Every day, thousands of students at McLean log onto StudentVue to check their grades making it one of the most used sites at school. However, after the end of every quarter this portal is closed for a prolonged amount of time, not allowing students the ability to check their final grades until later into the next quarter.
Many students find this closure of the gradebook extremely frustrating, especially when major assignments or assessments are graded at the very end of the quarter.
“I think it’s very frustrating that we can’t see our grades once the quarter ends because sometimes I want to see what I got on a test or assignment that was due at the end of the quarter and I just can’t,” sophomore Murad Feroze said.
According to school policy, StudentVue is closed at the end of each quarter in an attempt to allow teachers to finalize grades before report cards are released. While this process is intended to prevent errors and confusion, some feel the lock of access creates unnecessary stress.
This issue affects students throughout the school year as many rely on their gradebook to track their progress and continue to be motivated.
“Seeing my grades helps me know what to improve and what I’m doing well with,” freshman Grayson Terzaken. “When it’s closed, I’m always worrying about my grades and GPA.”
Some argue that closing StudentVue at the end of each quarter is necessary to give teachers time to finish up the grading process without pressure from students constantly checking for updates. Keeping the portal open could create confusion and questions if grades are still being changed or incomplete, leading to unnecessary concern.
However many believe that this issue could be avoided without fully shutting down access to StudentVue. Allowing students to view grades in a read-only format would prevent confusion while still giving students transparency. Since students already understand the process of changing grades before becoming set in stone, completely restricting access creates more anxiety and stress than it prevents. Providing limited access would balance accuracy with the ability to meet the needs of students.
