Grade grubbing

Despite the motto that the only `A' that matters is the one in the "Yale" on a student's diploma, grades have preoccupied generations of Yalies. In the reckoning of Yale College Dean Richard Brodhead, BR '68, GRD '72, "It's not an unimportant part of learning to have people measure how far you've gone and far you have to go. To learn the difference between the mediocre and the excellent is a very important part of [the] learning [process]."

For many students, prompted by the intrusive reality of post-graduate requirements, however, grades are a source of aggravation and anxiety. A higher GPA improves a student's probability of winning a prized spot in medical, law, or graduate school. In the end, students fear that when the battle for scarce spots is decided, they may not have the numbers to prevail.

Admissions officers at graduate or professional schools will generally tell you that college grades are key in deciding who is invited to matriculate and who is asked to apply elsewhere. M. Lynne Wotton, director of admissions at the Yale School of Medicine, explained, "Grades are very important. They are only one piece of the overall evaluation process, but grades and MCAT scores are two important pieces when determining a student's overall ability."

The Yale Law School echoed this sentiment: "Grades are important. They tell us how hard the person has worked, what the person has learned, and what skills they've acquired," Yale Law School Director of Admissions Jean Webb said.

Since candidates for medical school and other graduate schools are generally evaluated on the strength of GPA, standardized test scores, and recommendations, some professors argue that grades must represent as accurately as possible the competence of students in their field.

"Grades ultimately are one source of information on the next step a student's taking. There are some universities where every kid has an A or A- average, so ultimately that source of information becomes meaningless," biology professor Jeffrey Powell said.

Makonen Belema, GRD '97, has worked as a teaching assistant in many competitive chemistry classes--including the pre-med-mandated organic chemistry--and cautions students not to overlook the importance of class material out of concern over their final grade. "Here at Yale grades are quite high. If you are making a B, you may be below average. While GPA does matter in going to med school, that's not the only criterion; you can prove yourself in many other ways."

Graduate programs aren't the only places looking at undergraduate grades. Certain employers scrutinize transcripts for signs that applicants have specific skills and a high record of achievement. In recent years, more than a few companies recruiting on campus have specifically noted in informational and advertising literature that they are seeking candidates with "an outstanding record of academic achievement." A First Management Consulting Group advertisement in the Yale Daily News recently solicited "graduates with superior analytical abilities...and personal computer knowledge." Recruiters in financial realms traditionally seek students with specific skills, as do those in scientific fields.

"Pre-med" in the vernacular now connotes a legitimate stereotype of a student who is almost single-mindedly focused on academic achievement. After all, in 1995, the average GPA of students accepted to U.S. medical schools was 3.47 out of 4.00. Last year, Yale's own School of Medicine accepted only about 100 of its over 3,600 applicants--not even three percent.

In the midst of widespread student concern over grades, some professors have tried to maintain the responsibility of educating while mitigating the implications of grading. English professor Leslie Brisman generally does not assign grades to papers he deems in the A- to B- range in order to better focus students' attention on his comments. While he does award As for exceptional work and grades lower than B- to warn students whose written work he feels is of questionable quality, the absence of grades minimizes the pressure to inflate grades through the semester and makes those he distributes more meaningful.

"There are a few [students] who are made nervous by [my grading policy]...and especially at the upper end, [there are] students for whom it makes a life-and-death difference whether it's a B+ or A-," he said. "My feeling remains that it is a help for most students who are doing good work in a course not to be burdened by a somewhat arbitrary and not very definitive letter grade."

Former Registrar and current Dean of Administrative Affairs John Meeske, JE '74, sees grades as a means of communication between professor, student, and potential employers or graduate schools. Powell agrees, noting that grades "should signify the performance and the comprehension of a student of the material presented in the course--did they understand it, did they know how to digest it, did they learn how to use it--" to make them a meaningful criterion for graduate/professional schools and employers to review.

Educators and students alike are frequently disheartened by the heavy emphasis placed on academic achievements. Teaching assistants, especially those in competitive pre-med classes, were most vocally disillusioned by students' concern with grades. Belema said that Yale undergrads were preoccupied with grades, to the point where their education and proficiency in subjects was secondary to their desire for a high grade: "Here, people are very much into grades big-time. They argue with me that they deserve one more point on this or that. I try to de-emphasize the importance of grades, but you have to mark differentiation between people."

Pre-med Albert Chung, SY '97, agreed with Belema's general description of his peers. "I don't know any cut-throat pre-meds, but some forget that they're here to learn the subject matter. They're here to beat the curve."

But there are also students who contest assigned grades, not just out of post-college ambitions, but on the principle of fairness. In fact, last January, 11 students in an Engineering and Applied Science course signed a letter to Yale administrators and the E&AS director of undergraduate studies complaining of unfairness after they received Ds and Fs. Their professor did raise the grades after the appeal--without bureaucratic intervention by the Committee on Honors and Academic Standing, which oversees official petitions to change grades.

For each case of students succeeding in revising their grades to what they feel is a more fair and accurate representation of their classwork, there are several where students fail, literally and figuratively. Most petitions heard by the Committee on Honors and Academic Standing involve attempts--past deadline--to change CR/D/F classes to a letter grade, or to question whether a `W' for withdrawal was appropriate, Meeske noted. After a grade is reported to the Registrar, it can be changed only if it was the result of a clerical error, or if the professor's petitions the Committee on Honors and Academic Standing.

Longtime professors and administrators sense that grade anxiety has not appreciably increased over time, a feeling substantiated by tracing the history of Yale's various grading systems. In what Brodhead termed the "ancient days" of his own undergraduate years at Yale, students received grades based on a numerical system from 1-100. In the late 1960s Yale College opted for a honors/high pass/pass/fail system which is currently used by the graduate school. The faculty voted for the change in order to diminish student concern over grades, according to Brisman. "I don't think it had any effect on student anxiety since honors was the only way to be distinguished....When I taught [what is now English 115] and students would work very hard and earn a `pass'--which I interpreted to be B- but which they interpreted to be a D--I think that was cruel."

The honors/high pass/pass system lasted for only a few years, and during Meeske's undergraduate years, the faculty decided to change plans again. "Honors was supposed to be a very unusual and exceptional grade; over the years from 1967 to 1972, honors/high pass/pass/fail had become an A/B/C/F system," Meeske said.

For the past two decades, Yale College has distributed grades in roughly the same format that current students receive and frequently complain about them. The system has undergone minor tweaking: in the late 1970s the CR/F option (later modified to CR/D/F) was added; by the mid-1980s, the letter system included the +/- designation; and the Class of 2001 will only have the option of taking four classes CR/D/F. Even now, Yale is considering options that other colleges have implemented, such as adding an A+ option, and including the average grade awarded in a course alongside each student's grade.

"As a student in the '70s, I thought we'd change the [grading] system every five years; whatever system you have, it seems to get devalued over time," Meeske said. Whatever the form and particulars of the grading system at Yale, chances are that students will continue to press for fairness and perhaps inflation in grading, while professors resist, using grades as a way of differentiating and marking extraordinary achievements.