But the release of the 2022 results of the international PISA assessment and the decision made shortly thereafter by Minister Gabriel Attal to put an end to the “uniform” middle school system in order to make the French education system “more demanding” have brought the issue of grades back to the forefront of the education debate.
Even as numerous studies highlight the excessive pressure they place on students, will the stated goal of raising academic standards restore them to a central role within the school system?
For more than a decade, the school system seems to have been swayed by two concurrent pendulum swings. The first swing concerns what might be called its dominant philosophy, which oscillates between the call for high standards in the pursuit of excellence and the desire to provide a welcoming environment for all, with a view to genuine democratization.
The second area, which overlaps with the first, pertains specifically to evaluation. Assessment is subject to periodic surges toward an expansive and intensified grading practice—believed to promote excellence—followed by periods of calm, characterized by a less invasive and more measured approach—believed to be better suited to contributing to the democratization of the system.
Thus, after voices speaking out against a culture of performance and an obsession with rankings called for an end to “the tyranny of grades,” Minister Luc Chatel decided in November 2010 to maintain the grading system in the French school system. For, he stated, grades are useful for “providing benchmarks.”
Then, although an IFOP poll in 2012 revealed that 80% of French people were opposed to eliminating grades in school, in 2014—following a proposal by the Higher Council for Educational Programs—there was a push to eliminate grades and grade point averages altogether. However, in 2015, *Le Monde* ran the headline “The end of grades isn’t really coming anytime soon.” A 2016 CNRS study showed, however, that eliminating grades in the classroom helps reduce disparities in academic achievement linked to social background.
The issue of the middle school diploma is symptomatic of the debates surrounding this dual trend. Since 2006, the diploma—which assesses mastery of the curriculum—has coexisted with the Personal Skills Portfolio, which validates mastery of the “common core” of knowledge, skills, and culture. In 2014, Minister Benoît Hamon considered abolishing it—or, at the very least, reforming it. Should we retain two examination formats? And what should be the balance between ongoing assessment and a final exam?
The certificate has remained in place to this day, with 50 percent of the grade based on ongoing assessment. However, Attal has expressed his desire to overhaul it completely, making it a mandatory requirement for admission to high school, and one that will be based solely on grades assigned by graders, without any collective assessment of skills. This risks lowering the pass rates.
The Minister of Education has therefore decided to make the education system “more demanding.” But does this (elitist?) demand require grading, and does benevolence (which promotes democracy?) require its elimination? To seriously address the role and future of grading in the school system, we must acknowledge the twofold reality that assessment is not limited to grading, and that the presence (or absence) of grading is not, in and of itself, a sign of excellence—nor of mediocrity.
A grade is simply a convenient way to express an assessment of how well the student meets certain expectations (in terms of, for example, knowledge acquisition). There are other ways—undoubtedly much more informative ones—to express and refine this assessment, including personalized diagnostic tools such as descriptive rubrics.
The presence of a rating does not have a single, unambiguous meaning. A rating does not imply rigor, just as its absence does not imply laxity or methodological weakness. Rigor lies in adhering to an approach that is now clearly defined. And the rating itself is not responsible for how it is used!
To evaluate is to determine value by assessing the acceptability of a reality in relation to expectations concerning it. But this can be done from two broad perspectives: an informational perspective and a filtering perspective. In the first case, the goal is to enable individuals to know, each in their own way, where they stand within the framework of a personal development plan. Evaluation, in this informative capacity, provides context: it answers the question, “Where do I stand?”
In the second case, the goal is to determine an individual’s place within a group where not all positions have the same value, within the context of a plan for social advancement. It answers the question: Am I well-positioned (or even: best-positioned)… to move up the “social ladder”? Assessment, in this “ranking” sense, serves to determine: it allows for the sorting and filtering of those who will be best positioned, because they are highest-ranked. It identifies the best, effectively assigning them greater “academic” value—and, by extension, greater social value.
In the second of the cases mentioned, the assessment tends to prioritize the “problematic pairing” of ranking and selection, ultimately following a competitive logic. In the first case, it tends to prioritize what might be called a “virtuous pairing”: the duo of diagnosis and support. A diagnosis is formulated to better support each student in their individual progress. It is clear that this approach is preferable in an educational context, when the goal is to help students learn. And that the second approach may be—if not preferable, then at least acceptable—if—and only if—the school system is given the legitimate mission of regulating student flows by gradually identifying an elite.
Rather than trying to sway the balance to give greater or lesser weight to grading, the best course of action would be to ensure that grading aligns with a clearly defined objective. But this should be done only after assessing the legitimacy of that objective—and taking care not to act as if there were only one objective, thereby overshadowing all others.
Thus, we must not act as if assessment could be, for example, only “formative,” forgetting that it must also serve the function of certification, ultimately awarding diplomas that will act as a passport to socially valued positions. Nor should we act as if assessment could be only selective, forgetting the need—especially within an educational system—to contribute to the success of all students by implementing formative assessment.
Ultimately, the role of assessment (and not merely grading) depends on the importance and legitimacy of the objective it serves. It’s a safe bet that, as long as the school system’s primary—and, unfortunately, dominant—function is to filter out an elite, graded assessment will have a bright future ahead of it. After all, the algorithmic ogre must be fed (example: Parcoursup), which requires information for placement purposes at key junctures in the school system—that is, at every point where a decisive educational choice may be made. However, assessment should not be reduced to this single function.
