A fair grade

In an academic system where a degree, and not actual learning, is the main goal, grades take on a disproportionate importance. It may seem that a small decimal digit separates the very best from those who are not in the top league. Employers may use an arbitrary cutoff of the final grade point average to determine who is worthy of their company; graduate schools may do something quite similar with a more humane name. As the competition in the world grows, more and more students worry about grades in an unhealthy way. Many of my students suffer from this affliction too - worrying about a point on a homework or an exam. As much as I tell them about the real purpose of a college or a university, my sermons are unlikely to make a dent in their worldview shaped by outside forces that reduce entire education to a number on a four-point scale.

The issue of fair grades, or grade inflation, is one that is being discussed at institutions around the world - including in Pakistan. Just as I have heard from students here in the US, I heard from students in Pakistan that they choose certain classes (and even certain majors) because other classes that they may be really interested in are known to give too few As, and hence their overall GPA is impacted negatively. A well-paying job is worth more than passion for a discipline. Therefore, we must ask what should a grade measure? When we, instructors, assign grades what are we actually doing? What is a fair grade?

Several models for grading are out there. One of the more popular ones, based on fixed number of grades in a certain category, assumes that in any given class only a certain percentage can be As, Bs and so on. But this means that the final grade is not a measure of some actual mastery of the subject, but a competition between students. In a class, where there are many exceptional students, a given student will not get an A, even if he or she has risen to a certain level and did incredible work, because some other people are better than him or her. In a class of 10 students, for example, a criterion of 20% As would mean only two students get an A, even if it has four absolutely outstanding students.

There are other models that assume that the scaled cumulative score over the semester should be over a certain threshold (such as 90%) or above to get an A. Critics argue that this leads to students arguing over every half point in each assignment because the tiniest of adjustments can put them over, or away from, the promised threshold.

Then there is the question of what grades should measure. Should it be some absolute command of the subject, or greatest amount of knowledge gained in a given semester? Imagine someone who had a handicap or a difficulty but demonstrated extraordinary learning over the course of the semester yet fell short of the threshold due to their disability. Do they deserve some kind of a 'bump' - and if so, how much? How should we account for unique circumstances? What is fair here?

Universities have grappled with these issues for long and continue to do so. And I am not sure anyone has completely figured it out. None of the models are truly fair and many of us do not want any student to be treated unfairly. I have concerns about the models, but I have a bigger concern, and that is the reduction of class learning into a single number. I want my students to be engaged and challenged. I want to create a classroom that enables them to learn, take chances and grow intellectually. But I have realised that even when the students actually want to learn, our systems of employment and opportunities for advanced education force them to prioritise the score on the transcript over the life of the mind. The students may be fixated on grades and that is a problem, but they are also responding to market forces that reward this disastrous fixation. The students, in many cases, are not the problem.