When The Chronicle newsroom started unpacking the compact that the Trump administration sent to nine universities earlier this month, many pieces of it were familiar from other ways the administration has sought to remake higher education. The section on grades, though, wasn’t. My recent story attempts to unpack what the passage on grade integrity and accountability for grade distributions might look like in practice and to figure out how this piece fits into the broader agenda.
The section is short, and it uses several key terms without defining them. Here’s an example I didn’t even get to in my story. The compact says that each grade should reflect “the quality, breadth, and depth of the student’s achievement” and adds “a grade must not be inflated, or deflated, for any non-academic reason.” Well, what qualifies as an academic reason? Is giving students points for attendance or participation academic? Lots of professors do that because coming to class and engaging while there supports students’ academic success and makes for a better learning environment. But does a grade that incorporates those habits reflect only the quality of a student’s achievement?
The section also describes accountability measures that sound like an attempt to rein in grade inflation, another complicated prospect.
I interviewed a bunch of people who’ve thought hard about — and in some cases studied — grades and grading and how they fit into the overall project of education. I hope you’ll read my story, if you haven’t already.
I also want to hear from you — especially now that the compact is open to all colleges. Consider the compact’s section on “Student Learning.” If you haven’t read it yet, it’s all of 100 words long. What do you think it’s saying about how colleges should use grades? Why do you think it’s included in the compact? And how similar or different is this from the way you view what you’re doing when you grade your students?
Share your thoughts with me at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com and we may include some of them in future newsletters.
More on grades
Working on the compact story reminded me of some of my other work on the topic:
- I was interviewed about grade inflation on The Chronicle’s College Matters podcast.
- I wrote a compilation of different stakeholders’ responses to the same question: What does an A mean?
- I focused one of my pandemic teaching feature stories on the complexity of grading.
- I wrote a story about ungrading that described what led Susan Blum, who edited a book that helped popularize the idea in higher ed, to embrace it in her own teaching.
Make it relevant
One of the more frequent notes I’ve gotten from newsletter readers over the years goes something like this: “I loved hearing about the amazing idea Professor X is trying this semester. But how would it work in the really large-enrollment course I’m teaching?”
This feedback helped inform my thinking as I laid out the Learning Lessons series I’ve been writing. These stories describe promising approaches professors have found for getting students to buy into the project of learning.
I tried to pick examples that were compelling and that came from contexts in which the challenge of student engagement was more, not less, pronounced. So several of my examples come from large-enrollment and introductory courses. I also chose a couple that feature courses that are required for all students, or meet a gen-ed requirement.
My most recent installment describes the way that a professor approached teaching introductory astronomy to nonscience majors as a way to help them have a better foundation for understanding how science works. Some of what the professor, Doug Duncan, an emeritus faculty member at the University of Colorado at Boulder, did could be applied in just about any teaching context. But I think it’ll be especially resonant with anyone trying to make gen ed feel more connected to students’ lives. I hope you’ll give it a read.
Thanks for reading Teaching. If you have suggestions or ideas, please feel free to email us at beth.mcmurtrie@chronicle.com or beckie.supiano@chronicle.com.
-Beckie
Learn more at our Teaching newsletter archive page.
