Enter your standards-based rubric score (on a 1–4 or 1–5 scale) and select your grading scale type to get the equivalent traditional letter grade, percentage, and GPA points. You can also enter multiple assessment scores and choose a calculation method (Mean, Mode, Highest, or Most Recent) to see your overall mastery level and converted grade.
Letter Grade
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Mastery Score
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Percentage Equivalent
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GPA Points
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Mastery Level
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A standards-based grading (SBG) scale measures student mastery of specific learning standards rather than averaging points across assignments. Most schools use a 4-point scale (1–4) where 4 = Exceeds Standard, 3 = Meets Standard, 2 = Approaching Standard, and 1 = Below Standard. Some schools use a 5-point variant.
Conversion methods vary by school, but a common approach maps a 4-point SBG score to letter grades as follows: 4.0 = A, 3.5 = A-/B+, 3.0 = B, 2.5 = C+, 2.0 = C, 1.5 = D, and below 1.5 = F. This calculator uses a widely accepted rubric-to-percentage mapping to produce an equivalent letter grade and GPA.
The best method depends on your school's philosophy. Mean (average) is the most common, while Mode favors the score a student achieved most consistently. Highest Score reflects peak performance, Most Recent emphasizes growth, and Decaying Average (popularised by Khan Academy) weights recent scores more heavily than older ones.
A 4-point scale is the most widely used and maps each level to Clear mastery descriptors (1–4). A 5-point scale adds an additional tier — often used to give more granularity between 'Meeting' and 'Exceeding' standards. Both can be converted to traditional grades, but the percentage thresholds differ slightly per tier.
Yes — a score of 3 on a 4-point scale means the student 'Meets the Standard,' which is the expected level of proficiency. It typically converts to a B (around 83–86%) in traditional grading. A 4 indicates the student exceeds the standard, equivalent to an A.
Decaying average assigns more weight to recent assessments and less to older ones. A typical formula gives 65% weight to the most recent score and 35% to the prior decaying average. This method rewards growth and acknowledges that more recent evidence of learning is more meaningful.
Yes, once converted to traditional letter grades or percentages, SBG scores can feed into standard GPA calculations. This calculator outputs both the letter grade equivalent and the GPA point value so you can use the result directly in a GPA calculator.
Mastery level refers to a student's demonstrated understanding of a specific standard or learning objective. Common labels are: 4 = Exemplary/Exceeds, 3 = Proficient/Meets, 2 = Developing/Approaching, and 1 = Beginning/Below. These descriptors help students and families understand progress beyond a simple number.