<p>I read a book called "More Sex is Safer Sex" which discusses issues looking at them from an economical standpoint. One of the issues discussed was that in order to prevent grade inflation, teachers should have grade budgets. For example, only five people per class can get an A each semester, then five for a B, etc. That way, students have to compete to earn grades and an A really would be Excellent or whatever it's supposed to mean and a B really would be Above Average like what it's supposed to mean. </p>
<p>Now, I want to ask you all, my fellow CCers, what are your opinions on this subject? Should schools try out these "grade budgets" or should they stick with the grade inflated systems that most already have?</p>
<p>Don’t some colleges already do that sort of thing? I know Princeton tries to keep the number of As per class to a max of 35%, I think? Something like that.</p>
<p>I think it is find as it is, the problem with grade budget is if each student got a 100 in the class, it will be all down to luck and luck should never be a factor when the grade is a reflection of how the student does in the class.</p>
<p>It can also be the opposite way, if students were forced to compete against each other for grades, and 5 people were given A’s, people would probably switch to other schools because they would know that only 5 people can get an A.</p>
<p>With this grade budget, I agree that in can raise standards but there is also a huge chance that it can not prepare students for higher level courses because the standard will be set by the “average student” instead of a set standard. If the “average student” was doing his/her best and still can not get to an A because “brighter students” already has all the A’s allowed, they will have a strong temptation to just slack off and then it will turn into a cycle and other people in the class slack off. There is a chance that grade budget would be beneficial, but there is also a chance that grade budget would be harmful because it would benefit the “bright” students only while the hard-working “average” ones have to accept the C.</p>
<p>I believe that the grading system is not used to measure how average or above average a student actually is, but I believe that it is used to indicate how the student mastered the content.</p>
<p>So if a student got an A, that means that they exceeded what they need to learn.</p>
<p>The B means that they mastered a bit more than they actually need to learn.
C means that they learned they need.
D means that they learned enough to pass the class
E they mastered less than what is required</p>
<p>Education should not be a competition between people, but rather a journey to learn skills to succeed in the real world.</p>
<p>The goal for a class is not to reward bright students any more than they would be rewarded otherwise. Why would the grade curve make it any less fair for the hard-working students than the current system?</p>
<p>Also, the teacher should be writing tests so difficult that no one can get 100 (or just a few people). The distribution should be very clear. That way, no problems with determining grades, and no “luck.” (pertains mostly to math and science)</p>
<p>Life is largely a competition. A boss has one spot. Two applicants want the job. Will he hire both? No. See, competition.</p>
<p>But, if they did it in high school, what if you go to school w/ a bunch of smart people? Even though you could easily get an A at another school, you would have a B on your record. It would make it even harder for colleges to know how good a student is, esp. w/ differences in students in a class from year to year. I know for example the juniors at my school were on average much bettet students than say the sophmores.</p>
<p>I agree grade budget has benefits. But I believe that raising the set standards would be a much more applicable solution to grade inflation. Cause the people who want to go to college will know that they are competing with other people, however they should only be worried about doing their best in their courses in high school as well as enjoying the environment that they learn in. Not thinking" Okay in order to get the A I have to make sure I do a much better job than this person so I will study till 3AM to knock that person down to a B so I can get the A". If this were applied to high school, which probably already is at some schools, then the place where students are supposed to enjoy there years before adulthood would become a very hostile place and people would become too obsessed on “knocking down the lowest of the best”. The maturity of high school students may not be able to handle this system. Cause even if there is competition in the real world, there is also respect. Would a boss hire a person who is unable to effectively communicate with other people because of the grade budget system that was used in high school , or would they hire a hard working person who wants to raise the set standards of the company because they learned how to communicate with other co-workers because they came from a school where their friends were glad to guide them to think a learn by him/herself while also working with other people because they were not afraid to drop down a grade because there is no grade budget, but instead a high standard where people have to meet .</p>
<p>One possible prevention against ultra-competitiveness is the one that my school embraces: It’s loosely graded on a curve, but there’s no quota. The median student usually gets a B+. However, if the class is exceptionally strong, that student may receive an A- instead, or there will simply be more higher grades awarded.</p>
<p>It’s an idea, but how are you to determine the specific numbers for each grade range? And how would it be fair for 5 people to get 95 or above (A’s) and the guy who gets 94 (B)? </p>
<p>Another idea would be eliminating letter grades completely and just using percentages. I’m sorry, 99%>>>>>>>>93% (even though my school awards the same GPA for each). Colleges can clearly see grade inflation and rework GPA’s on their system.</p>
<p>It’s a terrible idea. If the purpose of a letter grade is to denote the quality of a student’s work, I seen no reason why the description of the quality of an individual’s work should change because of other students’ work.</p>
<p>Now, this isn’t to say I’m against curving. If the highest grade on a test is an 83 (a C+ at my school), it stands to reason that the median ought to be recentered, since the relationships among individual grades will remain the same. Establishing a specific quota, however, is just unnecessary and dumb, because such a system assumes that the relationships among individual grades will always follow a certain pattern. Is this making sense to anyone?</p>
<p>^Yes, but the value of an A is cheapened if many people get one. If A is “excellent work” or “exceeds expectations,” then the expectations need to be reevaluated. In addition, what is the difference between one A student and another if 3/4 of the class get As? You have to consider the ranking aspect.</p>
<p>If too many people are getting A’s (and at my school this was most common in the humanities and social sciences, which ****ed me off because those are my strong points) it’s a sign that the class needs to be harder or the teacher needs to grade harder. A “grade budget” is a lazy solution that does nothing to correct the actual problem on anything more than a superficial level. </p>
<p>By contrast, for example, if a teacher decided to make his/her tests longer and more rigorous, the variance of scores among students would be likely to increase (if a majority had previously been scoring in the A range) even as the scores themselves lowered, separating the proverbial wheat from the chaff causing a natural distribution to form which could then be corrected by way of a simple curve.</p>
<p>This actually addresses the disease (non-rigorous courses) rather than the symptom (universally high grades), whereas a “grade budget” would just create a disproportionate distinction between a 96-scorer and a 97-scorer, which almost everyone would agree is grossly unfair, especially when one takes into account the effect that luck would play in such a system.</p>
<p>AP Stat changed the way I think about the world.</p>
<p>^Right, simple grade quotas are a lazy solution.</p>
<p>That being said, there still needs to be some element of competition. The solution you described would include that (the curve that rectifies the natural distribution).</p>