Grading Systems - USM Forum -- Message Board

Date: Feb 2, 2006

Grading Systems

Date: Feb 2, 2006

The University of Houston employs such a system. It's tough to get an A- and it doesn't count as a 4.0. On the other hand, that B+ is always better than a B. U of H also lets their professors decide if they want to use the +/- system.

Date: Feb 2, 2006

There was such a system in use at Vanderbilt, at least in the graduate school. I can tell you, there's a world of difference between a B- and a B+ for graduate students!

As a former instructor, I would have appreciated the opportunity to give a B- instead of a C in many cases.

Date: Feb 2, 2006

Thanks for your comments. I like the idea of being able to provide finer distinctions in performance through this system. My concern revolves around how this can affect a student's GPA and consequently, retention. SC has an educational lottery and many students attend college on the associated scholarship. They must have a C average to keep it. Now giving a student with a 72 a C- vs. a C might cause them to lose their scholarship and they may have to leave school. Also, we are very dependent on tuition dollars at Winthrop. So this has very serious implications for faculty and adminsitration. I am in favor of it in theory but weary of what it might mean for the University in the long haul.

Date: Feb 2, 2006

The early impetus for plus-minus grading was a desire to get a handle on grade inflation. The idea was that a prof might give a B+ instead of an A or a C+ instead of a B. In practice the adoption of a plus-minus system seems to have very little effect on GPAs. Those most affected are at the extremes. Straight A students get the occasional A-, and D students get an occasional D-. There is a great deal of research on this topic (Google "plus-minus grading"), and there are some real problems in practice.

My feeling is that the use of all five traditional letter grades provides more than enough distinction among students. Using eleven gradations of performance implies a degree of evaluation accuracy that does not exist. The problem with traditional grading arises when professors who use only two or three grades come to the realization that some of their A students are qualitatively different from the other A students, and that some of their B students aren't really above average. At that point they want to have the A- or the B+ to get back to five grades. Had they graded honestly in the first place, all the hassle and practical problems of plus-minus grading could have been avoided.

Date: Feb 2, 2006

Stickler wrote:

The early impetus for plus-minus grading was a desire to get a handle on grade inflation. The idea was that a prof might give a B+ instead of an A or a C+ instead of a B. In practice the adoption of a plus-minus system seems to have very little effect on GPAs. Those most affected are at the extremes. Straight A students get the occasional A-, and D students get an occasional D-. There is a great deal of research on this topic (Google "plus-minus grading"), and there are some real problems in practice. My feeling is that the use of all five traditional letter grades provides more than enough distinction among students. Using eleven gradations of performance implies a degree of evaluation accuracy that does not exist. The problem with traditional grading arises when professors who use only two or three grades come to the realization that some of their A students are qualitatively different from the other A students, and that some of their B students aren't really above average. At that point they want to have the A- or the B+ to get back to five grades. Had they graded honestly in the first place, all the hassle and practical problems of plus-minus grading could have been avoided.

I love plus and minus grades. In the arts that kind of shading can be very important -- in looking at a design, a piece of writing, the playing of a piece of music there is truly a huge range of small steps between points (A<B<C etc.). I respect that in some disciplines numbers accompany the grade and that helps tell the story of where a student fell within the given grade range, but often in evaluatng student artists numbers are usually not very helpful, even when they are part of the grading system.

Date: Feb 2, 2006

stephen judd wrote:

Stickler wrote: The early impetus for plus-minus grading was a desire to get a handle on grade inflation. The idea was that a prof might give a B+ instead of an A or a C+ instead of a B. In practice the adoption of a plus-minus system seems to have very little effect on GPAs. Those most affected are at the extremes. Straight A students get the occasional A-, and D students get an occasional D-. There is a great deal of research on this topic (Google "plus-minus grading"), and there are some real problems in practice. My feeling is that the use of all five traditional letter grades provides more than enough distinction among students. Using eleven gradations of performance implies a degree of evaluation accuracy that does not exist. The problem with traditional grading arises when professors who use only two or three grades come to the realization that some of their A students are qualitatively different from the other A students, and that some of their B students aren't really above average. At that point they want to have the A- or the B+ to get back to five grades. Had they graded honestly in the first place, all the hassle and practical problems of plus-minus grading could have been avoided. I love plus and minus grades. In the arts that kind of shading can be very important -- in looking at a design, a piece of writing, the playing of a piece of music there is truly a huge range of small steps between points (A<B<C etc.). I respect that in some disciplines numbers accompany the grade and that helps tell the story of where a student fell within the given grade range, but often in evaluatng student artists numbers are usually not very helpful, even when they are part of the grading system.

And actually, Stickler, I've been teaching since 1977 (except for a couple of times when I left to return to grad school or work in the professional world) and this is only the second school I have been at that wasn't +/-. So I agree that while the move in the last few years may have been to deal with grade inflation, that doesn't explain the number of schools that have had such a system in place for decades.

Also, as noted, I think that disciplines really do differ in their need for a finer tuned grading mechanism so I'm not sure that the issue of "honest" grading is in all cases relevent, or even primary.

Date: Feb 2, 2006

Like Stephen, I appreciate a +/- system. USM is one of only two schools I've known without it, and the other school put the system in while I was there. I still calculate grades in my courses on a 1000-point scale. I find that kind of record useful when writing recommendations, for instance when writing recommendations.

Among majors in a discipline, there may indeed be fine but significant distinctions. My own discipline of English literature is particularly concerned with fine shades of meaning. (I could quote Byron here, but I'll restrain myself.) In any case, there is a greater difference between a B+ and B- than between an A- and a B+. The students who work hard should be able to see a result for their effort.

Jameela

Date: Feb 2, 2006

Currently here's the situation at USM:

>89.49 is an A
79.49

Date: Feb 2, 2006

Let's try this again without those pesky greater than/less than signs:

Currently here's the situation at USM:

greater than 89.49 is an A
79.49 to 89.5 is a B
69.49 to 79.5 is a C
59.49 to 69.5 is a D
less than 59.5 is an F

Every semester, some students take the opportunity to argue grade assignments and whether or not they deserve a B, even though they had a 79.00 average, because they were "so close." In fact, there are currently 4 break points at which students can attempt to negotiate, beg, or plead for a grade boost. Now, suppose USM adopted a +/- system similar to this:

greater than 92.99 is a grade of A
89.49 to 93.00 is an A-
87.49 to 89.50 is a B+
82.99 to 87.50 is a B
79.49 to 83.00 is a B-
77.49 to 79.50 is a C+
72.99 to 77.50 is a C
69.49 to 73.00 is a C-
67.49 to 69.50 is a D+
59.49 to 67.50 is a D
less than 59.50 is an F

Under this system (which you may notice includes neither an A+ nor a D-), there are 10 break points at which students can attempt to negotiate, beg, or plead for a grade boost, which more than doubles the chances for opportunistic individuals to track you down, call you at home, and ask you to change their grade from a D to a D+ (even though their average was a 66.00) because they were "so close."

USM has enough issues with grade inflation, students who negotiate grades and rules rather than earning grades and following rules, and other such basic idiocy. Let's leave the +/- system to schools with student bodies that can be stratified into such fine partitions. USM's student body just needs three grades: A, C, and F. If you're at USM you're either too good to be at USM (the smallest group), you're an average student (the largest group), or you should probably be at a trade school (the group that's gaining fast on the average students). In most cases, is we were honest about our standards and held the line on grading, we'd find just that.

Date: Feb 2, 2006

Currently Non-plus/minus-ed wrote:

Let's try this again without those pesky greater than/less than signs: Currently here's the situation at USM: greater than 89.49 is an A 79.49 to 89.5 is a B 69.49 to 79.5 is a C 59.49 to 69.5 is a D less than 59.5 is an F Every semester, some students take the opportunity to argue grade assignments and whether or not they deserve a B, even though they had a 79.00 average, because they were "so close." In fact, there are currently 4 break points at which students can attempt to negotiate, beg, or plead for a grade boost. Now, suppose USM adopted a +/- system similar to this: greater than 92.99 is a grade of A 89.49 to 93.00 is an A- 87.49 to 89.50 is a B+ 82.99 to 87.50 is a B 79.49 to 83.00 is a B- 77.49 to 79.50 is a C+ 72.99 to 77.50 is a C 69.49 to 73.00 is a C- 67.49 to 69.50 is a D+ 59.49 to 67.50 is a D less than 59.50 is an F Under this system (which you may notice includes neither an A+ nor a D-), there are 10 break points at which students can attempt to negotiate, beg, or plead for a grade boost, which more than doubles the chances for opportunistic individuals to track you down, call you at home, and ask you to change their grade from a D to a D+ (even though their average was a 66.00) because they were "so close." USM has enough issues with grade inflation, students who negotiate grades and rules rather than earning grades and following rules, and other such basic idiocy. Let's leave the +/- system to schools with student bodies that can be stratified into such fine partitions. USM's student body just needs three grades: A, C, and F. If you're at USM you're either too good to be at USM (the smallest group), you're an average student (the largest group), or you should probably be at a trade school (the group that's gaining fast on the average students). In most cases, is we were honest about our standards and held the line on grading, we'd find just that.

I'm sorry you find yourself spending so much time on student challenges. I can sympathize as that is generally pretty unpleasant.

In my discipline students generally accept the grades, not necessarily happily but we are in the fairly fortunate position of having a lot off out of class interaction between students and faculty because so much of our work is studio/rehearsal oriented or work in performance and production.

What I miss in the +/- grades is the ability to shade, as Jameela indicates.

I've never seen in a system where +/- existed where it was a great bother to most faculty in disciplines where the grade is a product of fairly clear numbers crunchoing through testing, etc.

Where that breaks down for a lot of us in the arts are in things like essay writing, painting, drawing, acting, etc. . . . the assignment of numerical grades is somewhat arbitrary when you are trying to deliver an evaluation that is often subtlely nuanced. That is at least an issue of some legitamacy can probably be exemplified by asking what would be the result if we only had two grades . . . Pass and Fail. That is simply too crude to really help students understand how the grade correlates to their performance, although it might be true. The folks that pass probably want to have some sense of whether their performance was exceptional or simply average.

We spend a lot of time in the arts in critiques and writing responses to student work. But when I look at grades of students who are applying to my graduate program, the +/- tells me an awful lot that the raw ABCDF simply doesn't.

It is interesting that this should come up on this board since I have been contemplating for some time asking academic council to reconsider the +/- question.

Date: Feb 3, 2006

Wow. Thanks for all of the comments. As I mentioned before, I think it is a good thing. Most students think it is a bad thing. The students proposed a plus only system such as the one at the University of South Carolina, as that wouldn't have negative consequences for their GPAs. I will use it because I often have heartburn over giving the student with an 80 the same grade as the one with an 89. Perhaps it won't have a tremendous impact on retention. After the summer or fall semester, I guess we'll have some indication. Thanks again.

Date: Feb 3, 2006

Currently Non-plus/minus-ed wrote:

"Under this system (which you may notice includes neither an A+ nor a D-), there are 10 break points at which students can attempt to negotiate, beg, or plead for a grade boost, which more than doubles the chances for opportunistic individuals to track you down, call you at home, and ask you to change their grade from a D to a D+ (even though their average was a 66.00) because they were 'so close.'"

The higher number of break points would probably decrease the number of grade challenges, since the gain would be so much smaller. I haven't heard of many grade challenges in any case, even under the current system. JL

Date: Feb 3, 2006

A thought about the "problem" of having a student with an 80 and a student with an 89 get the same grade:

If the grading policy is publicized thoroughly and applied fairly, then why is unfair to give those two students Bs? Life is full of instances in which individuals have different performances and yet receive the same reward (or penalty). For instance, in a sales contest, salespeople who sell between $A and $B get a certain (but same) reward. In our own cases, we probably have colleagues in our areas that work less but get paid the same salary (or more).

If you publicize that a student must achieve a 90% success rate in order to get an A, then everyone who falls short of that mark is excluded from getting an A, regardless of how much they fell short. I'm in agreement with "Currently Non-plus/minus-ed" in that this seems to be to a mechanism to make students feel better but may turn out to be a bigger headache, given my past experience with plus-minus systems at other schools.

By the way, I think it's a little too easy to gloss over the statement made by "Currently Non-plus/minus-ed" that USM's students have become accomplished grade negotiators. In my own field, I have many students who feel that I work at Burger King: they can have it their way. Solid B students who feel they have a legitimate request for elevation to A because they want to go to grad school, C students who feel they should get a B just because they came to class every day, etc., are more common than one would think. Grade negotiators would cease to attempt to negotiate if they were completely unsuccessful.

Date: Feb 3, 2006

Southern Justice,

As a pedagogue, I have no problem with letting students experience the consequences of their actions. That's part of teaching. But another part is pushing the students to higher achievement, and this goal is facilitated by having that higher achievement articulated into smaller steps. More people will try to achieve the next level if it doesn't look impossible. I'm always troubled by the student who gives up with an 80 because a 90 is out of reach; that same person might have worked for an 83, or even an 87.

Cordially,

JL

Date: Feb 3, 2006

I agree with Jameela's take on our grading system. I, too, wish there was a means of differentiating between a student who barely makes a B and one who nearly makes an A.

I wouldn't be so bold as to offer solutions to grade inflation, but, as an instructor, I would like to have the ability to make finer distinctions.

Has this issue come up in the past at USM?

Date: Feb 3, 2006

Louis K wrote:

Has this issue come up in the past at USM?

It has been raised a number of times, but never successfully. Note that graduate students have plus/minus grades, though arguably that distribution is equivalent to the A-F spread, as graduate students should only be getting (mostly) A's and (occasionally) B's.

JL

Date: Feb 3, 2006

Jameela Lares wrote:

The higher number of break points would probably decrease the number of grade challenges, since the gain would be so much smaller. I haven't heard of many grade challenges in any case, even under the current system. JL

In my experience, the number of grade negotiations has gone up now that I am teaching with a +/- system than when I was at USM (granted, it could be the different cultures at the two schools). Especially when they get a B+ or an A-. Giving a student one of those two grades will nearly ensure that I will get an email almost immediately after grades are posted saying, "What did I make on my final, I don't understand, I was doing so well, I came to class everyday."