Student Expectations Seen as Causing Grade Disputes (New York Times)

<p>If all colleges and schools have inflated grades. The ones that will pay the price are those with old-school teachers who deflate grades.</p>

<p>Tokenadult, your report about Harvard does not correspond to reports of grade inflation there:</p>

<p>All Things Considered, November 21, 2001 · Student's grades at Harvard University have soared in the last 10 years. According to a report issued Tuesday by the dean of undergraduate education, nearly half of the grades issued last year were A's or A-minuses. In 1985, just a third of the grades were A or A-minus. Linda Wertheimer talks with Susan Pedersen, Dean of Undergraduate Education and a Professor of History at Harvard University, about grade inflation. (from Harvard</a> Grade Inflation : NPR)
and:
Patrick Healy provoked a national debate about grading when he revealed in a series of Boston Globe articles that 91 percent of Harvard seniors graduated with honors in June 2001. (from AAUP:</a> Grade Inflation Scrutinized at Harvard and Elsewhere)</p>

<p>According to Denise Pope, author of "Doing School", some college students have parents who will phone to complain about grades and she's heard of a parent who tried to negotiate child's starting job salary.</p>

<p>a link from today's NYT's Op Ed page with response to the original post.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/23/opinion/l23grades.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/23/opinion/l23grades.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>What I quoted from a news report (by some professional journalist) about Harvard is that hardly anyone there has ever graduated with a straight-A grade average. I'm not hearing that having a few grades of B here or there has done much to hurt the prospects of Harvard graduates, all the same.</p>

<p>In my son's school, which is a low-ranked state school, there is actual pressure from the administration on the faculty to give good grades. The 4-year graduation rate is abysmal (25%) and the admin is frantically trying to improve that number. Consequently, professors definitely structure many classes so that if you do attend, participate, turn in all work on time, and get a passing grade on tests, you will get an A or B. Of course, my son was delighted to find this out.</p>

<p>But, is he learning anything? It all depends. In some classes, definitely yes. But he took a differential equations class recently. The professor was ill most of the semester; the class had a different substitute every single class!! Most students dropped out in frustration. My son patiently hung in there, did all the homework, and passed all the tests and quizzes. He was a rarity. The professor rewarded him with an A. But my mathematician husband, after talking to my son several times about the subject, said that the poor kid learned next to nothing about diff. equations. This summer, he and my son are going to review the whole subject again!!</p>

<p>Mrs. Weasley, 2001 is an eon ago in the life of a college.</p>

<p>mathmom, you are right, but I was responding to a post about the history of Harvard grades since 1982. </p>

<p>And the Denise Pope information was from a presentation she gave this year.</p>

<p>I used the "search this thread" tool to see how we got talking about Harvard in the first place. In the context of this thread, I find it quite incredible to claim that grades at Harvard are significantly MORE inflated than grades at several other colleges around the country. Yes, students at Harvard these days graduate with undergraduate G.P.A.s that generally would have seemed remarkably high when my grandfather and grandmother graduated from college. But </p>

<p>a) students at grandpa's alma mater and grandma's alma mater are also much more likely to graduate with high undergraduate G.P.A.s these days than when they graduated, </p>

<p>and </p>

<p>b) students entering Harvard are much more likely to have high G.P.A.s coming out of high school, in harder courses, then they did back in my grandparents' day. </p>

<p>The grading scale has slid upward for a lot of students, but in general college students have to work a good bit harder for a given G.P.A. than high school students do, and Harvard students are still substantially better prepared coming in the door for tough college work than students at many other colleges. </p>

<p>But to agree with the main point of the article linked in the original post, yeah, college students have unrealistically soft expectations about how hard they ought to work to get a given grade. I just don't think Harvard students are especially notorious in that regard, until someone shows me a lot more comparative evidence.</p>

<p>here in singapore, we dont have an issue with that i think.
In our HS we do not get awarded for daily work,so we know that not doing homework and not putting in effort can still get results. </p>

<p>That was my issue though, not putting in effort and getting results...</p>

<p>
[quote]
I've had several professor at Maryland echo the "Do the job assigned and get a C. A's and B's require more" mentality.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>If any future professor of mine said that, I'd walk right out of the room, walk straight to the Registrar's office or the nearest computer, and drop the class. And register for another class with a more lenient professor. As much as university is supposed to be about learning, I have a GPA to manage and law school admissions to worry about.</p>

<p>Besides that, I check out professors pretty thoroughly before registration anyways. I've only had one ridiculous professor out of 12 or 15.</p>

<p>True story. Prof stands in front of a class of about 20 and says, I realize I assigned a great deal of reading for over the weekend. It will not happen again. Now, how many were able to complete it all? About 6 raise their hands. He says, "Okay the rest of you can leave, I don't speak to unprepared students." They left. I wonder how that would go over in these days of entitlement?</p>

<p>I think part of the problem is the demonization of Cs. "OMG, I got a C! I will diiiiie!" A C means "average" (or should!) There are a lot worse things in the world than being average at something.</p>

<p>I find it bizarre that anyone would think they should be rewarded for their effort rather than their results. They're going to get a shock when they get out of college and get a job!</p>

<p>"I find it bizarre that anyone would think they should be rewarded for their effort rather than their results. They're going to get a shock when they get out of college and get a job! "</p>

<p>if only you could be in my shoes for one day...I must hear that 3-4 times a day now....never used to hear it before but it is fairly routine now! i must be old school, but effort is not the same as results in my eyes.</p>

<p>
[quote]
They're going to get a shock when they get out of college and get a job!

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I'll cross this bridge when I get there. But I first have to get into law school, go to law school, finish law school, and GET A JOB before I can cross that bridge.</p>

<p>Given your goal, I think your approach is completely rational.</p>