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Local high school dropping grades for first year pupils

Shifa Rahaman
June 20th, 2016


This article is more than 8 years old.

The move has led to a host of positive changes

The administration at Øregård Gymnasium in Copenhagen have decided to drop the 7-point grading system for all first year pupils for the fist six months of their schooling.

The gymnasium’s leadership, which believes that the move will allow students to focus on what they’re learning instead of what they’re scoring, said that the experiment has so far generated positive results.

What’s in a number?
The move has led to a host of welcome changes – including less absenteeism, more class and group participation and an increased motivation to learn.

“Students can better challenge themselves academically when they focus on what they are learning rather than on the numbers [they are being graded with],” Birgitte Hansen, deputy rector of Øregård Gymnasium, told Berlingske.

The students are still graded for classes they finish with in the first year – however, for all others, they are only given constructive feedback.


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A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”