1 in 10 Arizona schools could lose full letter grade with removal of bonus points

The Arizona State Board of Education voted unanimously Monday to authorize the removal of bonus points from the school letter grade system.

The change could cause 10% of schools to see their grades drop, officials said.

Each year, the Arizona Department of Education assigns letter grades to schools based on criteria such as academic proficiency, state assessment results, attendance and graduation rates. Schools receive grades of A through F.

Monday’s vote was the first in a series of expected decisions as the A-F letter grade system goes through updates. The next vote will determine which of the indicators that previously earned bonus points will be integrated into the standard grading system.

Sean Smith, chief accountability officer for the Arizona Department of Education, told the board the bonus points were started as an incentive for schools to excel, but the system ended up unbalancing how schools compared in terms of academic performance.

“The compensatory nature of the indicators causes problems when they [schools] need to stand alone and perform. You can’t just have rogue indicators behaving badly when we’re reporting on each indicator,” he said.

Smith said that without the bonus points available for a variety of factors, such as graduation rate improvement and enrollment of students with disabilities, around one in 10 schools will drop a full letter grade.

Removing the bonus points will serve to level the playing field, he said.

“The way points are earned across the different [factors], who earns what, it’s really kind of haphazard across schools,” he said.

In the 2024-25 school year, the number of Arizona schools that received an F letter grade doubled.

In July, the Arizona Auditor General’s Office released a report showing that the letter grades do not accurately reflect the performance of individual schools.

The report pointed out that more than 77% of K-8 schools statewide received A or B grades, saying the system allows schools to earn high marks without demonstrating academic proficiency by excelling in other areas.

The auditor general recommended that the department and state board revise the definition of each letter grade to clarify what it means in terms of school performance.

Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne told KTAR News 92.3 FM in July that the department and the state board are already working to overhaul the grading system. He plans to propose that no school receive an A if students test low in academic proficiency.

Funding for this journalism is made possible by the Arizona Local News Foundation.

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