Re:GREAT Business, GREAT sense (Score 1)

The notion that grades are measured against some higher standard is ludicrous. Even classes that don't have curves are measuring relative achievement. The only difference is that whoever is teaching that class has figured out how difficult to make it so that a certain number get As, Bs, etc. Grades are inherently relative. If you get an 80% on an exam, it doesn't mean that you know 80% of all the information pertaining to the subject. It means that someone made a test that you can get an 80% on with your level of knowledge. If everyone makes an A, what is the use of the grade? The only way that everyone in a class should be able to get A's is if they're keeping track of performance relative to everyone who has taken the class in the past, etc. Then, if a really smart bunch came through, they should be able to make better grade on average.

Again, grades are inherently relative. That is all they are. When someone looks at your grade and you made an A in English I, they don't think "hmmm... this guy knows almost everything there is to know about English I." Rather, they think "hmmm... this guy took English I with a bunch of other people and got one of the best grades out of the group."

If anyone out there has been fooled into think that grades are absolute and that everyone can make an A, you've been fooled. That's just what people tell you for encouragement. Teachers/Professors who say that have never given all A's. If they did, the grades would be useless and we might as well do away with them.