Viewmont High School Principal Dan Linford isn’t bothered so much that the new school grading system gave his school an “F.”

He is bothered by the fact that if just a few more students had taken CRT — or criterion-referenced test — exams, Viewmont High in Bountiful would have earned a “B” from the controversial new system.

“If anyone in my community sees the ‘F,’ they know it is a flawed grading system, and it speaks more to the system than it does to Viewmont High,” he said Tuesday. “But Viewmont also is not a ‘B’ school. Viewmont is an ‘A’ school.”

Both Newsweek and the Washington Post have declared Viewmont to be within the top 6 percent of public schools, Linford said.

“We have never failed AYP (adequate yearly progress),” he said. “Schools from across the country and the state have come to study our program for at-risk students. People come from everywhere to see what we are doing.”

For an accurate picture of student achievement, check the school’s test scores, not its letter grade, Linford said.

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Davis School District schools were given grades ranging from “A” through “F” in the report, released Tuesday.

The only other Davis district school to get an “F” was Mountain High, an alternative school with the mission of attracting and helping struggling students.

Weber School District’s grades duplicated Davis district’s range, with the only “F” given to an alternative school, Canyon View School.

Box Elder School District received “B” and “C” grades, and Morgan School District earned three “B”s and one “C.”

Ogden School District schools earned “B” through “F” grades.

One failing grade went to George Washington High, an alternative school, and the other went to Ben Lomond High, which missed getting a higher grade because of a few students not participating in testing, said Rich Nye, Ogden School District assessment coordinator.

Nye said Ben Lomond had a 96.2 percent participation level overall, which was above the 95 percent threshold required for passing, but the test participation percentage for below-proficiency students was 94.21 percent.

Without the automatic fail for test participation below 95 percent, Ben Lomond’s grade would have been a high “D,” Nye said.

“There’s a lot of emotion attached to letter grades,” Nye said. “We know what we need to work on, and we are actively working to help students be proficient. A letter grade didn’t add anything we didn’t know. We are motivated without a letter grade.”

Linford said at Viewmont, some of the students who did not take the CRT English test were part of advanced-placement English courses.

The legislation, based on SB271, adds another system of school accountability to the Utah Comprehensive Accountability System (UCAS), created in response to 2011 legislation.

School Grading Program critics, including members of the Utah School Board Association, have said the new system is flawed for a number of reasons: It doesn’t give credit for growth achieved by students still at below-proficiency levels, and it assigns failing grades based on participation in end-of-year tests regardless of circumstances at the school level.

Also, it treats all schools the same, regardless of whether they serve alternative populations, or students with mental or physical disabilities.

And it counts students at below-proficiency level twice, once as part of the whole school population and once as a subgroup. The system also grades on a curve, ensuring the largest number of schools will get mid-range grades, regardless of achievement.

Nate Taggart, Weber School District spokesman, said his district believes in transparency and helping parents understand how schools are performing.

“But this letter-grade system for schools is not a fair measure of student achievement,” he said. “I don’t know of any calls we have received from parents. People know their neighborhood schools and what goes on there. They know the quality of the work the school faculty and administrators are doing.”

It’s not surprising that alternative schools would fail in the new system, said Logan Toone, assessment director for the Davis School District.

“The system is set up so alternative schools can’t be successful in the school grading system. It’s an inherent inequity in the system.”

Toone said Davis district is trying to take the school letter grades in stride.

“It’s a big deal, and people are concerned, but I don’t know that anyone is in shock. We are making sure the community understands the nature of the grades. It’s a misrepresentation of what is going on.”

Stephanie Thornley, co-chairwoman of Viewmont High’s Community Council, said she is proud of the school.

“Viewmont welcomes accountability and transparency,” she said. “I am very proud of Viewmont High’s performance across the board. This was just a technicality, basically, that kept us from doing better.

“We had 98 percent of our students test, but were lower in a subpopulation. Viewmont High is a great school with nothing to hide. The ‘F’ is very unfortunate, but it’s an unfair representation of what our school is all about. It’s a distorted view.”

Linford said the new school grading system is based on one created in Florida, which offered funds for school improvement. Utah’s new system does not offer funds for school improvement, he said.

“This system assumes bad grades will make us work harder. But Florida is not using the system anymore. They don’t believe in it.”

Contact reporter Nancy Van Valkenburg at 801-625-4275 or nvan@standard.net. Follow her on Twitter at @S_ENancyVanV.