Changing the Game: How Equity in Grading and Teaching Transformed My Classroom

By: Mitchell Stanberry, M.S., Mathematics Teacher, Warden High School
Ian Quitadamo, Ph.D., Professor of Biology and STEM Education, Central Washington University

My Journey to Growth-Based Grading

Over more than two decades of teaching, I’ve come to understand that true education is about fostering each student’s growth—not by focusing on where they start, but on how far they progress relative to their starting point. As society evolves, so too must our instructional methods to meet the changing needs of students. My most profound professional transformation began when I transitioned from teaching at an affluent, majority-Anglo high school in western Washington to a high-poverty, majority-minority school in eastern Washington. This experience fundamentally reshaped my perspective on equitable teaching and grading, especially in addressing growth and achievement gaps.

When I arrived at my current school, the student learning challenges I observed were immense. Many students, predominantly heritage Spanish speakers, faced multiple barriers both within and beyond the school system. Are Spanish-speaking students inherently less deserving of a quality education in a country that espouses education for all? Of course not. The real question remained: how do we elevate learning, no matter where students start?

Internal school system challenges included a lack of dual-language support and limited student confidence in their STEM abilities. This, combined with standardized test results that revealed significant gaps in foundational math skills, meant many students were entering high school with proficiency levels closer to those of elementary students. Further analysis showed that traditional grading practices exacerbated inequities—penalizing struggling students, failing to challenge advanced learners, and ultimately limiting every student’s ability to reach their full intellectual potential. These outcomes come at an unacceptably high cost for students and society, both figuratively and literally.

My instruction and evaluation practices clearly needed to change to address this new reality. Instead of asking whether students could meet rigid, predetermined standards, I began focusing on their progress—whether they were learning more today than yesterday—and ensuring their growth could be measured quantitatively. This shift required a near-total overhaul of my teaching approach, including the use of growth mindset, intentional scaffolding, differentiation, and supportive tools such as translated notes, peer tutoring, and technology-based resources.

A Case for Basing K-20 Student Success on Growth

This inequity issue extends beyond K-12 education. Dr. Ian Quitadamo, a university biology and STEM education professor specializing in critical thinking research, spent eight years analyzing his higher education courses and found that traditional exam-driven evaluations disproportionately favored white male students—by as much as 10%. Were white male students inherently better learners? Unlikely. Dr. Quitadamo concluded that the disparity might emerge from established biases embedded in traditional evaluation practices, similarly requiring his instructional recalibration to ensure students were evaluated based on their growth and intellectual development rather than unfairness carried forward by outdated practices.

Without intervention, grade disparities persisted throughout each term. Dr. Quitadamo then implemented a system that provided students with multiple pathways to success, including growth-based assessments. The new results were striking: by the end of each subsequent term the gap between female and male students, as well as between white students and students of color, dropped to less than 1%. While not a controlled study, this work over nearly a decade suggests that growth-based grading can more fairly measure student success, focusing on where students are rather than where the system assumes they should be.

Grading based on growth can be particularly effective in closing achievement gaps for underserved populations, especially when driven by growth mindsets. Work by Dweck (2007) and Qin et al. (2021) indicates that students who adopt growth mindsets are more likely to achieve at higher levels. It makes sense, then, that growth-based evaluation would follow. Students with lower starting points often face insurmountable challenges under traditional instruction and grading systems, which measure performance against static standards. A mindset shift towards intellectual challenge and growth appears to be a driver of some achievement gains  A growth-based approach can motivate more students to want to improve regardless of their baseline, and challenges high achievers to continue advancing. Growth-based models by definition prioritize improvement fostered by a continuous learning mindset that may result from an authentic sense of accomplishment and progress toward self-efficacy. Students reduce performance anxiety by celebrating incremental progress, allowing students who struggle to gain confidence while high achievers remain challenged. By valuing effort and reflection, these approaches help cultivate a sense of ownership and perseverance in all learners. This decreases competitive social comparisons and makes feedback more individualized, ultimately motivating a broader range of students to keep improving. This approach fosters fairness and equity, puts the responsibility for learning on students, and encourages every learner to strive to become successful.

The Utility of Growth-Based Grading

To measure whether a growth-based grading approach could help students learn more effectively, I incorporated growth metrics into my grading system using the NWEA MAP test to track students’ progress in algebra, geometry, and statistics. Growth percentiles became a key part of their final grade, emphasizing progress over perfection. For example, in one year, our 10th grade cohort grew from having a single student above the 90th percentile to 14 in our Algebra 2 Honors class.

Observed growth spanned all proficiency levels, demonstrating that improvement-based grading benefited both struggling and advanced learners. Students who began high school at an elementary level showed remarkable progress, whereas high achievers continued to excel (see Figures 1a, b).

Figures 1a, b (click here to enlarge). Overall achievement graphs for Applied Geometry and Honors Geometry classes.  Figure 1a shows a wide distribution of student achievement. All students included in the sample entered high school as Level 1 on the 8th grade Smarter Balanced assessment. Figure 1b shows considerable movement toward high achievement/high growth for the same students. Purple circles represent females and blue diamonds represent males.

We All Experience Learning Differently

Expecting all students to succeed while starting from vastly different positions is fundamentally unfair. To make real education progress, we have to acknowledge that students do not start at the same level of preparedness, and then intentionally design course frameworks and assessment metrics that incorporate varied starting points and that measure progress toward a specific goal, rather than imposing an inflexible one-size-fits-all standard. In real life, learning is always differentiated. When we encounter something new, each of us experiences and processes it uniquely, even if the phenomenon is the same. This is not a flaw—it is a fact of life and should also be an educational reality. So why do we so often fail to integrate this understanding into American education?

In Washington State, the Teacher Principal Evaluation Program (TPEP) assesses teacher performance by emphasizing student growth. Teachers are evaluated on their ability to analyze learning data and use it to help students reach growth goals. The TPEP’s focus on individual and group progress helps ensure that every student is provided with a suitable opportunity for success and is intended to promote the use of effective teaching practices. Notably, GPA is not used as a success metric at all, suggesting that student success should prioritize progress over traditional grades.

Educators can differentiate content by meeting students at their level while scaffolding opportunities for deeper thinking. By anchoring tasks in rigor and relevant culture, teachers foster environments that encourage intellectual risk-taking, productive struggle, and intrinsic motivation. Authentic, accessible content then not only builds academic skills but also nurtures a growth mindset essential for lifelong success.

The Essentiality of Higher-Level Thinking and Problem Solving

Many educators believe reducing intellectual challenge helps unprepared students, but the opposite may be more effective. In Feldman’s (2019) book Grading for Equity, he discusses how a growth-based grading approach creates student success while maintaining academic rigor and student accountability, both crucial for genuine success. Education must remain challenging to prepare students intellectually, professionally, and personally for productive roles in society. In Zaretta Hammond’s (2015) book Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain, she emphasizes that underserved students need more opportunities for critical thinking and problem-solving, not fewer. Research conducted by Dr. Quitadamo in his classroom similarly shows that rigorous challenges are essential for developing advanced thinking skills. Yet, many educational systems default to low-level tasks like rote repetition – especially for underprepared students – which fail to foster critical thinking or deep understanding.

Differentiation Promotes Fairness

Growth-based grading requires differentiation, providing tailored support to meet each student’s unique needs. Struggling students benefit from targeted remediation that builds foundational skills with developmentally appropriate rigor and language support, while advanced students need complex projects and opportunities to extend their thinking. Differentiation is not just a strategy but a value and commitment to fairness, ensuring all students receive the instructional investment they deserve. Research in How People Learn (Bransford et al., 2000) highlights the importance of engaging prior knowledge and meeting students where they are to maximize growth potential. Every student deserves learning opportunities that expand their future in STEM, making differentiation essential.

Figures 2a, b (click here to enlarge). Student growth over time on the NWEA standardized test.  Figure 2a (top left) shows a female student growth from 9^th grade mathematics with the normed data of NWEA, who entered our school system from Mexico as a Spanish speaker. Figure 2b (bottom) shows data from a male heritage Spanish-speaking student who was underserved using traditional instruction in middle school but then accelerated into our honors program in grade 9 during the same time period that growth-based grading was being used.

Addressing Criticism

Critics argue that passing students who aren’t at grade level undermines their future success. While this concern has merit, it overlooks the reality that many students enter high school with limited STEM skills, knowledge gaps, and a history of failure, leaving them unmotivated to learn. Focusing on growth rebuilds confidence and provides flexible pathways to grade-level proficiency. Achieving 90% growth helps students close the gap with peers, even if they’re not yet at grade level. In contrast, holding students to unattainable standards and failing them ensures they fall further behind, reducing their chances of contributing productively to society.

An Invitation to Engage

Every student in Washington—and across the U.S.—deserves fair opportunities to succeed as a learner. However, significant inequities persist, often reinforced by traditional practices like conventional grading systems. Teaching practices grounded in growth, fairness, and equity have the power to transform education. Encouraging all students to push beyond their limits and maximize growth over time is a far more effective way to ensure underserved populations aren’t left behind.

Growth-based grading, centered on continuous learning and closing achievement gaps, helps students see the value of education and develop intrinsic motivation to succeed. To genuinely support learning for every student, we must align our actions with our ideals by adopting equitable evaluation systems that prioritize fairness and positive progress. Constantly telling students they’re not meeting standards—perceived as “not good enough”—stifles learning and risks setting them up for lifelong failure, contradicting the mission of every school. Shifting traditional evaluations to focus on growth enhances teaching effectiveness, improves teacher assessments, and promotes fairness for all students.

By prioritizing growth, we can redefine success, rebuild student confidence, creating classrooms where every student thrives. Schools can become what they were always meant to be: places of genuine learning, platforms for growth, and launchpads for a promising future. Let us commit to grading practices that reflect the transformative power of education—practices that value growth, equity, and the limitless potential of every learner.