Fight Against Grade Inflation Has Little Support

Although administrators have said that Harvard should be a leader in the fight against grade inflation, the Committee on Undergraduate Education has yet to take definite steps against the trend of rising grades.

Harvard's inaction comes in the wake of recent decisions at Stanford University and Dartmouth College to address the issue.

"Stanford has acted and Dartmouth has acted," Kenan Professor of Government Harvey C. Mansfield Jr. '53 said yesterday. "It's time for us to get off our duffs."

The average Harvard grade now floats between a B+ and an A-.

At tomorrow's CUE meeting, grade inflation is once again on the table, but it is unclear whether the discussion will lead to a vote.

At last month's meeting, CUE members discussed a proposal to place the mean grade as well as class size next to the student's grade for each class. The plan drew little support.

The proposal was discussed last year in the Faculty Council, the CUE committee and the faculty Educational Policy Committee. At November's meeting, the committee was supposed to "decide whether to resubmit the proposal for further discussion" to the Faculty Council.

But since the committee did not reach a decision, Dean for Undergraduate Education Lawrence Buell asked members to submit any ideas for combating grade inflation to him or Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education Jeffrey Wolcowitz.

Last week, Buell sent committee members suggestions he received from Associate Professor of Applied Mechanics Howard A. Stone and Baird Professor of Science Gary J. Feldman. Neither professor's proposal includes transcript reform.

Stone's letter suggests "thinking some more" about the problem. He would like to look at each discipline and see what the average grade is. Then, a conference could be held among disciplines which could introduce a discussion and come to a middle ground, according to the letter.

Feldman outlines three problems in his letter: grade inflation, grade compression and grade inequalities.

"Grade inflation is probably the least of the problems," the letter reads. "What used to be a B+ is now an A-, and everyone understands that. It is just a relabeling."

Since the B+ has moved up to an A-, other grades have also moved up and are thus "compressed," Feldman explains. In other words, there is a smaller range of grades to give.

"Grade compression is a problem because it means that truly exceptional performance cannot be identified and encouraged," the letter says. And "grade inequalities between concentrations and between courses within concentrations are clearly bad because they encourage students to take irrelevant factors into consideration" when choosing classes.

In his letter, Feldman also urges "opening up the full 15-point scale" with the creation of an "A/B" grade, the equivalent of a 13. Each department could then announce its target goal for average grades in different types of courses.

For instance, the Physics department could set a 10.5 target for introductory courses and an 11.5 target for upper-level courses and try to stick to those goals, according to the letter.

Although his letter does not specifically suggest transcript reform, Feldman said he would not mind seeing a new transcript which lists the average grades in "different categories," such as introductory or upper-level courses in a certain concentration. But he has opposed efforts to list average grades for individual courses.

Action

Whatever the proposed solution, many students and faculty think it is time to do something.

"I think people are waiting with high expectations for the committee to act," Mansfield said.

He said that grade inflation is detrimental to good students, poor students and faculty members.

"It's bad for the best students who are judged in the same category as not-so-good students, and it's bad for the not-so-good students because they get a transcript that people increasingly dismiss," Mansfield said.

"It's also doing damage in the Faculty, where it reflects a loss of morale," Mansfield said. "If you are impressed with something, it's usually because it's difficult, but if everybody's getting A's, how difficult can it be? The faculty needs to pull itself together and recover its ability to discriminate."

Bradford E. Miller '97, a student member of the CUE, said communication is his top priority.

"I'd like first and foremost to see a discussion about this at a Faculty meeting," Miller said. "If we don't get all the Faculty's input on this, the proposal will go nowhere."

He cautioned, however, that the students he has talked to do not want to see their transcripts changed.

"Grade competition is a serious problem but can be dealt with now," Miller said. "It just shouldn't be allowed to get worse. Any kind of transcript reform proposed by the registrar would increase competition."

Another student member of the committee, Justin C. Label '97, said that he was torn.

"Personally, it seems to me that strong action should be taken against grade inflation," Label said. "It isn't good for the college. But I know a lot of students don't feel the same way."

Professor of Government Peter A. Hall, member of the Educational Policy Committee's subcommittee on transcript reform, said he would like grade inflation to slow down but is not sure how best to achieve that.

"I think we might take a step in the right direction by making some changes to the transcript, mainly by reporting the median grade on the transcript as well as the student's grade in that class," Hall said.

Transcript changes or not, Hall joined many others in his call for discussion and persuasion.

"In any case, I think there's a need for moral suasion from department chairs and deans and from those concerned about the collective good," Hall said. "In the post this has not been very effective, I think because most faculty members want to be fair to their students, quite rightly, and they define fairness as grading on roughly the same scale everyone else does.

"Grade compression is a problem because it means that truly exceptional performance cannot be identified and encouraged," the letter says. And "grade inequalities between concentrations and between courses within concentrations are clearly bad because they encourage students to take irrelevant factors into consideration" when choosing classes.

In his letter, Feldman also urges "opening up the full 15-point scale" with the creation of an "A/B" grade, the equivalent of a 13. Each department could then announce its target goal for average grades in different types of courses.

For instance, the Physics department could set a 10.5 target for introductory courses and an 11.5 target for upper-level courses and try to stick to those goals, according to the letter.

Although his letter does not specifically suggest transcript reform, Feldman said he would not mind seeing a new transcript which lists the average grades in "different categories," such as introductory or upper-level courses in a certain concentration. But he has opposed efforts to list average grades for individual courses.

Action

Whatever the proposed solution, many students and faculty think it is time to do something.

"I think people are waiting with high expectations for the committee to act," Mansfield said.

He said that grade inflation is detrimental to good students, poor students and faculty members.

"It's bad for the best students who are judged in the same category as not-so-good students, and it's bad for the not-so-good students because they get a transcript that people increasingly dismiss," Mansfield said.

"It's also doing damage in the Faculty, where it reflects a loss of morale," Mansfield said. "If you are impressed with something, it's usually because it's difficult, but if everybody's getting A's, how difficult can it be? The faculty needs to pull itself together and recover its ability to discriminate."

Bradford E. Miller '97, a student member of the CUE, said communication is his top priority.

"I'd like first and foremost to see a discussion about this at a Faculty meeting," Miller said. "If we don't get all the Faculty's input on this, the proposal will go nowhere."

He cautioned, however, that the students he has talked to do not want to see their transcripts changed.

"Grade competition is a serious problem but can be dealt with now," Miller said. "It just shouldn't be allowed to get worse. Any kind of transcript reform proposed by the registrar would increase competition."

Another student member of the committee, Justin C. Label '97, said that he was torn.

"Personally, it seems to me that strong action should be taken against grade inflation," Label said. "It isn't good for the college. But I know a lot of students don't feel the same way."

Professor of Government Peter A. Hall, member of the Educational Policy Committee's subcommittee on transcript reform, said he would like grade inflation to slow down but is not sure how best to achieve that.

"I think we might take a step in the right direction by making some changes to the transcript, mainly by reporting the median grade on the transcript as well as the student's grade in that class," Hall said.

Transcript changes or not, Hall joined many others in his call for discussion and persuasion.

"In any case, I think there's a need for moral suasion from department chairs and deans and from those concerned about the collective good," Hall said. "In the post this has not been very effective, I think because most faculty members want to be fair to their students, quite rightly, and they define fairness as grading on roughly the same scale everyone else does.