The COVID-19 epidemic has caused dramatic changes to both student's and teacher's lives as well as education. We have all experienced an increase in stress due to the lack of social interaction and the difficulties of continuing learning in an online-only manner.

Problems associated with Online learning include:

• Limitations of Technology (which more significantly affects lower-income families)
• Students dependent on in-classroom teaching are without their necessary environment (less mature students have great difficulty when forced into almost self-studying)
• Consistency and Quality of lessons from teachers lacking appropriate training
• Removal of previously relied on supplementary resources such as our peers and in-person tutorials

Less counselor availability and health resources
This is not to say that FISD has not attempted to make up for some of these issues. Zoom tutorials with teachers are available for help along with the counselors but it can be easily recognized that the assistance from these interactions is naturally inhibited by the method of communication (some courses are more affected by this than others). Students who rely on classroom discussion and tactile learning for their best performance are at a great disadvantage during this time. Furthermore, it should be recognized that social distancing is causing a downturn in the mental health of many students not just in Frisco but across the country.

For these reasons, FISD should implement a Pass/Fail grading system similar to UC Berkeley, Stanford, Columbia, Barnard, Dartmouth, Smith, MIT, and many primary education districts across the country. While the point could be made that Highschool work is not as challenging as college level and that dependent students are not going through as much difficulty, denying a Pass/Fail change for the end of the year would be hypocritical of the district's goals in many cases. While this would affect on-level course students less, pre-ap and mainly AP courses are specifically geared to be comparative to collegiate work and result in college credit, if FISD were to deny the change on this basis they MUST acknowledge that their AP courses are NOT on a similar level to the college credit they result in at this time. Moreover, if they were to deny this change on the grounds that online classes were sufficient for all their students it would certainly make questionable that they "know each student by name and need". The assertion could be made that changing to Pass/Fail would cause students to lower the amount of effort they put into their work. While this has truth to it the reality is that students rarely put in an extraordinary effort to assignments that are not major grade tests or quizzes, it is difficult for teachers to outline their specific desires when work must be submitted over the internet. If teachers were to make it a specific point by point outline for their expectations it would result in ridiculous amounts of stress in their students, therefore a Pass/Fail system with a single bar of expectation would simplify things for both students and teachers.

For fairness of education and the health of FISD students, I encourage you to sign this petition.