What Are They and Why Have Them?
School-wide expectations address important information regarding teacher and student expectations, grading, and attendance. For this to work, everyone must have an understanding of what they can expect from one another.
What You Can Expect From Teachers
Teachers will:
- Teach the Utah Core Standards as defined by Utah State Office of Education and adopted by the Board of Education.
- Monitor and evaluate student academic and social growth, maintain records, and communicate progress to students and parents.
- Model professional and ethical standards when interacting with students, parents, peers, and community.
- Model and instruct students in citizenship, including digital citizenship.
- Establish and maintain standards of student behavior that support school and district policies in order to create a safe, supportive, and positive learning climate.
- Apply grading policies consistently, return feedback on assignments quickly, and post grades to Skyward at least once a week.
What We Expect of Students
Students will:
- Follow all school policies classroom rules, and teacher directives.
- Attend every class, every day.
- Be on time, and be prepared to participate in learning.
- Demonstrate respect for all people (students, faculty, staff, volunteers) and property.
- Complete and turn-in all assignments on-time as assigned by the teacher.
- Voice any concerns about class procedures or instruction in a respectful manner.
- Ask for help when needed ~ before it’s too late (e.g., end-of-quarter).
- Put away personal electronics before entering the class use them only when explicitly permitted by the teacher.
- Bring candy, food, gum, and/or drink to call only when permitted specifically by the teacher.
Academics and Citizenship
Grading
In order to more accurately report a student’s academic achievement, Elk Ridge has adopted a school-wide grading policy. This policy reflects current professional practices and focuses on what a student has learned and can do. Grades are artifacts of learning. Achievement is performance measured against the published standards. Grades should provide feedback that is accurate, meaningful, consistent, and supports learning.
It is the mission of Elk Ridge to cultivate a culture of learning and to help move ALL students toward proficiency in ALL curricula content. Our focus is to more effectively and accurately communicate each student’s level of achievement of the Utah Core Standards. We encourage students to initiate and develop open communication about their individual learning with their teachers. This includes submitting quality work on-time, asking for clarification when needed, attending Intervention, retrieving work missed during an absence, and meeting with teachers before and/or after school.
Grades reflect the evidence students have submitted to demonstrate knowledge and understanding. If a student has not provided sufficient evidence for a teacher to determine what s/he knows and understands, the grade is reported as an “I” until such evidence can be submitted. An “I” may change to an “F” if the student does not submit evidence in a timely manner. Points earned on projects, quizzes, and assessments may be weighted when calculating the final grade. Percentages are converted into the letter grades. **NOTE: Behaviors such as attendance, participation, effort, and adherence to class and school rules will not exceed 5% of the student’s grade; they are included in the Citizenship grade. (Fine Arts, Foreign Language, and Physical Education classes may include a larger percentage of participation points due to the performance-based nature of their curricula.)
Work Quality
Quality is expected on all work, from all students. Quality work reflects a student’s best effort. Quality work is:
- Complete – fulfills assignment as outlined.
- Legible & Intelligible – written or typed carefully and thoughtfully.
- Neat – free of smudges, scribbles, stains, etc. for written work, and properly formatted for typed work.
- Edited – error-free, complete sentences, specific details, vivid word choice, and so forth.
Work that is not deemed of an acceptable quality may be returned to the student for improvement. Teachers will assign a new due date by which the student needs to resubmit the assignment.
When work is performance-based, students should show a positive attitude, active participation, and accurately portray their level of knowledge on the subject.
Absent Work
The student is responsible for obtaining missed assignments upon his/her return. The student must take initiative to work with teachers to make up the missed work within the agreed-upon timeframe. Each teacher reserves the right to require an alternative or additional assignment if the original assignment has been corrected in class.
Educational Leave is for families planning to take an extended trip sometime throughout the year (more than 3 days). Educational Leave forms are in the Attendance Office and must be completed BEFORE leaving.
Late Work
Students are expected to submit assignments on the designated due date. When a student feels that the deadline/due-date cannot be met, s/he may approach the teacher and discuss a solution. Teachers will work with students to determine an intervention schedule when a student begins to fall behind in assignment submission. Also, teachers will communicate with parents, counselors, and administrators when a student begins exhibiting a pattern of not submitting work on time. The Elk Ridge faculty follows two non-negotiable deadlines for accepting late assignments: midterm and one week before end-of-quarter.
Academic Misconduct
Students at Elk Ridge Middle School are expected to participate in their learning, to perform to the best of their academic abilities, and to be honest in all their schoolwork. Students who copy another student’s work (without teacher permission), share their work with another student to copy (without teacher permission), or in any way try to take credit for work they didn’t do (plagiarism) will receive an alternative assessment. The purpose of an alternative assessment is to provide the student with another opportunity to demonstrate their current understanding. The assessment will be provided at a time convenient for the teacher. The student will also be referred to an assistant principal for possible disciplinary consequences.
Interventions
DEAR/Intervention ERMS continually strives to find ways to help students succeed. On Monday -Thursday, 30 minutes is scheduled for students to participate in DEAR and/or receive additional support for learning from their teachers. Every student is expected to have a book or magazine for DEAR every day. Individual and small group re-teaching is given priority during this time. Students who need to retake tests or make-up assignments/labs will need to do so during the teacher’s office hours.
Extra Credit/Bonus Points
No extra credit will be offered to students at Elk Ridge. Students may work with teachers to earn back credit on a ‘not-proficient’ assignment within an established deadline. Students may also work with teachers to provide extra evidence of learning that reveals their deeper understanding.
Behavior and Citizenship
Several behaviors affect academic achievement (e.g., attendance, effort, the frequency of participation, adherence to school and class rules). Elk Ridge supports the development of these behaviors in order to enhance learning. Such behaviors are specifically described in the Safe, Kind, and Responsible Matrix. (Available on the website.) Citizenship grades are based on the matrix and reported every quarter. Unacceptable behavior will result in an Unsatisfactory (U) Citizenship grade and a conference with an administrator.
Attendance
It is critical that students attend school every day. Attendance directly affects academic achievement, self-esteem, high school graduation rates, and future employment. It is essential that students attend every class, every day. Activities, discussions, simulations, and presentations that take place during class cannot be duplicated- even by after-school instruction, video tutorials, or makeup work. Educational achievement not only comes through effort, assignments, projects, and tests, it also requires class participation, listening to others’ ideas, and engaging in collaborative work.
If it is necessary for a student to miss school, it is the responsibility of the parent/guardian to notify the Attendance Office (801-412-2800). A student may fill out an Educational Leave form if s/he will be on vacation during the school year. Forms are in the Attendance Office and must be completed before leaving.
Tardiness
Tardiness hinders a student’s ability to profit from instruction at the beginning of class. It also interrupts the work of other students who made the effort to be on time. Students are tardy if they are not in their assigned seat before the bell rings. Tardy consequences are as follows:
- 3rd Tardy – Teachers will have the student call home. Solutions to the problem will be discussed with the teacher, the parent, and the student.
- 4th Tardy – The teacher will refer the student to the administration. The administration will conference with the student and parent (via phone) about help and solutions. The student will be assigned one week of lunch detention.
- 5th Tardy – The student will receive an additional week of lunch detention and a call home from the administration.
- 6th Tardy – Parents are asked to come to the school for a conference. The student will be suspended, typically for 1 day. The student may return from the suspension when a parent comes to “shadow” that student for the day. The student will remain suspended until the parent shadow can occur. The student and parent may be required to attend JSD’s Attendance School at the Jordan Family Education Center.
Truancy
A student is considered truant if the teacher who is responsible for the student cannot account for him/her. Truancy is a violation of Utah State Law. A student is considered truant for any of the following reasons: leaving school without permission (Elk Ridge is a closed campus), coming to school but not attending class, or obtaining permission to go to a certain place but not reporting there. They are also responsible for making up missed work.
Other Issues
The Student Handbook contains additional vital information about Elk Ridge’s policies and procedures (e.g., Student Discipline, Dress Code, Code of Conduct, DEAR/Intervention; Cell Phones, Check-in/out Procedures) on the school website. Teachers review information in the Student Handbook and answer questions at the beginning of each semester.