From Grades to Growth: The Future of School Reporting

A Short Look Back at School Reports

History tells us that Aristotle taught Alexander the Great. But did he ever write him a school report? Did it say that Alexander was ambitious, restless and often distracted by dreams of building empires? Probably not. But the idea reminds us that teachers have always noticed more than knowledge alone. They notice effort, attitude, character and potential.

School reports have existed for much longer than many people realise. In the nineteenth century, reports included exam results, teacher comments and even observations about a student’s character. At King’s College, Canterbury, exam results were printed in Speech Day programmes in the 1840s, while at Eton, housemasters sent letters to parents at the end of each term. These reports were not always perfect. Some comments were witty, some were brutally honest, and some would probably not be accepted in modern schools. But they had one important quality: they felt personal.

Why the Old Way of Reporting Is No Longer Enough

Today, school reports are usually much more structured than they were in the past. They often include grades, targets, attendance, teacher comments and sometimes information about behaviour or effort. This makes reports clearer and more consistent.

However, structure alone does not solve the problem. As formal education expanded, teachers became responsible for larger classes, making it much harder to write reports that were informative, personal, and unique to each child.

As a result, many school reports became more standardised, often relying on universal phrases such as “well done,” “needs more focus,” or “good effort” instead of detailed individual observations. While these comments are not necessarily wrong, they are often too general to explain what is actually behind a grade. For instance, a phrase like “needs more focus” could point to many different issues, including confidence, organisation, motivation, subject knowledge, or classroom behaviour. Without clearer information, students may not understand what they need to improve, parents may not know how to support them, and schools may struggle to identify wider learning patterns.

Traditional reports can also be too focused on attainment: what a student achieved at one point in time. But attainment is not the same as progress. A final grade may show the result, but it does not show the journey behind it, the skills a student is building, or the areas where further guidance may be needed.

These limitations suggest that school reporting has room to grow. Rather than relying on broad comments or single grades, reports can offer clearer insight into a student’s strengths, learning needs, and next steps. With clear criteria and better digital tools, reporting can become more informative without becoming unmanageable for teachers.

The Role of Criteria-Based Marking

One way to make reporting more meaningful is through criteria-based marking. Instead of giving only one final grade, this approach breaks learning down into specific areas, making feedback clearer and more transparent for students, parents and teachers.

For example, instead of simply writing:

English: 78%

A report could show:

This kind of reporting is more useful because it explains where the student is doing well and where they need support. It also helps teachers make feedback more consistent across classes and year groups. Instead of relying only on personal judgement, reports can be based on shared criteria and clear evidence.

Soft Skills Should Be Part of Reports Too

Modern reporting should not only focus on academic achievement. Soft skills such as communication, teamwork, leadership, creativity, responsibility and problem-solving also belong in school reports because they affect how students learn, collaborate and grow.

For example, a student may achieve strong academic results but struggle to work confidently in a team. Another student may not always receive the highest marks, but may show excellent leadership, empathy or persistence. If reports only focus on test results, these important qualities can easily disappear.

Soft skills can also be reported through clear criteria, such as:

This does not mean reports should become emotional or subjective. Soft skills can be assessed through teacher observations, classroom behaviour, projects, group work and student reflections. Including them simply makes reports more human. It helps schools show the full picture of a student, not just their exam performance.

From Static Reports to Progressive Reporting

Another important idea is progressive reporting. Traditional reporting often happens only at the end of a term or semester, which means the information may already feel outdated by the time parents receive it. The student may have improved, the topic may have changed, or the teacher may already be focusing on different targets.

Progressive reporting responds to this by sharing updates throughout the learning process, rather than only at the end. These updates could include teacher observations, examples of student work, short feedback notes, images, videos, project outcomes, criteria scores and progress comments. This makes feedback more useful because students can still act on it while learning is happening, rather than receiving it too late to make a difference.

Mojo: The Future of Reporting

Adding more meaningful information to school reports does not have to create extra work for teachers. With the right system, reporting can become faster, clearer and more useful.

This is wh ere platforms like Mojo become important. Instead of treating reports as rushed end-of-term documents, Mojo helps schools build a continuous picture of each learner’s development. Academic progress, soft skills, criteria-based assessments and teacher observations can all be recorded throughout the learning process.

Because this information is collected in one place, teachers do not need to search through separate documents, notes or spreadsheets. The data they already record through assessments and classroom activities is automatically organised and transferred into the report card using Mojo’s built-in report constructor. This makes reporting more structured, while still allowing feedback to feel personal and specific.

Mojo also gives schools access to useful analytics. Since the data is stored in one system, schools can track student progress, class performance, soft skill development, criteria results and wider learning patterns. This is especially valuable for school leaders, who can use this information to understand what is happening across classes, year groups and subjects.

The benefits are clear. Students receive feedback that shows what they are doing well, what they are developing and what they need to improve next. Parents gain a fuller picture of their child’s progress, effort and skills. Teachers save time while still producing meaningful reports. School leaders gain structured data that supports better decisions about teaching and future development.

In this way, reporting becomes more than a grade, a comment or a document sent home at the end of term. It becomes a tool for growth.

The future of school reporting is not about making reports longer or more complicated. It is about making them smarter, clearer and more human.