In November of last year, I wrote a column in which I expressed my concern that grade inflation is running rampant across our college campuses.
Last week, Harvard’s administration and faculty took action, as 70% of the faculty voted to cap the number of A’s given to undergraduates to about 20% per class. This is certainly a step in the right direction, although since A- grades will not be capped, the full intent of stemming grade inflation may be somewhat muted.
I addressed the negative impact grade inflation can have on our national competitiveness in four ways. First, grade inflation causes erosion of standards, ultimately leading to a workforce with reduced skills and work ethic. Second, grade inflation makes grades a less meaningful screening device in the employee selection process. Third, the link between a degree and a potential employee’s competence becomes less meaningful, making it more difficult to match a person to an appropriate job. Finally, more students getting high grades demotivates the most capable students, as less capable students are evaluated the same as they are. In my column, I urged higher education to take action to curb grade inflation to help restore our national competitiveness. Six months later, I have some good news, some bad news, and one local idea that, if implemented appropriately, can be very helpful.
First, here is the good news. As I mentioned in my November column, Harvard University had recently released a report in which its undergraduate grade inflation was chronicled for the past twenty years. In that time, A’s had grown from 24% of grades assigned to over 60%. The institution believed this indicated that they were not providing their students appropriate feedback, nor were they adequately communicating student achievement to employers and graduate/professional school admissions committees.
However, I think this is a move in the right direction, as do many faculty members, particularly at elite institutions. More importantly, moves such as this will allow grades to again be both discriminators and motivators. As students enter the job market and apply to graduate and professional schools, there needs to be a clear way to determine who is most capable of success in a particular job or program. A distribution of grades enables such a determination to be made. In addition, grade distributions (or caps) will motivate students to compete for higher grades, leading to them putting forth their best efforts and learning more from their classes. Harvard has challenged other higher education institutions to follow suit, and its peers, such as Yale and Dartmouth, appear to be ready to do so. The real challenge will be for all institutions to stem the tide of grade inflation, as exhibited by my “bad news” example.
Prior to coming to Augusta University (AU), I spent almost fifteen years at Kennesaw State University (KSU). During my last five years at KSU, in addition to my primary role as the Senior Associate Dean in the Coles College of Business, I was responsible for oversight of the intersection between academics and athletics. Therefore, I still tend to keep an eye on that arena and have a large network that keeps me well-informed. While on LinkedIn last week, I saw a post that indicated that the University of Florida’s (UF) athletic department (i.e., the student-athletes on UF’s intercollegiate athletic teams) had an overall grade point average (GPA) of 3.43 for Academic Year 2025-2026. Knowing that at KSU in 2016, we were proud to have an athletic department grade point average of 3.0, I found this remarkable. The University of Florida is one of the top-ranked public universities (#5 by Forbes, #7 by U.S. News & World Report) in the country, yet its average student-athlete nearly qualifies to graduate with honors (a 3.5 GPA qualifies a graduate for Cum Laude status). So, I looked back ten years and found that the average student-athlete GPA at UF was 3.02 during the 2015-2016 year. At KSU, where our Fall 2015 student-athlete GPA was 3.01, it rose to 3.28 in Fall 2025, while not as extreme as UF, still significant. These student-athlete GPA increases are good proxies for overall student body GPAs, indicating the news is on grade inflation is still not good at most institutions. Both UF and KSU would be wise to see what is going on at Harvard and consider how they might also rein in grade inflation.
Fortunately, the University System of Georgia (USG) and locally, here at AU, some steps are being taken to improve grading and student feedback that, while not primarily and explicitly intended to address grade inflation, might be very helpful. In an email to faculty last week from AU Provost, Dr. Maggie Tomovo, her primary message was that: “Research consistently shows that students perform better when they receive regular feedback and clear insight into their progress throughout the semester – not just at the end of the term.” Therefore, the USG has updated its grading and feedback guidelines that “… emphasize ongoing assessment and timely, meaningful feedback that helps students stay connected to their learning and identify areas for improvement…” I think this is a very good idea that will be very helpful to students and their learning experiences. However, there is another piece of her guidance that I think can help address the issue of grade inflation.
That guidance reads: “Rather than relying primarily on major exams or final evaluations, faculty should provide students with multiple opportunities to demonstrate learning through both low-stakes assignments (such as class discussions, journals, paper drafts, or polls) and higher-stakes assignments (such as term papers, projects, or portfolios) that align with course objectives.” The reason I think this can address grade inflation is that it not only provides students multiple opportunities, but it also provides more opportunities to distinguish student performance while also allowing students to rebound from poor performance. In my classes, I already use a broad portfolio of assignments, papers, and exams, which tends to result in a wide distribution of grades while providing students opportunities to respond to feedback. This allows me to assign grades that I believe provide insight to potential employers as to what my students really know.
It has been a long series of small steps that has created the grade inflation problem we have today. However, Harvard has shown courage to take an initial step to address grade inflation, and proper implementation of the USG/AU guidance on grading and feedback can lead to additional change. We need to continue down this path before we do a further disservice to our students, their potential employers, and the communities we serve.
