Harvard Faculty Approves Cap

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

That's not what they are saying. They are saying that there is such a disparity of needs in the class (due to TO and woke stuff) that they cannot effectively teach. That's fair.

“I can’t teach effectively because there are black kids in my class.” That’s what you’re saying. It’s racist and boring.

These schools classes are test required and they still have issues. What’s the next boogeyman?

They can’t effectively teach because they’ve diluted their own standards and refuse to improve their teaching. They mostly have no solutions to the AI problem, and they have not self reflected that THEY give out grades. If an A means nothing at Harvard, I’m blaming faculty, not students. Students don’t make grades, they earn them. Faculty at Harvard should be embarrassed by themselves, and their obsession with calling the younger generation incompetent all while they are full professors with 1/10 of the work needed today to become a full professor is hilarious.

Professors were at a disadvantage previously because they felt "compelled" to give better grades in fear that their evaluations would be compromised. So instead of obtaining the support from the institution to decrease the importance of evaluations, they are instead putting this back on the students.

If professors feel pressured to inflate grades because student evaluations affect their careers, that points to a flaw in how institutions evaluate professors, not necessarily a justification for rigid grade caps. A forced limit on A grades might reduce the incentive to inflate grades, but it can also prevent high-performing students from receiving grades that accurately reflect their work. The better solution is to address the underlying incentive structure and evaluation methods, rather than imposing uniform grading limits across different classes, disciplines, and student populations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The 20 percent plus 4 cap on flat As has passed. Notably there is no cap on the grade of A minus. Goes into effect fall of 2027 for a three year pilot.

This brings Harvard back to the grading metric of the early 1990s.

Where are all the dcum moms who said this would never pass at Harvard?

Next is Yale.

Yale is going to chart its own waters. It said it was keeping a close eye on Harvard and Princeton, but Princeton has already done the grade deflation thing, and they’re not going back. Hopefully, Yale faculty are smarter than Harvard and can figure out a rigorous solution.

Wait for a few more days and you will find out. A big slap on your face.

Actually, the Yale proposal is much more drastic than the Harvard proposal.

Agreed. Isn’t Yale’s a 3.0 mean? That actually makes much more sense than the Harvard proposals. It just says they will set the average Yale student to be a defined 3.0, instead of where it’s currently like 3.8 and the average student is apparently grad school level. It’s not even really grade deflation just changing standards.

Worse -- median.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The 20 percent plus 4 cap on flat As has passed. Notably there is no cap on the grade of A minus. Goes into effect fall of 2027 for a three year pilot.

This brings Harvard back to the grading metric of the early 1990s.

Where are all the dcum moms who said this would never pass at Harvard?

Next is Yale.

Yale is going to chart its own waters. It said it was keeping a close eye on Harvard and Princeton, but Princeton has already done the grade deflation thing, and they’re not going back. Hopefully, Yale faculty are smarter than Harvard and can figure out a rigorous solution.

Wait for a few more days and you will find out. A big slap on your face.

Would you like to tell me princetons grade policy then? You seem quite knowledgeable so I’d love to hear about how they’ve agreed to deflate grades!

They are referring to what Princeton did in 2004, they limited all A grades (A+, A, A-) to 35 percent of the class. It was unpopular and discontinued in 2013. Today, 40-45 percent of grades at Princeton are an A or A+.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

Unless you have a kid at Harvard, I don't see how this is a problem. There will always be plenty of schools that still assign A's to the majority of students, as grade inflation has been a trend not just at Harvard, but at all colleges. I don't think this is going to be a policy everywhere, as many students will obviously choose to go to schools where A's are easier to come by.

Whether you assign letter grades on the transcript, or write down qualitative words like "excellent," "fair," "average" (that's what the letter grades are supposed to mean, aren't they?), I still think it's a good idea to have meaningful differentiation. The most common grade in colleges before the 1960's really was a C. Many people point out that college students are way more stressed out now under grade inflation than in the old days, because they feel they have have a ton of spectacular, often unrealistic extracurricular achievements or experiences in order to be competitive for the job market or grad school or professional school, since GPAs aren't meaningful anymore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The 20 percent plus 4 cap on flat As has passed. Notably there is no cap on the grade of A minus. Goes into effect fall of 2027 for a three year pilot.

This brings Harvard back to the grading metric of the early 1990s.

Where are all the dcum moms who said this would never pass at Harvard?

Next is Yale.

Yale is going to chart its own waters. It said it was keeping a close eye on Harvard and Princeton, but Princeton has already done the grade deflation thing, and they’re not going back. Hopefully, Yale faculty are smarter than Harvard and can figure out a rigorous solution.

Wait for a few more days and you will find out. A big slap on your face.

Actually, the Yale proposal is much more drastic than the Harvard proposal.

Agreed. Isn’t Yale’s a 3.0 mean? That actually makes much more sense than the Harvard proposals. It just says they will set the average Yale student to be a defined 3.0, instead of where it’s currently like 3.8 and the average student is apparently grad school level. It’s not even really grade deflation just changing standards.

Worse -- median.

There shouldn’t be that much of a difference. You’re capped at 4.0 and there’s a minimum gpa to stay at the institution.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The 20 percent plus 4 cap on flat As has passed. Notably there is no cap on the grade of A minus. Goes into effect fall of 2027 for a three year pilot.

This brings Harvard back to the grading metric of the early 1990s.

Where are all the dcum moms who said this would never pass at Harvard?

Next is Yale.

Yale is going to chart its own waters. It said it was keeping a close eye on Harvard and Princeton, but Princeton has already done the grade deflation thing, and they’re not going back. Hopefully, Yale faculty are smarter than Harvard and can figure out a rigorous solution.

Wait for a few more days and you will find out. A big slap on your face.

Actually, the Yale proposal is much more drastic than the Harvard proposal.

Agreed. Isn’t Yale’s a 3.0 mean? That actually makes much more sense than the Harvard proposals. It just says they will set the average Yale student to be a defined 3.0, instead of where it’s currently like 3.8 and the average student is apparently grad school level. It’s not even really grade deflation just changing standards.

Worse -- median.

I’m re-reading some of the articles, and there seems to be confusion between mean and median grades. They’re being used almost interchangeably, even though they measure different things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

That's not what they are saying. They are saying that there is such a disparity of needs in the class (due to TO and woke stuff) that they cannot effectively teach. That's fair.

“I can’t teach effectively because there are black kids in my class.” That’s what you’re saying. It’s racist and boring.

These schools classes are test required and they still have issues. What’s the next boogeyman?

They can’t effectively teach because they’ve diluted their own standards and refuse to improve their teaching. They mostly have no solutions to the AI problem, and they have not self reflected that THEY give out grades. If an A means nothing at Harvard, I’m blaming faculty, not students. Students don’t make grades, they earn them. Faculty at Harvard should be embarrassed by themselves, and their obsession with calling the younger generation incompetent all while they are full professors with 1/10 of the work needed today to become a full professor is hilarious.

Professors were at a disadvantage previously because they felt "compelled" to give better grades in fear that their evaluations would be compromised. So instead of obtaining the support from the institution to decrease the importance of evaluations, they are instead putting this back on the students.

If professors feel pressured to inflate grades because student evaluations affect their careers, that points to a flaw in how institutions evaluate professors, not necessarily a justification for rigid grade caps. A forced limit on A grades might reduce the incentive to inflate grades, but it can also prevent high-performing students from receiving grades that accurately reflect their work. The better solution is to address the underlying incentive structure and evaluation methods, rather than imposing uniform grading limits across different classes, disciplines, and student populations.

100% agreed and the reason this annoys me particularly is that Harvard faculty have the opportunity to push for shared governance, but that would outline them having a responsibility beyond spurning students. This decision is shockingly inept.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The 20 percent plus 4 cap on flat As has passed. Notably there is no cap on the grade of A minus. Goes into effect fall of 2027 for a three year pilot.

This brings Harvard back to the grading metric of the early 1990s.

Where are all the dcum moms who said this would never pass at Harvard?

Next is Yale.

Yale is going to chart its own waters. It said it was keeping a close eye on Harvard and Princeton, but Princeton has already done the grade deflation thing, and they’re not going back. Hopefully, Yale faculty are smarter than Harvard and can figure out a rigorous solution.

Wait for a few more days and you will find out. A big slap on your face.

Actually, the Yale proposal is much more drastic than the Harvard proposal.

Agreed. Isn’t Yale’s a 3.0 mean? That actually makes much more sense than the Harvard proposals. It just says they will set the average Yale student to be a defined 3.0, instead of where it’s currently like 3.8 and the average student is apparently grad school level. It’s not even really grade deflation just changing standards.

Worse -- median.

I’m re-reading some of the articles, and there seems to be confusion between mean and median grades. They’re being used almost interchangeably, even though they measure different things.

In this situation, they should be rather interchangeable

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

Unless you have a kid at Harvard, I don't see how this is a problem. There will always be plenty of schools that still assign A's to the majority of students, as grade inflation has been a trend not just at Harvard, but at all colleges. I don't think this is going to be a policy everywhere, as many students will obviously choose to go to schools where A's are easier to come by.

Whether you assign letter grades on the transcript, or write down qualitative words like "excellent," "fair," "average" (that's what the letter grades are supposed to mean, aren't they?), I still think it's a good idea to have meaningful differentiation. The most common grade in colleges before the 1960's really was a C. Many people point out that college students are way more stressed out now under grade inflation than in the old days, because they feel they have have a ton of spectacular, often unrealistic extracurricular achievements or experiences in order to be competitive for the job market or grad school or professional school, since GPAs aren't meaningful anymore.

Giving everyone Cs…won’t change this. Students will still want competitive jobs or go to great grad schools. Law schools effectively require top grades. Same with med schools. For graduate admissions, this will make the situation worse because it encourages over reliance on recommendation letters (on the back end, this is just accepting your peer’s (friend) advisee). Shutting down grade inflation won’t change that students want to make money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

That's not what they are saying. They are saying that there is such a disparity of needs in the class (due to TO and woke stuff) that they cannot effectively teach. That's fair.

“I can’t teach effectively because there are black kids in my class.” That’s what you’re saying. It’s racist and boring.

These schools classes are test required and they still have issues. What’s the next boogeyman?

They can’t effectively teach because they’ve diluted their own standards and refuse to improve their teaching. They mostly have no solutions to the AI problem, and they have not self reflected that THEY give out grades. If an A means nothing at Harvard, I’m blaming faculty, not students. Students don’t make grades, they earn them. Faculty at Harvard should be embarrassed by themselves, and their obsession with calling the younger generation incompetent all while they are full professors with 1/10 of the work needed today to become a full professor is hilarious.

Professors were at a disadvantage previously because they felt "compelled" to give better grades in fear that their evaluations would be compromised. So instead of obtaining the support from the institution to decrease the importance of evaluations, they are instead putting this back on the students.

If professors feel pressured to inflate grades because student evaluations affect their careers, that points to a flaw in how institutions evaluate professors, not necessarily a justification for rigid grade caps. A forced limit on A grades might reduce the incentive to inflate grades, but it can also prevent high-performing students from receiving grades that accurately reflect their work. The better solution is to address the underlying incentive structure and evaluation methods, rather than imposing uniform grading limits across different classes, disciplines, and student populations.

100% agreed and the reason this annoys me particularly is that Harvard faculty have the opportunity to push for shared governance, but that would outline them having a responsibility beyond spurning students. This decision is shockingly inept.

If I was a Harvard professor, it's easier to vote for this than have to deal with the extra work/headache to actually address the underlying issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

Unless you have a kid at Harvard, I don't see how this is a problem. There will always be plenty of schools that still assign A's to the majority of students, as grade inflation has been a trend not just at Harvard, but at all colleges. I don't think this is going to be a policy everywhere, as many students will obviously choose to go to schools where A's are easier to come by.

Whether you assign letter grades on the transcript, or write down qualitative words like "excellent," "fair," "average" (that's what the letter grades are supposed to mean, aren't they?), I still think it's a good idea to have meaningful differentiation. The most common grade in colleges before the 1960's really was a C. Many people point out that college students are way more stressed out now under grade inflation than in the old days, because they feel they have have a ton of spectacular, often unrealistic extracurricular achievements or experiences in order to be competitive for the job market or grad school or professional school, since GPAs aren't meaningful anymore.

Giving everyone Cs…won’t change this. Students will still want competitive jobs or go to great grad schools. Law schools effectively require top grades. Same with med schools. For graduate admissions, this will make the situation worse because it encourages over reliance on recommendation letters (on the back end, this is just accepting your peer’s (friend) advisee). Shutting down grade inflation won’t change that students want to make money.

I recognize that it won't eliminate competition. Competition is not going away, it's just a given. However, I think that competition would be a lot less stressful if it shifted back more towards learning in the classroom, instead of beyond the classroom. It might be more fair too, because let's face it, factors outside the classroom are a lot more manipulable by nepotism, wealth, etc.

My views on grade inflation are based on my own experience going to a very difficult college. Exams were notoriously difficult, essays were torn apart, and A's were really special because they were rare. At the time, we complained bitterly, but I honestly believe this experience made me a better thinker and a harder worker in a way that going to a grade-inflated college never could. My fellow alumni feel the same way. I do not believe that fighting grade inflation is anti-student, which is the way many of you here seem to feel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

That's not what they are saying. They are saying that there is such a disparity of needs in the class (due to TO and woke stuff) that they cannot effectively teach. That's fair.

“I can’t teach effectively because there are black kids in my class.” That’s what you’re saying. It’s racist and boring.

These schools classes are test required and they still have issues. What’s the next boogeyman?

They can’t effectively teach because they’ve diluted their own standards and refuse to improve their teaching. They mostly have no solutions to the AI problem, and they have not self reflected that THEY give out grades. If an A means nothing at Harvard, I’m blaming faculty, not students. Students don’t make grades, they earn them. Faculty at Harvard should be embarrassed by themselves, and their obsession with calling the younger generation incompetent all while they are full professors with 1/10 of the work needed today to become a full professor is hilarious.

Professors were at a disadvantage previously because they felt "compelled" to give better grades in fear that their evaluations would be compromised. So instead of obtaining the support from the institution to decrease the importance of evaluations, they are instead putting this back on the students.

If professors feel pressured to inflate grades because student evaluations affect their careers, that points to a flaw in how institutions evaluate professors, not necessarily a justification for rigid grade caps. A forced limit on A grades might reduce the incentive to inflate grades, but it can also prevent high-performing students from receiving grades that accurately reflect their work. The better solution is to address the underlying incentive structure and evaluation methods, rather than imposing uniform grading limits across different classes, disciplines, and student populations.

100% agreed and the reason this annoys me particularly is that Harvard faculty have the opportunity to push for shared governance, but that would outline them having a responsibility beyond spurning students. This decision is shockingly inept.

If I was a Harvard professor, it's easier to vote for this than have to deal with the extra work/headache to actually address the underlying issues.

Curious what you mean by "the underlying issues?"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

Unless you have a kid at Harvard, I don't see how this is a problem. There will always be plenty of schools that still assign A's to the majority of students, as grade inflation has been a trend not just at Harvard, but at all colleges. I don't think this is going to be a policy everywhere, as many students will obviously choose to go to schools where A's are easier to come by.

Whether you assign letter grades on the transcript, or write down qualitative words like "excellent," "fair," "average" (that's what the letter grades are supposed to mean, aren't they?), I still think it's a good idea to have meaningful differentiation. The most common grade in colleges before the 1960's really was a C. Many people point out that college students are way more stressed out now under grade inflation than in the old days, because they feel they have have a ton of spectacular, often unrealistic extracurricular achievements or experiences in order to be competitive for the job market or grad school or professional school, since GPAs aren't meaningful anymore.

Giving everyone Cs…won’t change this. Students will still want competitive jobs or go to great grad schools. Law schools effectively require top grades. Same with med schools. For graduate admissions, this will make the situation worse because it encourages over reliance on recommendation letters (on the back end, this is just accepting your peer’s (friend) advisee). Shutting down grade inflation won’t change that students want to make money.

I recognize that it won't eliminate competition. Competition is not going away, it's just a given. However, I think that competition would be a lot less stressful if it shifted back more towards learning in the classroom, instead of beyond the classroom. It might be more fair too, because let's face it, factors outside the classroom are a lot more manipulable by nepotism, wealth, etc.

My views on grade inflation are based on my own experience going to a very difficult college. Exams were notoriously difficult, essays were torn apart, and A's were really special because they were rare. At the time, we complained bitterly, but I honestly believe this experience made me a better thinker and a harder worker in a way that going to a grade-inflated college never could. My fellow alumni feel the same way. I do not believe that fighting grade inflation is anti-student, which is the way many of you here seem to feel.

I graduated from Harvey mudd. I understand want you mean, but it’s lacking the truth that this would decimate people outside of an engineering degree. The issue is that students feel they need to work in consulting/IB in the first place, and I don’t blame them when my friends in public health, public service, health research and adjacent fields are losing their previously stable jobs and flooding the market.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

Unless you have a kid at Harvard, I don't see how this is a problem. There will always be plenty of schools that still assign A's to the majority of students, as grade inflation has been a trend not just at Harvard, but at all colleges. I don't think this is going to be a policy everywhere, as many students will obviously choose to go to schools where A's are easier to come by.

Whether you assign letter grades on the transcript, or write down qualitative words like "excellent," "fair," "average" (that's what the letter grades are supposed to mean, aren't they?), I still think it's a good idea to have meaningful differentiation. The most common grade in colleges before the 1960's really was a C. Many people point out that college students are way more stressed out now under grade inflation than in the old days, because they feel they have have a ton of spectacular, often unrealistic extracurricular achievements or experiences in order to be competitive for the job market or grad school or professional school, since GPAs aren't meaningful anymore.

Giving everyone Cs…won’t change this. Students will still want competitive jobs or go to great grad schools. Law schools effectively require top grades. Same with med schools. For graduate admissions, this will make the situation worse because it encourages over reliance on recommendation letters (on the back end, this is just accepting your peer’s (friend) advisee). Shutting down grade inflation won’t change that students want to make money.

I recognize that it won't eliminate competition. Competition is not going away, it's just a given. However, I think that competition would be a lot less stressful if it shifted back more towards learning in the classroom, instead of beyond the classroom. It might be more fair too, because let's face it, factors outside the classroom are a lot more manipulable by nepotism, wealth, etc.

My views on grade inflation are based on my own experience going to a very difficult college. Exams were notoriously difficult, essays were torn apart, and A's were really special because they were rare. At the time, we complained bitterly, but I honestly believe this experience made me a better thinker and a harder worker in a way that going to a grade-inflated college never could. My fellow alumni feel the same way. I do not believe that fighting grade inflation is anti-student, which is the way many of you here seem to feel.

What incentive do I have for this? I am looking for a PhD student. It’s great and all if they’re a top student, but I’m looking for someone who can push the field forward and is an incredible researcher who will go on to conduct quality research. Most of our applicant field has top scores, and if they didn’t, they’d have close enough grades that it wouldn’t matter. Why do I care if they took a slightly more rigorous X or Y course, when they will be taking the most rigorous version of that course through their grad program. We aren’t looking for students that can only handle school- they need to be able to juggle classes, research, TAing and whatever other demands come up. I’m sorry but I’m still taking the 3.7 with 4 research projects and 2 publications over the most competent student who has no indication they can make it through the program or have any interest in research.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t wait for this era to end. A bunch of professors jacking themselves off about how intellectual they are and how they cannot possibly handle this generation. If you’re a tenured professor (as most of these professors are in op-Ed’s and making big decisions) talk to your chair and enact the standards you want to see. The chair should be able to work with admin so you can make your classes as demonically difficult as you desire.

On the other hand, if the goal is actual education, we should look towards more feedback and less reliance on grades. We’ve spent decades trying to quantify what an A or B or C is, and it has done almost nothing for us. Nonetheless, the qualitative nature of A as “Excellent” has stuck around, so people have some conception of why these qualitative descriptions are useful. Instead of spelling out every way to get an A in your course with insanely detailed rubrics, eschew from that model of cattle-like education. Actually connect with your students and the evaluations and scores will come naturally.

Unless you have a kid at Harvard, I don't see how this is a problem. There will always be plenty of schools that still assign A's to the majority of students, as grade inflation has been a trend not just at Harvard, but at all colleges. I don't think this is going to be a policy everywhere, as many students will obviously choose to go to schools where A's are easier to come by.

Whether you assign letter grades on the transcript, or write down qualitative words like "excellent," "fair," "average" (that's what the letter grades are supposed to mean, aren't they?), I still think it's a good idea to have meaningful differentiation. The most common grade in colleges before the 1960's really was a C. Many people point out that college students are way more stressed out now under grade inflation than in the old days, because they feel they have have a ton of spectacular, often unrealistic extracurricular achievements or experiences in order to be competitive for the job market or grad school or professional school, since GPAs aren't meaningful anymore.

Giving everyone Cs…won’t change this. Students will still want competitive jobs or go to great grad schools. Law schools effectively require top grades. Same with med schools. For graduate admissions, this will make the situation worse because it encourages over reliance on recommendation letters (on the back end, this is just accepting your peer’s (friend) advisee). Shutting down grade inflation won’t change that students want to make money.

I recognize that it won't eliminate competition. Competition is not going away, it's just a given. However, I think that competition would be a lot less stressful if it shifted back more towards learning in the classroom, instead of beyond the classroom. It might be more fair too, because let's face it, factors outside the classroom are a lot more manipulable by nepotism, wealth, etc.

My views on grade inflation are based on my own experience going to a very difficult college. Exams were notoriously difficult, essays were torn apart, and A's were really special because they were rare. At the time, we complained bitterly, but I honestly believe this experience made me a better thinker and a harder worker in a way that going to a grade-inflated college never could. My fellow alumni feel the same way. I do not believe that fighting grade inflation is anti-student, which is the way many of you here seem to feel.

What incentive do I have for this? I am looking for a PhD student. It’s great and all if they’re a top student, but I’m looking for someone who can push the field forward and is an incredible researcher who will go on to conduct quality research. Most of our applicant field has top scores, and if they didn’t, they’d have close enough grades that it wouldn’t matter. Why do I care if they took a slightly more rigorous X or Y course, when they will be taking the most rigorous version of that course through their grad program. We aren’t looking for students that can only handle school- they need to be able to juggle classes, research, TAing and whatever other demands come up. I’m sorry but I’m still taking the 3.7 with 4 research projects and 2 publications over the most competent student who has no indication they can make it through the program or have any interest in research.

You expect student applicants who are not even out of an undergrad program yet to have already demonstrated they are incredible researchers who can push the field forward? Talk about stressful expectations, and this seems to go along with the push for early, intense specialization that plagues society today. You only have 4 years in undergrad and a lot of that time should be spent sampling new topics, exploring, and figuring out what you are really passionate about. But it seems you want them to have already done a lot of focused research and published before actually entering a Ph.D. program? Of course, I think it helps a prospective grad student has some research experience and has a research mentor who can speak to their thinking style and work ethic, as I was lucky to have. But some of the best and most successful researchers I know entered into Ph.D. programs with very little research experience and zero publications, but they had a fierce intellect and curiosity that was obvious to their faculty mentors who encouraged them to go to grad school. Some of the most successful scientists I know didn't even pin down what field they were interested in until senior year, which wouldn't leave time for the 4 research projects and multiple publications as an undergrad.