Grading Music: Numbers to Letters and Back

While Stuyvesant High School is usually known as a highly regarded STEM school, what people often fail to realize is how essential the music program is to Stuyvesant’s identity. Students of all grades have the option to join one of the school’s five bands, three orchestras, and three choral ensembles. While enduring arduous days of school with no end in sight, many students turn to music to express themselves. Daily ensemble classes and after school practices culminate in winter and spring concerts, and all rehearsals are graded numerically, contributing to grade point averages. Student grades in music programs average from around the baseline 95 and up to a 100 for extra effort. However, a few days into the 2024-2025 school year, it was announced that the music programs would switch from a numerical grading system to a simpler pass-fail system.

The abrupt announcement of such a significant change caused many heated opinions, especially those of students’ whose schedules were already finalized with their music ensemble course. Most felt it was unfair that they were completely out of the loop concerning the new grading system when it was time to select their courses for the new year. “The fact that we didn’t know during course selections and program changes was kind of unfair of the administration [...]. We should have at least been informed of [the new system]. All we’re asking is to make an educated decision,” junior Emile Lee-Suk declared. 

It is likely that if students had known the music programs were becoming pass-fail, there would have been less of a struggle over the classes. Some students even dropped other classes just to accommodate a certain music program, since they occur during one specific period everyday. “If some of us had realized last year during programming or earlier this year during program changes, then maybe we wouldn’t have put in the effort to get into the music program this year,” junior Tahlia Jamir stated. 

Another reason why musicians opposed this change was that they believed the pass-fail system would downplay their contributions to the classes, seeing as their once-numerical grade would diminish into a “P” on their report card. “It saddened me to see because a lot of choral students, myself included, felt that it discredited all the hard work we put into our classes. To some, it may seem like it would come easily, and it’s something we do for fun—something that we can slouch around with and be lazy, but we actually put in a lot of work both in classes and outside of classes,” Jamir admitted. Indeed, in past years, students have needed to read new music, rehearse both during and after school, complete assignments, and even perform at events outside of school in order to receive a good grade on their transcript. But, thanks to the pass-fail system, students would no longer be incentivized to work so hard to pass the class.

The numerical grading system arguably allows for a better, more nuanced representation of a student’s performance in a class, because it really evaluates the amount of effort you spent in these programs. “For example, I was in choir and normally I think you'd get a 95, but if you do solos after school and help out in crews, then you’ll get a better score,” sophomore Troye Kim stated.

This news not only came as a shock to the students enrolled in these music programs but even the teachers teaching these classes. “We didn’t hear about it until the second day of school and apparently neither had our music teachers. I have Ms. Shamazov and she had no clue it was going on. Tamosaitis, Stephan, all those people they didn’t know either. I think that’s unfair to both us and to them,” Jamir divulged. 

The music teachers were in agreement with the students; the new change was quite sudden, and teachers were concerned over its validity. “I feel, and other music teachers feel, that making music pass-fail isn’t treating it with [the] respect that it deserves, and it’s treating it as if we’re a recreational class when, in fact, music is a highly technical discipline. And the criteria are very, very precise and exact. To me, first of all, it seemed like an insult to the students,” Orchestra Director Joseph Tamosaitis admitted. 

Due to the new requirement of simply passing the class, teachers were worried the pass-fail scoring system might have adverse effects, such as prompting students to practice less. “We were kind of worried because there would be no difference between a child who’s putting in [minimal effort] and another child who’s putting in an amazing amount of effort and work,” Music Department Coordinator and Choral Director Liliya Shamazov revealed. 

There were also concerns about students prioritizing other classes over their music courses, as their grades would not represent their hard work. “We were afraid that students would drop or would show less involvement because it would be involvement without a payoff,” Tamosaitis added. 

However, like with any other systems, there were still hidden silver linings. If nothing else, at least the teachers would finally be able to free up some time and energy through the pass-fail grading system. “I mean, it’s funny, but we were [thinking] grading will be very different, because you can just put a ‘P’ and just drag it across, because most students will, of course, get at least a 65, so the grading itself would be very easy,” Shamazov noted.

Even some students agreed that the pass-fail system had its benefits. “I was thinking that if [the class] became pass or fail, some people would drop the course who didn’t care about music, because I thought that some people were too interested in the numbers,” sophomore Richard He admitted. “I was thinking about how last year there was one kid who was sitting next to me and was always on his phone, and that really annoyed me, because I thought he didn’t really actually care about music or at least that he cared about the grade more than the music.” In this way, perhaps the pass-fail system would have weeded out students who sought after music classes for the alleged grade boost. 

Still, the majority of the school’s musicians thought the pass-fail system was the wrong way to go. Instead of driving students who genuinely love music to join the music programs, many believed that the new grading system would have caused individuals to look elsewhere—for classes with numerical grading. 

For some, the pass-fail system would threaten their dreams of one day making music their career or majoring in it in college. “Some students want to pursue a professional career, so they need a grade not a pass or a fail. In addition, other students want to pursue music and perform in college, so they need a grade for that as well,” band director Dr. Winkel stated.

The fear of having pass-fail music classes drove students to group together and think of ways to bring the old numerical grading system back. Lee-Suk authored a petition immediately after he found out about the change and enlisted fellow peers to spread the message. “I was like the Oratorio [Choir] representative in charge of spreading the petition. I signed it and then sent it to my music friends that were also in the Oratorio Choir, other choirs, and even other electives,” junior Alison Ren claimed. The petition was passed around both online and during class in hopes of garnering enough attention so that the school’s administration would take notice, and eventually, it did.

The students were not the only ones objecting to the pass-fail system—music teachers also tried to step up and voice their opinion about the integration of the pass-fail music programs to the administration. “I saw this at least as my obligation to let them know. We as a Music Department went to the administration as well and expressed our disagreement with this,” Winkel admitted. 

Both the students and their teachers’ efforts proved to be successful, because on Friday, September 13, Principal Dr. Seung Yu sent an email to all of the students in music ensembles, detailing the change back to a numerical grading system. “You may have felt that this decision was devaluing the course and your commitment to it. I want to apologize for giving you this impression as the decision was not intended to devalue the importance of our music courses [or] diminish the concerted effort and commitment you exert, nor to penalize you in any way for taking courses you thoroughly enjoy,” Dr. Yu’s statement read. 

Students were grateful that Dr. Yu acknowledged their feelings and took action upon hearing of their discontent with the system change. “I appreciate that he actually took the time to listen and that our names and our voices matter to him and the Stuyvesant community,” Jamir said. 

Even students who had previously supported the pass-fail system began to see the numerical grading system in a new light. “Reading other people’s comments made me realize that the old system doesn’t reward laziness—in fact, the new system would reward laziness more than the old system,” He admitted. 

The Stuyvesant music department has been restored to its former glory with the return of its numerical grading system. Thanks to the many students who expressed their dissent, said students can now continue creating music and working for their hard earned  grades.