Despite administration's efforts, grades continue to climb

As a rookie faculty member 30 years ago, economics professor Uwe Reinhardt thought he was a generous grader. He awarded 10 percent of the students in his accounting class A's, 20 percent B's, 40 percent C's and 30 percent D's and F's. In comparison, the Canadian university from which he graduated awarded only five percent of students A's, and a B was a terrific mark.

But the following year, Reinhardt discovered that his colleague in the economics department Burt Malkiel had given 25 percent of his class A's. Suddenly, the magnanimous Reinhardt felt like the Scrooge of Princeton grading.

"I went back to the Registrar and re-graded all of the [grades]," he said. He had been unfamiliar with the normal grading distribution at Princeton. "All I was told was there's the bathroom, and we have an Honor Code," he joked.

Four years ago, the University decided it, too, should be more familiar with grading patterns at Princeton. The Faculty Committee on Examinations and Standing initiated annual reports on grades to make professors and students more aware of grading practices across the University.

The last yearly report — dated this Sept. 28 — clearly shows inflation of grades in the past 20 years. While the mean GPA for coursework was a 3.05 in 1973, last year it was a 3.36. The GPA for junior independent work likewise jumped from 3.38 to 3.57, and for senior theses from 3.25 to 3.56.

These numbers have startled both administrators and faculty members.

"There [is] concern that if we let grade inflation go at the rate [it was going], people may [eventually] be getting all A's," explained Dean of the College Nancy Malkiel, who chairs the committee.

The overall distribution of grades in undergraduate courses, for example, shows 45.9 percent of grades were in the A range in the 2000-01 year, 38.5 percent B, only 6.7 percent C and a miniscule 1.5 percent in the D/F range. In contrast, the same distribution for the five-year period of 1973 to 1977 shows 30.1 percent A's, 39.2 percent B's, 14.6 percent C's and 4.3 percent D's or F's.

Since the first report four years ago, the University has embarked on an anti-grade inflation campaign. Through reports and publications on grading practices at Princeton, it seeks to increase professors' awareness of grading patterns and to encourage them to make full use of the broad spectrum of grades available at their discretion — from the coveted A-plus all the way down to the dreaded F.

The administration views the dissemination of this information as a viable way to reduce inter-departmental grading disparities and to lessen the tendency to award many more A's and B's than lower grades.

Departments now receive information on grading distributions across courses and independent work. They also receive a Guide to Good Grading Practices, which outlines sample grading guidelines that explain what students must do to earn each grade.

Get the best of the ‘Prince’ delivered straight to your inbox. Subscribe now »

"Internally [within the University], grades are most important for students. They give students the information they need to improve further in the future," Malkiel said. "We're getting students to understand which areas they might want to put more effort into.

"Students need and deserve written comments that spell out the strengths and weaknesses of the work they have done and specify what might be done to improve it," Malkiel explains in the guide.

Malkiel also cited grading as "an integral part of the pedagogical process that deserves close attention," and encourages professors and teaching assistants to seek additional assistance through the University's McGraw Center for Teaching and Learning.

"We're not telling [professors] how to grade," Malkiel asserted, adding that the administration has not imposed strict grade quotas, such as specifying an exact number of each grade a professor may award in each course. "We're saying 'here are the facts, here are some concerns a group of faculty colleagues and administrators have about grading' and we're sending historical data to them."

Two years ago, the University took another definitive step in its campaign to stop grade inflation by altering the way an A-plus figures into students' GPAs. The top grade is now treated the same as an A.

In so doing, the University sought both to restrict the number of A-plus's awarded, and to equal the playing field in the competition for Univer-sity academic prizes, national fellowship endorsements and institutional medical school recommendation letters — all of which are partially based on GPA. Before the new system, the 4.33 A-plus calculation favored students in the sciences and engineering, whose departments were known to award more A-plus marks than are given in the humanities and social sciences.

"We're hoping that, by the new approach on the A-plus, we can make it easier to consider fully the credentials of students in the full range of departments," Malkiel explained.

Yet, even with these changes in A-plus distribution, some honors, such as those awarded during opening exercises, are still awarded disproportionately to science and engineering concentrators.

Recently, the administration also added a veritable lock box to further protect the coveted A-plus reserve. Before awarding the top grade, faculty members must now provide a letter stating "what about the student's work is really distinguished and unusual," Malkiel said.

To date, the combination of both policies seems to have demonstrated its desired effects. Faculty members have additional qualitative information on students, and the A-plus is becoming a rarer sight on Princeton transcripts.

According to the Sept. 28 report, grade inflation is evidenced in all major areas of study at the University: the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and engineering.

In the past three decades, all these areas have witnessed large jumps in the percentage of A's awarded in 100-400 level courses. Such grade increases are particularly striking in the humanities, social sciences and engineering fields, which each dispensed over 15 percent more A's last year than in the 1973-1977 period. In the humanities and engineering, A's now account for half of all grades.

Natural sciences departments have also experienced a rise in the distribution of A's, but at a lower rate. The departments now distribute seven percent more A's than they did in the 1970s.

In light of the University's concentrated efforts to avert the upward spiraling of grades, it is unclear whether its initiatives have had a significant impact in broadening the range of grade distribution.

The grading report says that, from last year, mean grades in undergraduate courses "appear to be creeping up ever so slightly." However, the report contends that there has been a "modest downward trend" in independent work, and lower mean grades in some individual departments.

Malkiel cautioned, though, that a thorough evaluation of the program and its effects should be postponed until this spring, when five-year aggregate data beginning with the fall of 1997 will be available.

"Year-by-year data numbers jump around because of things that are non-recurring," she explained, specifying that grading data is upset, for example, when a professor of a course with a large enrollment goes on leave and the course is not taught that year.

The University is anxiously awaiting this data. "We are hopeful that, at the very least, grade inflation will have slowed down," Malkiel said.

Meanwhile, in his three decades at the University, professor Reinhardt has learned a great deal about its grading policies and practices. The veteran economist follows a well-defined curve in distributing his grades. And he hasn't been back to the Registrar's office to submit re-grades since his first accounting class.

"I'm well in favor [of the University's initiative]," he said. "I think it's late and still fairly timid. I would like Nassau Hall to do much more than is there."

This article is the first installment in a two-part series about grade inflation at Princeton. Next week's article will include student and teacher reactions to the University's anti-grade inflation campaign.