Economix Blog: A’s Have Been Harvard’s Most Common Grade for 20 Years

In the final handful of days, reviews that Harvard’s most common grade is an “A” have  now gone viral. But regardless of the shocked-shocked! tone of some of the coverage, this is truly quite previous news.

The last time A-selection (that is, the combination of A and A-) grades or their equivalent had been not the most common grades awarded at Harvard was 20 many years in the past. That’s according to Stuart Rojstaczer, who tracks and aggregates grading information at colleges, such as some information going back to prewar occasions. (You could recall he previously answered your concerns on grade inflation here).

He utilised the phrase “equivalent” since Harvard converted from a 15-stage grading method to a traditional A-F program in the 2000s. Harvard defined its “15″ as an A and its “14″ as an A-, Dr. Rojstaczer explained in an email.

Dr. Rojstaczer wrote that as of the 1989-90 academic yr, A- was the grade most frequently awarded to undergraduates at Harvard. By 2000-01, A- was extremely near to currently being replaced by A (inside of 1.3 percent) as the modal grade (that is, the grade that appears with the most frequency). The A-selection blend of A/A- grew to become the modal grade (in comparison to B+/B/B-) in the 1994-95 academic 12 months.

Clutching your pearls but? Bear in thoughts that nationally, the A/A- combination has been the most typical grade awarded nationwide at colleges since 1997.

“So Harvard was only about three many years ahead of its time,” Dr. Rojstaczer wrote.

Dr. Rojstaczer stated the Harvard information “come from the dean’s office by way of request to Larry Summers,” the university’s president until 2006. “Since Larry Summers resigned, Harvard has refused all requests for data.”

For some other coverage of grades and grade inflation, see this publish on how personal schools have inflated marks the most this item on how Republican- versus Democratic-leaning professors grade their students an post about how law college grading curves have been currently being deliberately softened so graduates would be much more aggressive on the challenging work market and this post puzzling by means of why university has gotten significantly less rigorous, but the college degree earnings premium has risen all the same.

Economix Blog: A’s Have Been Harvard’s Most Common Grade for 20 Years