Solving the Grade-Inflation Problem

James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal ^ | March 5, 2025 | Scott Yenor

[karpov]

Educators on the right and left condemn grade inflation in K-12 and universities. Inflated grades mark the transformation of education from actual learning to credentialing.

Grade inflation at America’s universities is a national scandal. GPAs were already inflated in the 1980s. According to a 1991 study, GPAs increased from 2.38 to 2.91 between 1962 and 1985 in select departments at eight prominent schools. Only 13 percent of course grades were above a B+ in 1962, a number that doubled by 1985. In 2012, 42 percent of grades were A’s. More than 50 percent of students routinely exceeded B+ in their classes in 2020. The median grade-point average for college graduates increased from 2.7 in 1987 to over 3.25 in 2020.

In 1962, there was nearly half a grade-point gap between “high-grading” departments such as English, political science, philosophy, and art and “low graders” such as chemistry and math. A gap remained until at least 2010, when one study revealed that 71 percent of education-class grades were A’s, along with 67 percent of music grades, while only 29 percent of math grades were A’s. This gap has narrowed or disappeared today. Average math GPAs have spiked above 3.25, and engineering averages were 3.17 in 2020, according to Best Colleges. Both figures were higher than social-science GPAs. The Covid spike has taken grades even higher across the board.

Several actors have tried to solve the problem. If only one university tries to address the grade-inflation crisis, however, its students are at a competitive disadvantage. Princeton put a cap on the number of A’s that could be earned in each class. As a result, Princeton undergraduates generally had lower GPAs than undergraduates at other Ivies.

[Bon of Babble]

This is exactly why tests like the ACT and SAT are so important in the college admissions process - something lefties sought to get rid of - and colleges are slowly and quietly reinstating b/c they are an extremely valuable tool to assess a student’s actual readiness for college - level work.

Of course, lefties call any/all testing of skills/merit “racist.”

[Leaning Right]

> Princeton put a cap on the number of A’s that could be earned in each class. <

I’m a retired public high school teacher. And perhaps in the last 10 years of my career we were pressured to inflate grades. Oh, the stories I could tell you about that! Higher grades made the administrators look better. Actual student achievement was not a priority.

Nevertheless, I am bothered by what Princeton did there. An “A” means the student has mastered the material. In a good class, it’s quite possible that many students have achieved that goal. So why not many A’s?

The trick of course is defining “mastered the material”.

[Roadrunner383]

All students are now above average.

[econjack]

My university required you to take the GRE in your major field, even if you were not going to grad school. I was an econ major, so think of the US pool of econ majors as the size of a manhole cover. Of that pool, maybe a tea cup size number of students took the GRE in econ. Of that small pool, you had to score in the top 70% to graduate with a degree in your major. Otherwise, you got an "attendance" diploma. The year I took the exam, we had 23 majors and the worst score was the 90th percentile. 18 of us went on to grad school.

I think a similar program in other schools might help.

[glorgau]

An A is a participation award.

[Vision]

Solving the Fed/Powell/Yellen Caused Inflation Problem.

[poinq]

Mastering the material used to mean a C, pass or fail. Quality beyond that would be an A. That of course is not the standard now. It was the standard where I went to college in the 70s. My school took a half a grade away from every one in the Journalism school while I was there.

The trick is to define pass before the class starts. Before the first day. That gets you a C. Then A should be for those who can show either advanced thought or skill in a field. Or extra skilled effort. And you compare the advanced skill or effort with other students. Like the Oscars, you have to choose one persons effort above others.

The department of education has not been helpful. They can show no success in the 50 years or so that they have been around. Just give the money to the schools or the states.

The MAP tests are pretty good predictors of how children progress. But schools are not the reason kids progress, Teachers are valuable if they are good. But parents are invaluable at setting values. And I think friends are even more valuable. If your kid gets in with a studious set of friends they are far more likely to do well.

[nopardons]

BTTT

[gloryblaze]

... pressured to inflate grades. Oh, the stories I could tell you about that!

Please do. This stuff is important.

[Carry_Okie]

The real question re grade inflation is whether a grade is meant to indicate relative mastery of a topic or whether it is to indicate relative standing among the class.

I had a professor of linear algebra at a local JC who was an outstanding teacher (Jeff Mock, I remember you fondly). He taught seven classes and they were full. He graded every homework paper. If a student blew an exam, he offered "extra credit" assignments that allowed his students to raise their grade. His goal was that everybody EARNED an A. I promise you: upon completing those extra credit assignments one would understand the material well enough to have earned an A on that exam.

That was not grade inflation; it was student elevation, which ought to be the goal of every college and university. Thanks to Jeff Mock, and his like, I transferred successfully to Harvey Mudd College, a science and engineering school that was no joke.

To repeat: What is the goal here? It is a question about which the author seems to have offered no consideration.

[Leaning Right]

> Oh, the stories I could tell you about that! - Please do. <

Here’s just two.

Report cards are issued every nine weeks. I had principals who would grade-shame teachers. After the grades came out, the principals would make a ranked list of all the teachers, along with their percentage of failures. It would look something like this:

Mr. Smith failed 0% of his students.
Ms. Brown failed 2% of her teachers.
Ms. Jones failed 16% of her students.
Etc.

A copy of the list was put in every teacher’s mailbox. It didn’t matter if Ms. Jones had good reason to fail that many. The implication was obvious. Mr. Smith and Ms. Brown are good teachers. Ms. Jones is not.

Such a thing is very intimidating to new teachers.

Here’s another. And it’s much worse. My district decided that the lowest possible grade we could give on a test was 50%. So if a student put his name on a test then went to sleep, he got 50 points out of 100.

So it was possible for a student to do very well on the first test, then do next to nothing for the rest of the quarter - and still pass.

We teachers all hated it, and tried to resist this rule. So the district got wise. They programmed the school computers so that any score we entered less than 50 was automatically changed to 50.

I’m told that my district is far from the only one with this 50% rule.

[ByteMercenary]

“... colleges are slowly and quietly reinstating ...”

Cynical reason - if a student is reported to be an ‘A’ student but fails out in the first year, 3 - 4 years of tuition and fees will not be coming Big Education’s (BE) way. BE knows that they must drag the kids thru to graduation so they transition to alumni status where the money will continue to flow.

[Leaning Right]

Sorry. Typo in my post #12. It should read:

Mr. Smith failed 0% of his students.
Ms. Brown failed 2% of her students.
Ms. Jones failed 16% of her students.
Etc.

[gloryblaze]

That is absolutely disgraceful - worse than I thought. Are school boards aware of this? I know that in my little town, the school board members seem to get pretty chummy with the teachers.

Apparently, the boards, administration and teachers' unions are all in on the lie. (?)

[bankwalker]

that is easily fixed ... most people don’t vote in school board elections or even understand the purpose of the school board.

[Leaning Right]

> Are school boards aware of this? <

Yes. In fact, they are the ones who approve of these policies. In many ways school board members are like school principals and superintendents. Most of them want to brag about how well the district is doing (even if it’s not).

So grades are inflated, and suspensions are reduced. The latter means disruptive students are sent right back to class. Gotta keep the suspension numbers low!

> Apparently, the boards, administration and teachers’ unions are all in on the lie.<

Boards and administration, yes. But it depends on the union. Some union leaders are committed leftists. They will back these bad policies all day long.

Other union leaders are more realistic. They share the concerns we teachers have. But it’s worth noting unions have zero input into how schools are run.

I’m not aware of a single time a school administrator asked the union for advice, or for an opinion.