You speak as if this is malicious. Far from it. If the grade objectively measures anything, there will, given a large enough student population, be some who fail; i.e., are 2 standard deviations below average. If a business or a school wants to know how that student is able to grasp a given subject, how is this malicious? It's not, it's simply informative.

Yes. I expect anyone who is doing the work will get a "C", and that by the end of the semester most students should have developed enough understanding of the subject matter to qualify for a "B".

It depends on what you want a grade to signify. If a grade is meant to signify that you made a reasonable effort, then sure. If a grade is meant to indicate whether a person is actually proficient in a subject, then yes, you must apply something like the normal curve to the results.

I'm impressed, you managed to write a post that did not include the word billionaire. Nice! But...you did get there indirectly by referencing Epstein, so I'm only giving you half credit (a C).

I agree with this statement. But it is not increasing or decreasing the difficulty of the work.

Yes, applying the normal curve to a single class, is neither useful nor accurate. A normal curve can only be applied across a large population of students. It's quite possible for a single glass to be made up of mostly excellent students, and another class to be mostly failing students. But in a larger population, these things average out.

You are kinder than I would be. My point of view matches how grades were originally envisioned: following the normal curve. In that scheme, a C would be average, up to 1 standard deviation from average. A B would be 1 standard deviation above average, a D 1 standard deviation below. Likewise, an A or F would be two standard deviations from average. Of course, these can be difficult to implement in practice, but it's the curve that should be the standard, in my opinion.

That should be a "C" grade. Did the work, put in the basic effort. "B" should be those who not only did the work, but seem to be getting the concepts as taught. An "A" should be reserved for those who truly understand the topic and how it relates to similar topics in the field -this requires understanding beyond what is directly taught in the course.

A "C" requires effort and memorization. A "B" requires understanding and demonstrated application. An "A" requires insight.

Applying the normal curve doesn't require increasing the difficulty of anything. It's simply applying math to the scores, to determine the average, and what scores fall 1 or 2 standard deviations from avareage.

The normal curve is irrelevant at a single classroom level. But over a population of 25K students, it certainly should be seen. If 23K students get A's, something is wrong with the scoring model.

Guess what, life *is* a competition. Even before humans existed. The "survival of the fittest" is literally a life and death competition.

The same is true when it comes to achieving the lifestyle we want. If you are as good as an average person at coding, you're not going to get as far as somebody who is excellent at coding. NASA isn't going to have college interns writing code that guides the Artemis mission to the moon.

When it comes to the normal curve, it's true that it's not applicable at the level of a single classroom. A group of 20-50 students isn't a large enough sample to apply the normal curve. But a campus-wide population of thousands of students *is* large enough that the normal curve should be seen. If Harvard has 25K students, there is no way that 22K should get A's.

A normal curve, applied correctly, is the *most* fair kind of grading system.

A Bachelor's degree is a Bachelor's degree is a Bachelor's degree. The material taught should not be significantly different than what is taught elsewhere for a Bachelor's degree. The exact same topics should be included. There is no additional requirements or insight at this level.

Perhaps at the Master's level, there may be some additional insight developed beyond that of students at lesser universities. Definitely at the Doctoral level the expectations should be higher.

But at the Bachelor level, the expectation is to learn what has been previously codified. It is undergraduate studies, basic competence in a field -the Journeyman level of qualification.

I guarantee that you cannot find a Harvard graduate who was a "DEI" admission who is not objectively significantly above the average college graduate. Even those you proclaim to be lesser because of their race or sex or "injustice over the years" are far above average.

The only Harvard graduates who are not necessarily excellent are Legacy admissions -the children of prior generations of Harvard graduates whose parentage ensures them a place among the elite leaders of industry and nation regardless of objective qualifications.

That was indeed the original design of the letter grade system. C was assumed to be average, with each letter grade roughly corresponding to one standard deviation above or below average. In other words, the normal curve.

But over the years, "grading on a curve" came to mean something like, the top grade is raised to 100, and everybody else's grade is raised by the same numeric amount as that top grade. This is *not* grading on a curve. It seems the concept is too complex for most to implement.

Maybe.

But if your objective measurement is "You get an A if all your homework is turned in on time" that measurement is objective, but not very meaningful. It *does* mean that you complete your assignments. It does *not* mean that you did your assignments well, or that you understood the content. To get that kind of meaning, you need to also objectively measure the quality of the work, in terms of things like correctness and form, not just a binary "yes or no did you turn in the homework."

Objectivity is a necessary part of meaningfulness. But if the meaning one wants to derive from the grades, is related in any way to the student's actual understanding and ability, then objectivity alone is not enough.

That's great for you. In the South, after sunset is often the only time of day that the temperature is bearable to *go* outside.

It shouldn't be easy to get an A. Or an A-.

If an A grade is meaningful at all, it has to be somewhat difficult to get. Not difficult in the quantity of work completed, but the quality of the work.

Today, A means only that the student did most of the work assigned, and says nothing about how well they did it.

This is much bigger than Harvard, it's a problem across the educational spectrum. Schools are incentivized to produce students with high grades, so guess what, they give out lots of A grades.