Harvard faculty vote to limit A grades to no more than 20% of the class

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/harvard-students-furious-over-plan-061700240.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAD1z6z1tIcGmU6fPqnH5QWV3uhzTpM1vKxuoDMfgIee8pKP5-5Jb2PVaqz2ABIctsxhvgX_k7FT1BF1tMxd7scdKqylNQ9MyzBHFXhXce8vi81WmCLoE2DHUFETMwEofazciWuf8_94YZ2pbZPSP7FJSzRoXpo3Jc13EklHRFRj-

The proposal under consideration would limit A grades in undergraduate courses to no more than 20% of the class plus four additional students. Roughly 60% of grades were an A in the academic year ending in mid-2025 at Harvard, more than double the rate in 2006. That fell to 53% in the fall semester after Harvard urged faculty to be more disciplined.

the Harvard vote has the potential to be a catalyst for wider changes. If one of the country’s best known and most prestigious universities declares grade inflation a problem, it could inspire other schools to do the same

If you read about the policy, it does not restrict A- grades, just flat As, so is not as draconian as it sounds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good. Grade inflation has been rampant for years at most universities and it hasn't helped the students in the long term.

People have been complaining about grade inflation for like a hundred years (no kidding—I saw a collection of headlines bemoaning grade inflation that went back to the early 20th century). It’s like a moral panic.

[Anonymous]

Grade inflation is rampant. Plenty of schools have a cap on As already —- what about business schools where it’s not uncommon. It’s not a big deal if an Ivy does this; it’s more common than you realize.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/harvard-students-furious-over-plan-061700240.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAD1z6z1tIcGmU6fPqnH5QWV3uhzTpM1vKxuoDMfgIee8pKP5-5Jb2PVaqz2ABIctsxhvgX_k7FT1BF1tMxd7scdKqylNQ9MyzBHFXhXce8vi81WmCLoE2DHUFETMwEofazciWuf8_94YZ2pbZPSP7FJSzRoXpo3Jc13EklHRFRj-

The proposal under consideration would limit A grades in undergraduate courses to no more than 20% of the class plus four additional students. Roughly 60% of grades were an A in the academic year ending in mid-2025 at Harvard, more than double the rate in 2006. That fell to 53% in the fall semester after Harvard urged faculty to be more disciplined.

the Harvard vote has the potential to be a catalyst for wider changes. If one of the country’s best known and most prestigious universities declares grade inflation a problem, it could inspire other schools to do the same

A strict cap on A grades is especially harmful to STEM and engineering classes because these courses are often designed around objective problem-solving rather than subjective evaluation. In many STEM courses, it is entirely possible for a large portion of the class to genuinely earn an A by correctly solving problems and mastering the material. Artificially limiting A grades means students could be penalized even when they meet the standard for excellence.

This is different from many discussion, or writing-based classes, where grading can be more comparative and subjective. In STEM, there is often a clear right answer. If 40% of a calculus or engineering class demonstrates mastery, forcing half of them below an A makes grades less accurate, not more meaningful.
The policy would punish success in rigorous technical courses instead of reflecting actual understanding.

Most engineering programs grade most courses using a bell curve.

[Anonymous]

Utterly ridiculous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/harvard-students-furious-over-plan-061700240.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAD1z6z1tIcGmU6fPqnH5QWV3uhzTpM1vKxuoDMfgIee8pKP5-5Jb2PVaqz2ABIctsxhvgX_k7FT1BF1tMxd7scdKqylNQ9MyzBHFXhXce8vi81WmCLoE2DHUFETMwEofazciWuf8_94YZ2pbZPSP7FJSzRoXpo3Jc13EklHRFRj-

The proposal under consideration would limit A grades in undergraduate courses to no more than 20% of the class plus four additional students. Roughly 60% of grades were an A in the academic year ending in mid-2025 at Harvard, more than double the rate in 2006. That fell to 53% in the fall semester after Harvard urged faculty to be more disciplined.

the Harvard vote has the potential to be a catalyst for wider changes. If one of the country’s best known and most prestigious universities declares grade inflation a problem, it could inspire other schools to do the same

A strict cap on A grades is especially harmful to STEM and engineering classes because these courses are often designed around objective problem-solving rather than subjective evaluation. In many STEM courses, it is entirely possible for a large portion of the class to genuinely earn an A by correctly solving problems and mastering the material. Artificially limiting A grades means students could be penalized even when they meet the standard for excellence.

This is different from many discussion, or writing-based classes, where grading can be more comparative and subjective. In STEM, there is often a clear right answer. If 40% of a calculus or engineering class demonstrates mastery, forcing half of them below an A makes grades less accurate, not more meaningful.
The policy would punish success in rigorous technical courses instead of reflecting actual understanding.

This is true of all degree plans. Writing can be made pretty objective through a thorough evaluation rubric. An entire class can be stellar writers with amazing arguments but this plan would have professors picking favorites. This is a mess across the board.

[Anonymous]

Students at Harvard are no smarter than they were in the 90's, and back then the average GPA was below 3.5.

Standards have gotten softer. There should be corrective measures to fix this issue. However, I do fear that lowering GPAs will hurt Harvard students seeking medical and law school admissions.

[Anonymous]

The engineer whining on this thread is pretty hilarious. Engineering has long been famous for killer curves. Beyond that, even if they were right about engineering, not all STEM fields are "criterion based." Math and physics in particular reward brilliance and wizardry in seeing beyond the textbook. Maybe we could all learn something from pure math.

[Anonymous]

This was common in many of my math, CSE and economics classes at Penn in the 90s. Not sure what the big deal is? The tests are really hard to differentiate amongst students. A is exemplary, B is good/great, C is satisfactory, etc. Plenty of B and C students that got their degrees and secured great first jobs. Employers manage expectations when they know the GPA is on a curve.

"Objective problem-solving" can be made more rigorous, deeper dive, more nuanced, trickier complex questions. The kids that met the bar, but weren't savants, collected their B or C and moved on with life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The engineer whining on this thread is pretty hilarious. Engineering has long been famous for killer curves. Beyond that, even if they were right about engineering, not all STEM fields are "criterion based." Math and physics in particular reward brilliance and wizardry in seeing beyond the textbook. Maybe we could all learn something from pure math.

+10

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Princeton had grade deflation in the 2000s, and no one followed.

Princeton got rid of its grade deflation policy in 2014 because people realized it was doing more harm than good.

In math, physics, and engineering, problem sets are a huge part of how students learn the material. They’re long, difficult, and usually done in groups because that’s how people actually figure out complex ideas. Collaboration isn’t just allowed but encouraged. From my own engineering experience, if a large number of students genuinely understand the material and do well on difficult exams, it makes no sense to artificially lower some of their grades just to fit a quota.

Curbing grade inflation with a blanket policy isn't a one-size-fits-all solution.

+1 My Ivy many years ago added % of As in the class to the transcript. That helped a bit with the grade inflation, but it was a bit annoying as better students took more rigorous classes, so it was a bit of an incentive to take the classes with weaker students, rather than upper level honors coursework.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Students at Harvard are no smarter than they were in the 90's, and back then the average GPA was below 3.5.

Standards have gotten softer. There should be corrective measures to fix this issue. However, I do fear that lowering GPAs will hurt Harvard students seeking medical and law school admissions.

I don't think standards are softer at all, just different. This isn't the UK where A means you have changed the field permanently, and so the grade "A" basically doesn't exist. I also don't get everyone's obsession with trying to label the average Harvard student "average."

What is true is that professors need administrative cushion to fail students, because early career professors get decimated in evaluations for doing so. What also is true is industry needs to buckle up to take in students who are very smart but averaging a 3.5 at Harvard, instead of the 3.7-3.8 minimum expectations these days. Will this fix Harvard's problem? No. It'll probably be disastrous for a percentage of students' outcomes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The engineer whining on this thread is pretty hilarious. Engineering has long been famous for killer curves. Beyond that, even if they were right about engineering, not all STEM fields are "criterion based." Math and physics in particular reward brilliance and wizardry in seeing beyond the textbook. Maybe we could all learn something from pure math.

As someone who studied Physics and got a PhD in computational physics, no that is not what physics rewards. It rewards understanding the content and applying it to new situations. At the undergraduate level, there's very little "brilliance" to reward, beyond working hard to understand content. There do, however, seem to be a lot of people in math and physics who are awful at the subject, but feel some need to emphasize that it's brilliance that separates those who do well from those who don't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This was common in many of my math, CSE and economics classes at Penn in the 90s. Not sure what the big deal is? The tests are really hard to differentiate amongst students. A is exemplary, B is good/great, C is satisfactory, etc. Plenty of B and C students that got their degrees and secured great first jobs. Employers manage expectations when they know the GPA is on a curve.

"Objective problem-solving" can be made more rigorous, deeper dive, more nuanced, trickier complex questions. The kids that met the bar, but weren't savants, collected their B or C and moved on with life.

The recruiters of today just filter for school AND gpa. No one gives a shit about the nuance about Harvard's grading. they want the "best."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The engineer whining on this thread is pretty hilarious. Engineering has long been famous for killer curves. Beyond that, even if they were right about engineering, not all STEM fields are "criterion based." Math and physics in particular reward brilliance and wizardry in seeing beyond the textbook. Maybe we could all learn something from pure math.

As someone who studied Physics and got a PhD in computational physics, no that is not what physics rewards. It rewards understanding the content and applying it to new situations. At the undergraduate level, there's very little "brilliance" to reward, beyond working hard to understand content. There do, however, seem to be a lot of people in math and physics who are awful at the subject, but feel some need to emphasize that it's brilliance that separates those who do well from those who don't.

You sound bitter