‘I can’t reach my maximum level of enjoyment just learning the material because I’m so anxious about the midterm,’ one student said in response to potential grading reforms
Harvard College students reacted hysterically to a “soul-crushing” report from the school arguing that it’s giving out too many As and must enact grading reforms to avoid “damaging the academic culture of the College.” One student was so distraught she “skipped classes” and “was just sobbing in bed.”
That’s according to the Harvard Crimson, which interviewed a number of students who “pushed back forcefully” against the report.
“The whole entire day, I was crying,” said freshman Sophiko Chumburidze, an economics, environmental science, and public policy major who says she believes the fields are “essential to building a more equitable, sustainable world.”
“I skipped classes on Monday, and I was just sobbing in bed because I felt like I try so hard in my classes, and my grades aren’t even the best. It just felt soul-crushing.”
Zahra Rohaninejad, a freshman who attended a $65,000 a year all-girls school that does not rank students and offers an anti-racist curriculum, said harsher grading practices would minimize her academic “enjoyment.”
“I can’t reach my maximum level of enjoyment just learning the material because I’m so anxious about the midterm, so anxious about the papers, and because I know it’s so harshly graded,” she said. “If that standard is raised even more, it’s unrealistic to assume that people will enjoy their classes.”
Freshman Kayta Aronson, who cried when getting into Harvard after dreaming of attending the school for nearly a decade, said the prospect of stricter standards makes her “rethink” her decision to attend the Ivy. “I killed myself all throughout high school to try to get into this school,” she said. “I was looking forward to being fulfilled by my studies now, rather than being killed by them.”
Another freshman, Peyton White, a fellow for the South Carolina Democratic Party and speaker of the United States Senate Youth Program who uses he/him pronouns, said any effort to crack down on grade inflation “attacks the very notion of what Harvard is.”
“What makes a Harvard student a Harvard student is their engagement in extracurriculars,” he said. “Now we have to throw that all away and just pursue academics.”
While those quoted in the Crimson piece argued that Harvard students have never worked harder—and are already being graded harshly—Harvard data say otherwise.
The college’s 25-page report from Dean of Undergraduate Education Amanda Claybaugh noted that the proportion of students receiving As has spiked by 20 percentage points over the last decade, resulting in a rise in the median undergraduate GPA from 3.64 to 3.83. At the same time, the report found that the amount of time students report spending on coursework outside of class has remained relatively stable since 2005.
“Our grading is too compressed and too inflated, as nearly all faculty recognize; it is also too inconsistent, as students have observed,” Claybaugh wrote in the report. “More importantly, our grading no longer performs its primary functions and is undermining our academic mission.” As a result, Claybaugh urged reforms meant to “restore the integrity of our grading and return the academic culture of the College to what it was in the recent past.”
The report followed a viral New York Times piece on grade inflation at Harvard. It found that many Harvard students “skip class and fail to do the reading” but “coast through anyway” due to “rampant grade inflation.”
“That means many students graduate without having benefited from talking very much with their teachers and peers, and they stay stuck in ideological bubbles, unwilling or unable to engage with challenging ideas,” writes Anemona Hartocollis of the Times.
To address the issue, Harvard is considering allowing instructors to award a limited number of A pluses—rather than the existing top grade of A—to “increase the information our grades provide by distinguishing the very best students,” as Claybaugh put it. It is also considering noting the median grade for each course on a student’s transcript.
Stephen Behun, a sophomore interested in “green energy solutions” and “political campaigns,” said any reforms would hurt students’ job prospects.
“Addressing it only at Harvard is potentially dangerous for these students that are looking to go on to the next level or need high grades,” he said. “I just worry that we’re putting the cart before the horse when it comes to fixing this without fully understanding how it’s going to impact students professionally, even if it academically helps them master subjects.”
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