<p>Our high school doesn’t do +'s and -'s, nor is there any rounding up. In our school system you have to make 93 or above to earn an A</p>
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I hate when individual students ask for extra credit work and have an unbending policy of not giving individual students extra credit opportunities. I look with disfavor upon them even asking. I sometimes put extra credit problems on an exam, but everyone has an equal opportunity to attempt them.</p>
<p>It isn’t jerky if you start with the assumption that grades aren’t a prize to be given, but an accurate reflection of a student’s degree of mastery. Sometimes, there is enough grey area that a teacher with integrity should give the borderline student the benefit of the doubt and not quibble over a point or two. In other cases, the 89.91 reflects a very clear B + student whose grade is as high as it is only because he or she has ALREADY earned some “freebie” points given out for the exact purpose of rewarding the conscientious student whose grade would fall just short based on tests and quizzes. </p>
<p>Teachers generally aren’t out to “catch” students. If there were policies in place to try to make grading more objective, I can almost guarantee you that the ultimate effect would be bad for the students. For instance, if I were a math teacher who had been giving an extra credit question on each test, and then the school passed a policy requiring rounding, I would just give less extra credit. Problem solved, for all the good it will do the kid in the OP’s scenario. This wouldn’t be because I don’t want students to do well, but because I want my grades to mean something.</p>
<p>This actually happened to my kid in Calc BC. Teacher was quite clear about not rounding - this dropped her grade from A to B. The teacher also made a mistake in not giving my kid some extra points for volunteer tutoring - this would have push her grade back over 90+. My kid was rather passive and did not want to advocate for herself even though the teacher was more than willing to revisit her tutoring credit. That’s why my kid is now slumming at some Podunk U instead of Harvard. :)) </p>
<p>I haven’t looked at this thread in days…and neither has the OP. Guess her friend isn’t concerned any longer :)</p>
<p>Oh, but I just came up with a relevant observation, thumper1! 
One of my colleagues used to say that he wanted to have 1,000,000 points possible during a semester. Then if a student narrowly missed a grade cut-off, he could say in good conscience, “I’m sorry, I couldn’t possibly give you an extra 10,000 points.”</p>