I went to the University of California, Davis a long time ago. An extremely high percentage of the students were aiming at Vet, Med or an MBA program. The competition was extremely fierce for those on the grad school track. And the competition was not necessarily good. Students would select professors based on what grade they might pull versus what they might learn, reference material would be hidden, books on library reserve would be checked out merely to prevent other students from access, lab experiements were sabotaged, etc.
Such anti-social competitive behavior didn’t motivate me. I was a Mandarin Chinese major, and we had ringers in the class who were native Mandarin Chinese speakers (for example, moved to the US for High School) to get an easy A. This brought up the curve and also made the workload very unrealistic. Those of us with zero Chinese background, which was a small minority of the students, just had an insane amount of work to pass because the standards became impossibly high. What ends up happening, is that a lot of the student population is forced to choose between learning and grades.
Slight hijack, can any of the University of California, Santa Cruz people tell me why the UC system decided to go back to grades? They’ve been using the evaluation system certainly for 20 years and probably a lot longer.
One of the charter schools in NH did away with grades back when I was in high school myself(early/mid 90’s) I’m almost positive I only heard about it because the students in that school were having a hard time getting into colleges, since the only thing the colleges would agree to base their possible admission on was their SAT scores. I have no idea if they’ve kept their gradeless policy or switched to a more conventional method of basing achievement, though.
“You all get smilie faces on your exams.”
“Dr. Solomon, we can’t get into grad school with a smilie face in physics!”
-3rd rock from the sun
Would that this were so. I’m sure we could all tell stories of people (perhaps ourselves) who worked hard only to end up with a mediocre grade, or of people (perhaps ourselves) who threw a paper or project together at the last minute and got an A.
Tell me about it. Just last week I studied for 4 hours using my textbook and notes for my Spanish test(I studied up until the time I had to write my name on the test), and I still got a 60% on the test. I’m trying my damnedest in this class, but I don’t get it. The teacher doesn’t explain hardly anything, and he always says everything in Spanish. I’m lily white, I have no clue what he’s talking about.
It doesn’t help that 80% of the class are Mexicans who’ve been speaking it all their lives, either. Thank God he isn’t grading on the curve.
Hmm… this may be a clue… "Somebody has to be the ‘loser’ " … for some reason many in our society associate the idea of being ‘the loser’ incidental to a specific instance of competition, with being ‘A loser’ as in having a moral deficiency. When all it should really mean, if you consistently get your ass kicked in the gridiron or at Calc, is that maybe you should consider Table Tennis, or French Lit, instead.
And reality sometimes grades arbitrarily, based on the whims and prejudices of those in a position to decide, however long and consistently you keep your nose clean and to the grindstone.
What would a new “pass” be equivalent to? An old grade C? E? A?
Or perhaps you’d like the system used in the UK actuarial exams. The philosophy there is that you can’t have a grade “B” actuary, so instead you just “pass”.
However, they do grade the failures. Thus the grade system is:
pass
FA
FB
FC
FD
We always joke that the last grade should be “FU”. “FA”, on the other hand, speaks for itself.
I can’t tell you what a comfort it is to know that one has only just failed the exam…
The argument against the traditional grading system isn’t that we should de-emphasize “competition”. The argument is that grades, as a short-hand method of evaluating success at learning, are a poor metaphor. Thus, a person looking at an “A” grade doesn’t really know what it actually conveys informationally regarding the knowledge gained by the student. One teacher may use the grade to convey the message, “You worked really hard and demonstrated that you understood more of the subject matter than all but a few students.” Another teacher may use the grade to convey the message, “You completed all your assignments and demonstrated that you understood the basics of what was taught.” Some teachers factor into the grade completion of homework assignments; others factor in only the result of infrequent testing. Thus, the receipt of a given grade in one class cannot be compared to the receipt of the same grade in a different class.
All of which, of course, would be irrelevant if it weren’t for our penchant to compare ourselves to our peers. Thus, we compile the notorious GPA, and use it to compare our accomplishments with other students. In addition, this sort of short-hand evaluation of a four-year effort ends up being used by institutions as a method of judging future results. All of which creates a very unfortunate focus for those who aspire to some additional position (such as acceptance to a college or graduate school).
For example, in our local school district, students who take “honors” courses (those who are adjudged through testing to be among the best in the district in the subject area, e.g., Mathematics) receive a higher number of grade points for completion of the course work with a particular letter grade than those taking non-“honors” classes. The purpose, of course, is to increase the GPA of those who take such courses. As a result, such students end up with a GPA in excess of 4.0, and the valedictorian is often the person who has taken the most “honors” classes. Does this mean such students really have done “better” than other students in learning high school course work?
I have long advocated requiring teachers to provide short assessments of students similar to the assessments usually provided by teachers of first through fourth graders. It is true that comparing students on the basis of such evaluations can be difficult, obviously forcing institutions to use a different paradigm for such evaluations. But from the standpoint of helping a student understand what success he/she has had in learning the information presented, grades are useless.
No, actually that is not how the world goes around.
First off, just because their are no grades, does not mean that there is nothing. We get detailed evaluations, talking about our strengths, our weaknesses, our attendence, our comments in class, our percieved dedication, even the subjects that we chose to write about (no more recycled term papers here!). And there is recognition. Good students do well in life, regardless of grades. Their papers get selected for publication (not because they got good grades, but because they are well written). They recieve honors recognition (not based on their GPA, but based on who the teachers in the department feel deserves recognition). They learn the things they need to know to exel in their fields (a natural consequence of learning). Learning provides its own rewards. Grades or not, good students excell, and poor students fail until they either quit or find something they are better suited for.
You are absolutly wrong. Life does not run on a graded system. It runs on what you do. And effort and ability will bring it’s own rewards. Getting the most out of your education will bring rewards far greater than a high number on your report card. All that number can do is distract you from that.
Come visit UCSC one day. I will show you some kids that are doing amazeing things. I will show you some of the most motivated students you have ever seen. Last time I went to an anti-grade protest, half of the protesters brought homework to do while they protested! I wil show you students that get into their top choice of grad schools 80% of the time. I will also show you some real losers. Not too many of them are seniors. Losers tend to find funner things to waste their time and money on. It all works out in the end. Don’t say it doesn’t work. It worked for me. It worked for thousands of others like me.