Ugh. Well, I won't derail, but let's just say that when a teacher communicates with my honors 11th grader with statements like these:
I know you know the material. So please read the comments and feel free to contact me if you want further assistance or some guidance to fix this on future assignments.
Finally, I know you are an excellent student so don't get too down on yourself. There are plenty more assignments to get your grade up and to fix the issues I mentioned on the essays.
on an exam where she earned a D... after earning 100% on the multiple choice 2/3rd of the test... This exam is 22% of her exam grade in the class. Only the cumulative final is worth more (27%), and exams are a WHOPPING 40% of her grade. Yes, boys and girls, that means that her TOP score in the class just turned into 94%. An "A" is 93% and up. Y'all know how hard we've worked to encourage her that she shouldn't be "perfect," she should just be "good enough," right??
Well, let's just say that problems like these eventually take on more OMINOUS dimensions. This is the same teacher that she had so much trouble with two years ago... who is completely clueless when it comes to perfectionism and gifted students, and (IMO) was one of the major factors in her near breakdown two years ago when she had him for the world's crappiest geography course.
Now she'll need about 100% for the rest of the term in his stupid class in order to be "sure" of earning the A that we
all seem to know she ought to be getting in light of her understanding.
(Yes, particularly nice that this communication was RIGHT.ON.THE.DOT for quitting time for said teacher for the afternoon, too... so now I get to do damage control with my emotionally fragile 13yo who now has an 83% in a class that she had, until now, had 98% in)...
Sorry. Just ranting here since it's really clear that "grades" so often have very little to do with what a student actually knows and understands. It's disgusting.
Grrrrr.
