Faculty Discuss Grade Inequities and Inflation

While Exeter has long been known for its high academic standards, students often raise questions about the consistency and equity of departmental grading practices. To better understand how students are assessed at Exeter, The Exonian examined grading practices across departments and trends in grading over time.

The Academy does not have a written philosophy on grading. “I believe this is a worthwhile task and goal. Part of that philosophy should be about equity and communication,” Director of Studies Scott Saltman said. “We should also be digging into what we believe to be appropriate and equitable assessment of Harkness—I know that is an area of student concern.”

Data on grading is collected for internal use by the Director of Studies Office. “The Academy collects data on grades simply because that is a good record-keeping practice,” Saltman said. “We need to anticipate how someone in the future might want to sort and examine that data.” Saltman declined to share school-wide grading data with The Exonian but noted that a faculty-wide discussion about grade disparity occurred in August.

“This fall, the faculty began a discussion of assessment practices, focusing on how assessments should be used to improve student learning and the benefits of giving feedback to students that is both evaluative and instructive,” Saltman said. “We also discussed the importance of maintaining clear expectations for student work, particularly as students move from one teacher to another in sequential courses.” 

However, standardizing grade distributions across the board is not a goal in this process. “Such a practice can be constraining and can lead to inequity—imagine a teacher being told to give a certain number of [lower grades], even if the students are particularly strong and deserving of [higher grades],” Saltman said.

Though there are collective efforts to improve grading, each department and faculty member has great latitude in grading practices. “There are inherent differences in the types of work that different departments assess,” Saltman added. “As a result of this, I don’t believe a standard school-wide grading scale would result in either a more equitable experience for students or more consistency between departments’ grade distributions.”

While the Science Department has a standardized grading scale, teachers still have a high degree of freedom. “We allow our teachers to determine how they will assess their students: both the quantity and types of assessments,” Science Department Chair Alison Hobbie said. “Faculty who teach in the same discipline often have conversations about how they assess student work, to promote conversations about what is important in an assessment and, to some degree, to provide some commonality in grading philosophy.”

By contrast, quantitative grading is difficult in humanities disciplines. “The kind of work we do is wonderfully, inherently subjective. I don’t know how you measure it—it would be suspicious if somebody said you could,” Chair of the Theater Department Rob Richards said. “I think we grade what we teach: In many ways, it has to do with the human experience, participation and transformation.”

Still, there are ways to create consistency in humanities courses. “We do group grading exercises and talk routinely about the skills we hope to teach and the elements of good writing in every genre we emphasize,” English Department Chair Nathaniel Hawkins said. 

Clarity in grading may also be reinforced by clear expectations. “I have a set of technical, organizational and content expectations for writing assignments; I use these to assess,” English Instructor Becky Moore said. “Along with the grade, I make notes and final comments on the assignments.”

Some departments that use written assessments set common goals. “The History Department has repeatedly visited the question of grading both essays and in-class discussion. Each faculty member enjoys some autonomy in their classroom, but the goals of assessment are largely the same: basic grammar and syntax, clear expression of ideas, demonstrated engagement with scholarship and primary materials,” Department Chair Kent McConnell said.

In many subjects, participation also factors heavily. “I determine grades based on class participation and assessments—mostly essays, but occasionally an in-class assessment is part of the calculation. Class participation can be anywhere from 25 to 50 percent of the total grade; it depends on the class,” History Instructor Betty Luther-Hillman said. “I tend to weight class participation more heavily for seniors because I assume they’ve learned ‘how to Harkness’ by the time they get to senior year.”

In some departments, assessments tend to be formative in nature. “Many activities in the Music Department—ensembles and lessons—aren’t graded with letter grades. Lessons and ensembles are feedback-rich environments where formative assessment is happening at almost every meeting,” Chair of the Music Department Kristofer Johnson said. “Those experiences are given a narrative comment at the end of term.”

Most departments use assessments as more than evaluations. “Assessments should help the learning. They should be crafted in such a way that they themselves are learning activities,” Religion Department Chair Hannah Hofheinz said. “They are not mere judgements.”

Chair of the Modern Languages Department Evelyn Christoph explained that although teachers put in their best effort to grade equitably, there is still room for improvement. “There are still questions being raised on whether there are disparities in how assessments are graded. We are working seriously on questions of grading and equitable grading practices,” she said. 

Even within a department, standardized grading scales are not always the best method of creating consistency. “Different types of assignments require different approaches to grading, and different teachers give different types of assignments,” Hofheinz said. “We always talk about best practices.”

However, some students pointed out that some courses tend to be more subjective than others, giving those who excel in some fields an advantage. “For courses like English or Modern Languages, assessments are usually based on writing, which are really subjective,” upper Yulian Ye said. “That’s why I personally feel more challenged in the humanities courses and languages than, say, math or science.” 

Still, discrepancies in grading can be attributed to the type of student each department draws. “One reason for discrepancies is that … the English Department are required to teach all students in the school—whether the students see English as a particular strength or not,” Moore said. “In contrast, some other departments suggest that since they teach only those students for whom the subject is a particular passion or strength, that the performance and following assessment will skew to the excellent, rather than the good or average.”

Some instructors felt that students could learn from the variations in grading style. “I think students have a lot to learn from different teachers’ approaches to writing. There’s no one ‘correct’ writing style for historical analysis, so students need to learn what style is most successful for them,” Luther-Hillman said. “But, at a fundamental level, all history teachers want students to engage with texts, use factual evidence to support their points, and show an understanding of the history topics they’re learning.”

Despite the variation in grading style, students felt that, due to the term system, average grades would even out. “If you have a teacher that’s considered ‘hard’ by many students, it’s hard in that moment, obviously,” senior Smaiyl Makyshov said. “And it may be a tough time. But it is what it is.”

Other students felt that their peers tended to blame teachers for poor grades. “For the most part, I think teachers are fair … It’s really easy to blame your own failures on the teacher,” lower Juliette Ortiz said. “When you’re learning something new and learning how to learn, it’s hard. If you’re not getting it right away, that’s normal.” 

In addition to questions on consistency, concerns on grade inflation have been raised on campus. “In certain circles, it’s recognized that grade inflation is a thing. We’ve fallen out of the ‘learn or get out’ model that was started by Principal Amen, that endured until the seventies or eighties,” upper Charlie Preston said. “When we talk about early cum [laude], we talk about the cutoff—we say that it’s going to be higher for our grade than others. More and more people are getting grades that are above a 10.”

Moore similarly felt that a shift had occurred. “The faculty receives a summary of all the grades given for any term by individual teacher and department; when I began here, the English Department Chair wanted a term department average of 8.5. These days, it has begun to approach 9.0,” she said. “One concern is that some students and families have much less ability to hear that their performance earns any assessment in English below a B+. Too many of them—parents and students—can only seem to equate academic identity with one letter: A.” 

Moore felt that this cultural shift has changed her approach to grading. “Instead of arguing with students and families over a grade, I would rather spend my time helping a student learn the material,” she said. “Teachers have little incentive besides their own integrity to affirm that grades of C-,C, C+, B- and B indicate good, creditable work done and more skill and material to learn.”

McConnell characterized grade inflation as a present and concerning trend. “My evidence is anecdotal, but over the twenty-plus years of my teaching at both [the Academy] and the collegiate level, grades have been inflated for all sorts of reasons,” he said. “There are other factors beyond epistemological considerations that play into grading and grade inflation that are not good for students and their educational pursuits. This is not a student problem, but an institutional one and one of our culture in America as a whole.” 

McConnell stressed that his stance was not a blanket endorsement of previous grading methods, given studies on knowledge acquisition that should be taken into account during grading.

Hofheinz noted that grade inflation—or grade condensing, as they put it—may actually cause greater stress for students. “The counterintuitive part is that when we lose real differentiation in grades … when grades get condensed, when it feels like everyone needs to get an A- or B+, student anxiety goes up, learning outcomes go down. It ends up being a much harder situation for everyone,” they said. 

Hofheinz felt that grades may even hinder learning. “Grades take too much attention. Students invest grades with so much emotion and so much personal identification—as if it’s who you are as an identity,” they said. “In our department, we are far more interested in the learning, in the questions and in facilitating classroom experience as students move toward the goal of better understanding themselves and the world. That often is not the same matter as grade.” 

Similarly, Richards noted that learning to stumble is a key part of growing up. “Somebody said, ‘As a parent, if you don’t teach your kids disappointment, you’re doing them a disservice,’” he said. “I had to learn that the hard way, but I am a believer in that.”

While grading should not be a determinant in student perception of themselves, they are key parts of the academic process. Thus, the faculty have made meaningful strides towards consistency and equity. “It’s part of our ongoing conversations—we talk about grading in a variety of ways, as a whole department and as individuals,” Hofheinz said. 

Saltman echoed Hofheinz’s thoughts. “We have asked the faculty and departments to consider and discuss their values and their expectations,” Saltman said. “We believe that by starting the conversation in that area, we will develop more consistency in grading practices.”