In August of 2024, Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS) began the process of revising Policy 5030 - Assessment and Grading. As shared in the Superintendent’s Post-Entry Plan, we began a journey to listen to your inputs, and revise the policy to be more easily understood and improve its application to your student’s classroom experience. Early feedback from LCPS teachers, students and families indicated that expectations around grades and assessments were unclear. Three concerns surfaced, including formative assessments, retakes, and a grading “floor of 50.” Focus groups with parents and staff confirmed that the previous version of the policy was difficult to understand. Read the Fall 2024 Feedback Report.
By January 2025, the policy had undergone proposed revisions based on extensive feedback. Further public review and inputs were gathered, and the revised policy was presented to the Curriculum and Instruction Committee in mid-March, 2025. The School Board heard information on the revised policy during the March 25, 2025 meeting, and voted on the policy revision on April 8, 2025. The policy passed with some amendments. As soon as the complete version of the policy is available, you can find it on the LCPS Policy and Regulations page.
The newly adopted policy will take effect with the start of the 2025/26 school year. LCPS staff is updating Regulation 5030 and developing information for teachers to guide their interpretation and ensure consistency across the school system. This information will be shared with LCPS educators prior to the start of the 2025/26 school year.
Significant updates to the policy include:
Definitions are included for terms like “reasonable effort” and “formative” or “summative” assessments to ensure families and staff have a consistent understanding of key terms.
The floor of 50% has been changed to apply only to quarter grades, not individual assessments. The floor of 50% also no longer applies to Advanced Placement courses.
Students must submit homework and other formative assessments, demonstrating reasonable effort, before any major summative assessment may be re-administered.
The ceiling of 80% for reassessments has been lowered to 70%. Students may only take a reassessment when they have received a grade of below 70% on a major summative assessment and may earn up to a grade of 70% on the reassessment.
The policy now allows for weighting for homework and formative assessments of a total of no more than 10% of a quarter grade.
Thank you to the community, LCPS staff, and students for their extraordinary dedication to this issue and for providing feedback that helped develop a clearer policy.