Editor’s note: This story is part of the annual Mosaic Journalism Workshop for Bay Area high school students, a two-week intensive course in journalism. Students in the program report and photograph real stories under the guidance of professional journalists.
Rachel Fletcher, a rising senior at Homestead High School in Cupertino, used to be organized and on top of her work. Then she lost motivation to complete assignments due to distance learning during the pandemic.
“It was a struggle for me to get through some of my classes,” Fletcher said, adding that while she’s typically a straight A and B student, she uncharacteristically got a C in her math class.
Fletcher is not alone — trends of overall poorer performance were seen in high schools across the country.
At Homestead, data presented to the school board in October showed a dramatic, across-the-board increase in the number of D’s and F’s on the first progress report of the 2020-21 school year.
According to the nonprofit news site EdSource, the number of students at Sequoia Union High School District in San Mateo County receiving more than one failed grade increased by 9% from the fall of 2019 to the fall of 2020. At Mount Diablo Unified School District in Contra Costa County, the percentage of students receiving more than one failed grade increased from 19% to 31% over the past two school years. In Los Angeles, the number of D’s and F’s in high school increased by 8.7% this fall over the previous one.
Even if a student did not fail, they may have seen their grade drop, as Fletcher did. Rising junior Esha Nag from Santa Clara High School reported such an experience.
“I do think my grades were impacted by the virtual format. Being in a classroom and socializing was everything I loved,” Nag said.
Educators say students who come from low socioeconomic backgrounds, whose first language is not English or who have learning disabilities were hit the hardest by the virtual format.
“The kids that normally get more support in the classroom weren’t getting that same kind of support,” Homestead High School Principal Greg Giglio said.
Getting a failing grade increases the likelihood of students dropping out of school — research shows ninth-graders who receive one or two F’s are much more likely to not graduate or not go on to college.
Recognizing the difficult year many students experienced, Gov. Gavin Newsom recently signed a bill that allows students to change any letter grade to a pass or no-pass. Assembly Bill 104 also allows students with mostly failing grades to request to repeat the previous school year.
To help students graduate, Homestead is offering to let students who received a passing grade in the second semester of a class collect full credit for the year despite a failed first-semester grade. While this does not replace the failed grade, it does help students get on track to graduate with the credits they need.
“It was a pretty unfair year all around for students. We thought it was a fair opportunity to tell students, ‘Don’t give up. Keep working hard, you can get there,’ ” Giglio said.
In San Jose, Latino College Preparatory Academy also changed its grading policies. If a student earns an A or B during their second semester, the school would change a first-semester failed grade to a passing one.
Melissa Manoguerra, a teacher at Latino College Preparatory Academy, said she had to change her teaching style and grading practices to help her students get through the year.
“I was the kind of teacher who was strict about deadlines,” Manoguerra said. “As distance learning went on, I completely threw out my policies about late work.”
Like Manoguerra, Bob Ansaldo, an English and journalism teacher at Santa Clara High School, said he struggled on Zoom to cover the material fully.
“I couldn’t treat it like an in-person classroom, so I covered less material and didn’t do as much writing. The traditional standards didn’t matter as much as the emotional component.”
Ansaldo said he is worried how this year might affect students’ upcoming high school years.
“When the students came back, I had a couple of students who didn’t even know how to talk to people anymore,” Ansaldo said.
“Taking the great extent of learning loss, how do we get somebody to not only just be social, but now to effectively communicate that in words and writing to complete the standards? I am a little concerned.”
Naomi Baron is a rising senior at Homestead High School in Cupertino.
