TDSB students to get report cards after all

WATCH ABOVE: Parents around the GTA will get students’ grades, but no comments. Mark Carcasole reports.

TORONTO — After an uproar, the Toronto District School Board has devised a plan to make sure its elementary school students get their grades.

Students will receive marks, information about their attendance and whether or not they’ll be moving on to the next grade.

READ MORE: No deal, no report cards: Ontario grade school students may get letter instead

That decision comes one week after the TDSB announced it would not be handing out report cards but only placement letters instead.

“Instead of a report card we’ll be issuing a summary of marks,” Ryan Bird, TDSB spokesman told Global News Wednesday. “Those will be mailed home to 170,000 elementary students the week of July 13.”

Summary marks will be mailed out to students in Grades 1 through 8.

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“There will be no comments on it, no ‘learning skills,’ which are typically included on a provincial report card,” said Bird.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "There will be no comments on it, no 'learning skills,' which are typically included on a provincial report card," said Bird.

He said under current strike action, teachers are submitting marks for their students to principals, but the teachers are not entering the marks into a computer system.

Ontario’s elementary school teachers started a work-to-rule campaign on May 11, and stepped up actions June 1.

“Those marks will come in to the principal in various forms. The principal and now central staff will help go through those and then put them into a mark summary template.”

Since word got out that parents could contact principals to receive their children’s grades verbally, principals have been inundated by calls, leading to this move by the TDSB.

Centrally assigned, non-unionized staff, such as business operational staff, will help in larger schools. In some of the smaller schools principals will take care of the data entry themselves.

The mailouts will cost about $180,000, and the cost is largely attributed to supplies such as envelopes and postage.

The decision was made to send a marks summary to everyone, around the same date, to ensure all students and parents get their marks in a reasonable timeframe.

Bird said it would be nearly impossible for some larger schools to get the report cards out. Some students would have to wait months, or longer for their marks, and the mailouts make it “equitable across the board.”

The Durham District School Board also announced Wednesday it will issue report cards with marks to elementary students on June 25. In York Region District a mark summary will be available for pick-up at elementary schools as of August 31.

With files from Marc Carcasole and Paul Tadich