The Grouping of Grades

Nobody likes to be pigeonholed, especially when that pigeonhole is supposed to reflect one's academic abilities. Unfortunately, hierarchical categorization is one of the concomitants of any grading system, and one must accept it, to some, degree, if one accepts the overall benefits of having a grading system at all.

But unlike the more conventional 4.0-point system employed at most colleges, Harvard's 15-point system creates an additional, unnecessary focus one one's place in the grading hierarchy. Harvard's current grading system makes use of a point system. This scheme divides students into six categories, or "groups," by artificially enlarging the gap between different lettered, consecutive grades. At Harvard, students have the opportunity not only to worry about their grades, but their group as well.

Maybe this additional classification of students can be justified on other grounds. If it can, I'm waiting to hear of them. Psychologically, the system creates an unnecessary anxiety among students and logically, it fails to make sense.

Under this grading system, there are two points of difference between two lettered grades in sequential order. An A- counts for 14 points, while a B+ counts for only 12. On the other hand, similarly lettered grades in sequential order have a standard difference of one point; a B carries 11 points, a B- 10. The difference thus inflates the group rankings of those students who just made the cutoff point of some "minus grade" (A-,B-,C-, etc.).

If judges were asked to evaluate, on a scale of one to 15, the performance of musician, mathematician or a mile runner, they would not be told to omit the numbers 1, 5, 9 and 13. Not only would such an omission be odd, but it would divide what should be a natural continuum of performance into artificial categories.

The current grading system expects professors to evaluate students under this very system. If Harvard is to employ such an illogical policy, it should at least ensure that it is used consistently. But a significant number of professors in the sciences, social sciences and humanities told me that they were unaware of Harvard's unusual ranking system.

Some professors determine their grades by using the a bell-curve distribution. Professors of the Practice of Geology John A. Wood said he bases his grades on numbers, "and then I place those into...equally spaced distribution bins."

Thus, professors' different conceptions and applications of the current grading system make it even more likely that one's grades will depend on one's professor.

Besides skewing group rankings, this policy also makes many more students more grade-conscious. Those students who are concerned about their group ranking (for graduate schools, the job market, or even self-esteem) have a strong incentive to make the minus cut-off point. For such students, the difference between, say, a B- and a C+ becomes much more important than it would be under the more logical 4.0 system used at most colleges and universities.

Making students more grade-conscious has several unfortunate effects: It make them that much more competitive, and it diverts attention from the process of acquiring knowledge for its own sake, and it discourages them from taking more than four classes.

Each of these consequences adulterates the quest for truth and knowledge that the university is supposed to promote. Because it is easier to do well in fewer courses and in courses form one's concentration, the current system encourages the grade-conscious to take courses in familiar disciplines. Considering how much students are paying for their education, and considering the intellectual breadth with which many students would like to design their education, all reasonable measures should be taken to ensure that students have more course options during their college education.

To mitigate student competitiveness, to improve the consistency of grade values and to make the grading system altogether more logical, Harvard should scrap the 15-point system and supplant it with the conventional 4.0 system.