Where Have All the Zeros Gone? The Landscape of No Zeros Grading Policies

Debates about grading reform are intensifying, yet little is known about the formal policies that govern how teachers assign grades. This paper examines one prominent example – no-zeros policies (NZPs), which prohibit assigning zeros for assignments or course grades – by analyzing policy documents from school districts in Washington State and linking them to administrative data on district and school characteristics. We find that NZP adoption has more than doubled over the past decade, from roughly 30 districts in 2015-16 to nearly 70 in 2024-25, with the sharpest growth at the high school level. We develop a typology revealing substantial variation in how NZPs are structured, where they appear, and how they are communicated to families. Perhaps most striking, despite being framed as equity-promoting reforms, NZPs are less common in districts serving higher proportions of low-income students. We discuss implications for research and policy and call for greater attention to the design and distribution of grading policies as a foundation for evaluating their impact on students.