Dropping scores

I've finished grading everything that's going into the first semester for AP. If you have access to iParent, you can check your final grade. Each period has a slightly different point total due to curving: 2nd period=1410; 3rd=1480; 6th=1469.

Now, if you have an A--that's anything above 89.5%--don't bother asking me to throw out your lowest test. I won't bother. You have a frickin' A! Pluses and minuses don't show up on your transcript, aren't factored into your GPA, so don't waste my time bugging me to boost your 93% to a 96%. That will just annoy me. You know I'm not fond of grade grubbers.

If your grade falls in the lower ranges of each letter grade, dropping your lowest grade may not change anything. If you have an 82%, for example, dropping a 50 point vocab test that you bombed is NOT going to bump you up 8% into A range. In these cases, don't waste my time asking to drop your lowest grade just so you go from an 82% to an 85%. That will annoy me, too.

This is not a good time of year to annoy me. Winter makes me cranky enough as it is, slapping grading deadlines on top of that can trigger my bite-your-head-off response. Grrr.

The main folks who should be looking carefully at their test scores are those who are close enough to the next grade range to benefit. If this is you, turn in a piece of paper with the test you want dropped CLEARLY WRITTEN on it, e.g., "Practice Essay 2.A," "Vocab 51-100," "Multiple Choice 6." Be careful, I am not going to check that this IS your lowest score, so if you give me the wrong test name, you may be hurting yourself.

Rough estimate of percentages: an essay test is piddly, worth about 1%, most people shouldn't even bother dropping one, it won't make enough of a difference to matter, unless you're within 1% of the next grade. Most of the multiple choice and vocab tests will be worth around 3%, take a good look at these and figure out what's in your best interest. The last vocab test was 100 points...if your grade is higher than your score on Vocab test 151-200, you should probably drop it.

OK...grades are going in tomorrow afternoon. I hope no one is surprised by what they have.