Nearly 80 percent of all grades given to undergraduates at Yale last academic year were A’s or A minuses, part of a sharp increase that began during the coronavirus pandemic and appears to have stuck, according to a new report. The mean grade point average was 3.7 out of 4.0, also an increase over prepandemic years. The findings have frustrated some students, alumni and professors. What does excellence mean at Yale, they wonder, if most students get the equivalent of “excellent” in almost every class? “When we act as though virtually everything that gets turned in is some kind of...