completely derail any meeting of three or more educators – teachers, administrators, curriculum coordinators, outside consultants, or whatever – ask what our priorities should be.
You know, as educators – what are our priorities for the kids? It’s hard to make a good plan without a clear target, so what are we trying to accomplish – you know, ideally?

It was a relatively brief post (hard to imagine now, I know) addressing the difficulty of actually narrowing down our goals as educators. Do we prioritize content? Academic skills? Mindset? Grit? Job skills? Personal hygiene? The ability to work with others? Reading? Writing? Critical thinking? Citizenship? Not putting your entire email in the subject line?

Schools are expected to be at least three dozen different things simultaneously, plus whatever else people think of along the way. (That way, no matter how many things we’re doing well, there are always something for which we can be labeled complete and total failures.) Let’s assume we’re already doing our best with legislative mandates and district goals. These things are generally insufficient, however, to shape the day-to-day details of HOW we teach, let alone WHY we teach.

That’s what I’m wrestling with at the moment.

Success Secession

One of the top 3 or 4 reasons commonly given by teachers for why we do what we do is our desire that students succeed – not just in our classes, but in the so-called “real world.” We have this idea that success outside of school requires the sorts of mindsets and skills we traditionally value. Personal responsibility. Professional appearance. Work ethic. Good citizenship. Effective collaboration. Subject knowledge. Appreciating other points of view. Communication skills. Not smelling weird all the time.

I’m not sure these skills are as universally useful as we’d like to think.

I love Amazon, but is Jeff Bezos insanely rich because of how much personal responsibility he takes for his employees or his commitment to interacting fairly with other entrepreneurs? Does Mark Zuckerberg’s success demonstrate a commitment to good citizenship, honesty, or owning one’s choices? Are the Koch Brothers doing so well because of how respectfully they tolerate other points of view, or is it mostly their belief in democracy and the fundamental equality of all citizens?

Was Donald Trump elected President because of his work ethic, or was it more about his impressive command of relevant facts? Has he been so wildly influential because of his professional communication skills and ability to work well with others, or because he’s learned to show up on time and meet deadlines? The most powerful individual in the world has absolutely none of the skills or basic knowledge we push in public education – and shows zero interest in learning any of it. He is the personification of printing off your essay from Wikipedia then arguing vehemently that you wrote it even though the URL is still at the bottom of every page. The only difference is that Trump essentially became valedictorian as a result and half the school board is now questioning whether your teaching certificate is even real.

He may be the most outlandish example, but he’s hardly alone in his approach.

Studies suggest that overly confident (but largely incompetent) men get promoted far more often than counterparts who actually know stuff and demonstrate effectiveness at their jobs. It’s increasingly difficult to argue that political leadership requires real historic or legal understanding. Our cultural and political trend-setters and thought-leaders may include a few of the best-and-brightest, but they’re hardly the norm. Classrooms still hold up Abraham Lincoln and MLK as American heroes, but real success stories in the 21st century are about Übermensch more than emancipation.

“I have a scheme today… Me at last, me at least, like God Almighty, all for me at last!”

The Better Angels of Our Pedagogy

If we really want our students to be successful, perhaps we should be teaching them complete and total shamelessness – how standards, ethics, or consistency are merely chains to hold them back. We could offer lessons in race-baiting, gas-lighting, and general sophistry. We could teach them how to focus so intently on money and power that they don’t care who they use up or discard to get there, and that legal limitations are for poor people. At the very least, no child should be given a high school diploma without first demonstrating basic competence in manipulating the fears and insecurities of others to sell products or secure influence.

I’m not suggesting that all business owners are evil – merely that being responsible and smart and hard-working aren’t exactly requirements for success in the 21st century. (They may actually be disadvantages if taken too seriously.) Aren’t we doing our students a severe disservice if we refuse to be honest or practical about what success too often looks like in the “real world”?

The alternative, of course, is to continue inflicting our own narrow, idealistic views of how things should work, in hopes they might eventually come true. If that’s what we decide, that’s fine, but let’s be honest about what we’re doing. If what we’re actually teaching is a higher ideal for how society could be, and how capitalism could work, and what success could look like, let’s own that instead of hiding behind “real world” rhetoric. We may not win that argument, but we’ll at least be striving for something better.

I don’t love the real world at the moment. I don’t want to be responsible for preparing kids to “succeed” in it if that means they become more like those currently at the top. I’m willing to risk criticism from the powers-that-be and the perpetually victimized right wing to promote a higher ideal – one built on our founding documents and our national potential more than our Fortune 500 or modern politics.

So… I guess I do want my kids to succeed. I’d just like them to first question what they believe counts as “success.”

Dear Frustrated Student…

December 11, 2015June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal

Hello. Pull up a chair.

I know you came here to talk about grades, or get help on an assignment, or maybe just because your mom or one of your principals forced you to. That’s OK – I don’t take those sorts of things personally.

I can’t help but notice, however, that whatever your motivation, it does NOT seem to be a deep hunger for learning this particular skill or content. That’s also OK – like I said, not personal.

I can see your frustration. Seemed like you had all the time in the world to make up work, catch up on reading, figure out a plan… and now – suddenly – the semester is almost over, due dates are past, and you finally noticed the review sheet for the final and you don’t know ANY of this stuff – or so it feels.

Or maybe it’s a nagging disdain for school in general. Maybe you’ve begun to notice that the system itself isn’t particularly geared for deep, personal learning. It’s more like a weird bureaucratic game – fake some nice, show up and turn stuff in, and guess what each teacher actually wants from week to week. What you want, who you are, where you’re at, doesn’t seem to matter much.

And you’re right – it’s a stupid system. Some of us are working on that, but…

Hear me out – just for a moment. Please consider that even if grades are stupid, they’re still how the current system works. Even if they don’t accurately express who you are, what you know, or what you’ve done, they ARE attainable without extensive suffering. More importantly, grades give you options.

Maybe your parents will go easier on you about stuff if your grades are good. You have more choices about what to take next year if your grades are good. It’s easier to get into things you want to join, or get the jobs you want if you start working while still in school.

When you graduate, those silly numbers and letters largely dictate how many choices you’ll have about where you go and what you do from here. It’s not about what I think you should do at that point – it’s about YOU having OPTIONS.

And those, for better or worse, largely come from grades.

I hope, too, that you realize that even if grades don’t always measure learning, there’s still lots of learning to be had here. Most of your teachers got into this profession out of some combination of caring about kids and loving whatever subject they’re teaching.

Not ME, of course – I’m working out my personal issues by torturing teenagers – but I’m the exception. Most of the others felt a ‘calling’ to do this. They may seem jaded and bitter now, but the roots of their idealism are still there. You just have to tap into them.

You don’t have to love every subject, and certainly not every assignment, but please don’t let your frustration get in the way of noticing when something really is kinda cool, or interesting, or important, or engaging. It’s OK to care from time to time. It doesn’t mean you’ve sold out or given in; it just means you’re listening and willing to learn.

One other thing, then we’ll look at your grade and realistic options between now and the end of the grading period. Pretend you’re really listening to me here and I’ll probably go easier on you when it comes time to finalize this stuff. We like to feel like we’re ‘reaching the kids’.

It’s possible you haven’t made very good decisions so far this year. Maybe this is the latest in a long series of rocky semesters, or maybe it’s new – school used to be easy until…

If the underlying issues are about family, or legal stuff, or chemical imbalances, addiction, abuse, or simply good ol’ generalized rampant dysfunction – you need to understand that you’re not old enough for most of what’s happened to you in life so far to be your fault.

For the same reasons we don’t let you vote, drive, decide whether or not to go to school, or let you manage your own behavior while here, etc., you’re not morally, legally, spiritually, or intellectually culpable for the vast majority of what’s happened to you up until now.

Even when you’ve made choices – good OR bad – they’re inevitably shaped by your upbringing, DNA, and events beyond your control.

It’s not that problems go away when you hit 18, but they become more and more YOUR problems to handle as best YOU can. Part of what sucks about being a teenager is you have so many near-adult responsibilities, but so little power to handle them as you see fit.

That’s going to start changing, and suddenly all the rules will be different. Good decisions won’t always produce immediate good results, but a series of good decisions usually results in more good results than bad. All we can do is play the odds.

Old people like myself used to hang this poem on our bathroom walls or behind our desks – it starts with something like, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

You can’t change your parents, or your teachers, or your past. I know that sucks, but that’s how it is. You’d be surprised how many people burn up all their time, energy, and emotion trying. It never works.

You CAN do a better job with the parts IN your control. It won’t seem like it at first, but the learning happens in the struggle. You get better at it by doing it over and over. When it works, keep doing it; when it doesn’t, try again.

I know, sounds easy, right? It’s always easier to see and understand when it’s someone else.

Finally, you’re smart enough for this class. If you weren’t, you’d already be in another class. If there’s one thing we’re good at, it’s categorizing and tracking kids. I’ve been doing this for a long time, and if you were too stupid to be in here, I’d have taken you aside long ago and said, “Honey, I have some difficult news. You’re… well, you’re a great kid, but you’re simply too stupid for this class. I’m going to help you find a bozo class where you can be with your own people.”

But I didn’t, did I?

I promise you, then – you’re more than capable. Of course it’s hard. Why would we come to school and practice a bunch of stuff we could already do, or learn stuff we already know? Hmm? Oh, well – I can’t help how that other teacher does things, but that’s not what we SHOULD be doing, at least.

And you’re going to make it. It won’t be quick, but it WILL GET BETTER. Life doesn’t get easy, but you’ll get better at it being hard, I promise. Eventually you’ll be able to reach out to those around you less capable than yourself and help them get through their craziness as well. Because you’ll get it. Because you’ll have done it.

I’ll stop now, but I’m right about all of this. I’m very, very old, and very, very wise. Understood?

OK. Let’s look at that grade…

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The Awareness Test

March 1, 2015June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal

In the wide realm of things everyone else seems to have heard of except me, a colleague shared this video at a recent PLC:

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There are several variations, although once you know kinda what to look for, you think you’re getting better at it:

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Of course, just when you think you’re looking for the ‘right’ things…

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Sometimes the idea is done for class projects, other times to promote a show (above). It’s also popular with PSA about things like paying attention to bicyclists when you’re driving, or in this case:

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It’s funny, though, how often I missed stuff even when I thought I had a pretty good idea what sorts of things I should be looking for:

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The human brain is amazing at filtering out extraneous information when it really wants to and when it’s had some practice.

I know – you’re picturing your teenager, seemingly unable to set her phone down at dinner or your spouse who keeps checking his texts every time the dryer beeps. So, it’s more evident in some cases than others.

Much of it seems to be ‘preset’ by evolution (or, if you prefer, by the way the good Lord made us), and it’s NOT a bad thing. Can you imagine trying to get through even a relatively calm day if you were equally absorbed by everything around you – every image, sound, movement, option? We’d never be able to accomplish… anything!

This seems to be part of what’s happening with those we label ‘ADHD’. We’re living in rather stimulating times, and yet we insist they stay fascinated by US in a square room surrounded by diverse peers for hours at a time. They lack the ability, whether chemically or developmentally.

But that’s not why I bring up these Awareness Tests.

I’m more worried about the kids who ARE able to screen out extraneous information. We’ve done a great job teaching them to keep track at all costs of how many passes the team in white makes, or how many times the bird drops the stick. They’ve mastered the ability to zero in on the specific elements which result in ‘success’ according to our measurements – 94%, ‘B’, etc.

And yet we wring our hands and wonder why they don’t fall in love with the great short story, the fascinating complexities of history, the wonders of chemistry, or the moonwalking bear. We’re bewildered that they can’t seem to appreciate the stuff we find so very important, even though we’re the ones making sure they’re punished for not keeping track of those damn sticks.

What’s the matter – afraid of a ‘high standards’ and a little accountability?

We’re doing it wrong. I’m not sure I know the ‘right’ ways to do it differently, but I am confident this is not it.

My daughter is not the perfect student. She’s scathingly unforgiving of the slightest perceived flaws in her teachers (no idea where she gets this – must be from her mom’s side of the family). She has trouble getting up for school in the morning, and she spends too much time thinking she’s working while what she’s really doing is Twitter with her calculus book nearby.

Her state test scores were off the charts, and she was a National Merit Semi-finalist derailed only by her GPA – those magic marks we use to reduce each child’s value and learning experience to one of five letters and a number between 1-100 which no one can actually explain or justify.

Her situation is unique only in that she is either unwilling or unable to play the game as well as many of her peers. They learn to count the passes of the white team, the black team, and eventually they can be trained to spot when the curtain changes color. In the process they learn to ‘filter out’ anything not being measured, rewarded, or punished.

They hate it, but they’ve been brought up to believe this is what you do – digging holes in one part of the field and filling them in another, then reversing the process the next day because that’s what their captors tell them to do if they want to earn good marks.

She used to ask me the best questions about chemistry and mathematics – stuff I had no idea how to begin answering – and like an idiot I suggested she ask her teachers. But they’re in the same game, and discouraged such distractions. I’m not sure they always even knew what she was asking, or how to respond.

She doesn’t ask anymore. She’s learning.

I’m not talking about the kids completely alienated and marginalized by our system, the ones who fail and get in trouble and lower our teacher evals. I’m not talking about ‘bad’ schools – the ones supposedly hiding all of those ‘lazy’ teachers afraid of accountability. I’m talking about ‘successful’ students in top districts – the ones who we need leading tomorrow and being the future and lighting starfish in buckets or whatever.

We’ve taught them to ignore the moonwalking bears at all costs. We’ve taught them to grab the ‘right’ answer and present it carefully formatted in the ‘correct’ way no matter what they have to kill in themselves or filter out in their surroundings in order to do so. And every time we change the directions (‘OK, look for the bear this time’), they’ll do the new thing just as single-mindedly.

It’s not the fault of a few ‘bad apples’ in the classroom. We’re all part of a system requiring such travesties for our kids to graduate. Individual educators can fight it, but if you fight it too well, your students will end up outside the game and never make it into a decent college or whatever – so… that’s a problem.

We’ve broken them in the name of education, and I’m pretty sure we’re all going to teacher hell as a result. I’m increasingly unsure whether I can do it anymore. Maybe I can’t stop the abuse done in the name of ‘standards’, but that doesn’t mean I have to help sew the straitjackets. We’ve GOT to find a better way.

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He Tests… He Scores!

May 19, 2014June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal ~ 1 Comment

On April 27th, 2014, the Dallas Stars were only a few game minutes away from an improbable 4-2 home victory over the conference-leading Anaheim Ducks. It had been a storybook game with glorious hits, highlight reel scoring, and the sort of scrap and grit that made the Stars (rather than their opponents) the Disney-movie-ready heroes – IF they could tie up this best-of-seven series and force their way back to Anaheim for a final brouhaha.

Then, with seconds to go, the Ducks tied up the game and forced an overtime – in which they quickly knocked the Stars out of the playoffs. It was a crushing defeat, and – if you were the sort to be on Twitter during such things – one laden with personal animosity slung freely between fans on both sides.

The Stars season was over, and in the worst possible way – they didn’t have to lose. They had this. It was… they just… well, damn.

And yet, after a few moments of shock and vicarious trauma on the part of 19,363 fans at the American Airlines Center, applause began breaking out, then swelling, then exploding. The team stayed at center ice and raised their sticks, and the home crowd adored them for a bit before a microphone was handed to Captain Jamie Benn, who thanked the crowd for their support, said all the right things about the team, and promised they’d be back next season badder and better.

It’s been a few weeks, but if you ask the casual fan, the die-hard Stars supporter, any other team or owner or commentator in the NHL, this past season was a huge success. Not because of where they’d ended up, exactly, but because of how far they’d come.

By what should one measure success in professional hockey? It’s so relative, and it matters deeply where you started, what adversities you’ve faced, how much support you’ve had, how much talent you have to work with, Finances matter, and sometimes there’s a fair amount of luck involved.

There’s one clear measure – each season one team takes home the Stanley Cup, and the rest don’t. Some make it to playoffs, and the rest don’t.

In a few days, I’ll be entering final grades for this semester. I hate it. I try to be firm – you get what you get – but in reality I’ll end up browsing the final scores of each class, noting especially which students ended up a few points away from a different letter grade one way or the other.

What exactly am I attempting to measure here? Is it how much they’ve done? How far they’ve come? How well they’ve met state curriculum expectations? What they can DO decently in terms of social studies skills? Effort? Cooperation? Whether or not they’re a huge pain in the @**?

What am I measuring each time I give one of these ‘grades’?

I’ll go back to my hockey analogy, mostly because it’s easier to find supporting visuals that way. How do we measure success in a specific game? Not just for the team, but for the individual stu– er… players? What do we measure and thus value in hockey?

Scoring a goal. Stopping the other team from scoring a goal. Taking the puck away from a player from the other team. Passing the puck to a player from your team. After that it gets complicated.

I mean, sure it sounds easy – you gotta score goals, right? So, score a goal, you get a point. Maybe you helped score the goal instead, so… pass to a guy, and he scores the goal? That’s also a point. Easy.

But the other team is trying to score also. Huh. OK, OK… if you’re on the ice when your team scores a goal, that’s +1 for you. If you’re on the ice when the other team scores on you, that’s -1. Keep a running total, and it’s clear: the higher your +/-, the better player you are. So, like, Sidney Crosby finished the season at +18. That’s pretty good. Down from +26 last season, but there were other factors, because –

No! No other factors – we have to keep this measurable. No other factors. Let’s not run away from high standards and accountability.

T.J. Oshie, +19. Jamie Benn, +21. Alex Ovechkin, -35. Ryan Getzlaf, +28. Seth Jones, -23.

Wait – that can’t be right. Alex Ovechkin is one of the best-known and most valuable players in the league. Is that a typo? And Seth Jones – he’s going to be great. Young kid out of Dallas, playing for Nashville – I mean, what he DID this year for his age and background!

Yeah, OK – there must be other factors. Dammit.

If you’re a sports statistics person, or if you’ve seen Moneyball, you know it gets pretty weird pretty quickly when you try to figure out which numbers matter the most. Under what circumstances were these players on the ice? For how long, and how often, and during which games? Who were they on the ice with? (Turns out it’s much easier to score goals if you’re surrounded by other great players than if you’re the only guy with a clue on the team.)

All sorts of information can be useful to improve coaching, or help players improve their performance. Very few bits of information are useful in isolation to decide who the ‘good’ players are and who the ‘bad’ players are. Often we can’t even agree what those terms mean.

Maybe you have a defenseman with lots of blocked shots to his credit. That’s great – the other team can’t score if he’s throwing his body in the way of the puck. Valid thing to measure. But, wait… why are opposing teams taking so many shots while he’s on the ice? Shouldn’t the priority be to get the puck away from them and send it back up the ice with one of your guys? Maybe there’s more to that measurement…

You have a goalie with a great save percentage. That’s awesome – that is, in fact, their primary job. How many games is that percentage based on? In what circumstances did he play? He may be on a team that could pretty much leave their net empty and have no worries because their defensive play is so strong. On the other end of the ice, though, is a goalie working miracles but losing games because the team sucks. So save percentage is an important number, but not nearly as simple as it first appears.

You got a guy with too many penalty minutes, too much time in the box leaving your team short-handed? Yeah, that’s probably bad. Well, unless they were ‘good’ penalties to take – defending star players, or establishing physical presence on the ice. Maybe it’s just poor officiating – a ref having an off night can swing the entire dynamics of the game. Things like that can impact someone’s entire learn – er, I mean playing experience over time.

The measurements all matter. They all mean things. But the more you try to narrow everything down to one number, or statistic, or letter, or percentage, the less sense that system makes.

Which brings me back to these end-of-year grades. I’m a huge fan of accountability, and high standards, and that children are the future, teach them well and let them lead the way – all that stuff. But I’m having a hard time believing my own grading is a useful part of that.

The ‘intentional non-learners’ – as we call them around here – are easy. They wouldn’t do it, didn’t know it, tuned out for whatever reason, and they have a single percentages in all categories as a result. The overachievers are pretty easy as well. Although I’m not always sure how much they’ve learned, they’ve turned in everything twice, done the extra credit, brought the Starbucks gift card at Christmas, and have triple digit percentages.

But as I once again try to boil down everything a kid is, or has done, or has learned, or has survived, or could be, or should do, or… other stuff – I find myself increasingly cynical about the value of a single number, or a single letter. Better I should predict their day based on their astrological sign – at least that gives me TWELVE options with which to overgeneralize.

I believe it was Winston Churchill who said that our current grading system is the worst one there is except for all of the other systems that have been tried (I might have the details a little fuzzy). The thing is, we haven’t really tried that many others. And yes, I realize as soon as we open that door, there are huge arguments to be had about what we should measure and how and yada yada yada.

But I’d much rather have those arguments and risk doing it wrong in a variety of new ways than to be at peace with the current system. As sports aficionados of all sorts wrestle with evaluating performance on deeper and more meaningful levels, and in evolving ways, perhaps educators – striving to prepare our lil’ darlings for the future – should at least loosen our grip on yet another relic of the sort of factory-system education which lost its relevance nearly a century ago.

Oh, and #GoStars.

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