Should Professors Stop Grading on a Bell Curve?

[Cyberdyne 101]

Interesting NYT Op-Ed:
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/1...-should-stop-grading-students-on-a-curve.html

Essentially, the author argues that the elimination of bell curve grading would lead to more collaborative and productive academic environments and I tend to agree.

Any thoughts?
@efle @Lucca

Edit: see updated thread title.

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[Mad Jack]

Nah, I like undergraduate tears.

 

[bananafish94]

I've taken extremely few classes that are on a true "curve," so I don't have extensive experience with both systems. That being said, I think that the grade should reflect how well you understand the material and perform on whatever assessments are in place. I don't think that this should be dependent upon your classmates' performance. If the professor says that earning 93% of the points demonstrates a mastery of material that deserves an A, then as many people who reach that threshold should get an A. I do think that an "average" grade should be a C, whereas I feel that a lot people see that as a B.

 

[Hospitalized]

I'd like to think the curve accounts for variation among professors in their ability to create difficult tests that truly test your understanding of the material. I know this isn't the case, but whatever.

 

[TheBiologist]

The curve is an easy way to take into consideration the difficulty of an exam; professors often can not write identically difficult exams so assigning grades by where you stand in the class somewhat makes up for this.

I mean hey, at some schools I'm sure they could make a test easy enough so everyone gets above a 90, but they obviously would want a wider distribution than that.


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[MareNostrummm]

An ochem professor can easily fail an entire class if they actually want to... that's why we have curves to prevent this from happening.

 

[Cyberdyne 101]

An ochem professor can easily fail an entire class if they actually want to... that's why we have curves to prevent this from happening.

In those instances, curves are necessary. I was referring more to bell curves in which only a limited number of students can achieve an A.

 

[tuco's revenge]

curves save lives. and its also how the mcat and everything else works so it gets us used to the system. also, I took courses without curves at a CC that were SO hard. straight scale, no exceptions. only 2 or 3 people got an A in a class of 60. in a curved class it would be like the top 20% get A's

 

[bananafish94]

An ochem professor can easily fail an entire class if they actually want to... that's why we have curves to prevent this from happening.

Not to split hairs, but what you're referring to is an adjustment, not a curve. A true curve limits the percentage of students that can obtain certain grades.

If I were in charge of a class, I would want my grading system to be set up in a way such that in theory it's possible for everyone to get an A, but in practice only about 20% of people get an A.

 

[Petrichor1]

I have rarely had a class where the curve pulled the grade down of a student. The curve is an essential component to hard classes in top schools. They are particularly not used in other institutes because the professor's tests are fairly straightforward and I have seen those professors compensate for a poor test by replacing it with a better score component in the final. I have had many classes where the average has been very low precisely because the professor made the test very difficult by either increasing the length or conceptually convoluting exam instructions and questions.

On the other hand, a lot of math courses (no matter where you take them) do not curve. Even though the tests they make are some of the most nerve-wracking. It is an interesting contrast but I suppose it is because these classes have only <20 students and so curving in these courses becomes obsolete for a bell curve.

 

[efle]

Eh, I think curving is a good and necessary system. With static competency-based cutoffs you lose a lot of information and might block the cream from rising - for example I imagine the AAMC making the MCAT a Pass/Fail exam with only "above 500 - likely to succeed" or "below 500" as scores would not be well received.

But what a curve tells you is performance relative to others taking that assessment. Problems arise when you ignore differences in testing populations, without adjusting how you interpret grades. The way things are now, it's a bad idea for a lot of premeds to enroll at some universities. If the admissions game made it OK to get B's when you were at Hopkins or Berkeley type schools, my only real reason to criticize curving is solved. I don't think such environments would be so cutthroat if it became acceptable to be average among a bunch of standouts.

 

[GinnyWeasley]

In my histology class, grading started out with a 90+ is an A-, 93+ an A. Then the professor found out that many people were getting above 90, which considering these were very intelligent and devoted students, wasn't that big of a shock. He then changed it so that only the top 5% of the class received an A. There were people with 95% getting A-s, and people that had above 90% received B+s. It was frustrating that we weren't graded on our merit, but because our school has a quota on grades according to some professors. I understand that going to Ivy league supposedly leads to some (very small) advantage, but sometimes it's a lot of disadvantages.
I get that life isn't fair, so I sucked it up. But still haha

 

[Pagan FutureDoc]

I've long maintained that grades should reflect a students understanding/mastery of the material and not a relative ranking among their classmates.

 

[Petrichor1]

In my histology class, grading started out with a 90+ is an A-, 93+ an A. Then the professor found out that many people were getting above 90, which considering these were very intelligent and devoted students, wasn't that big of a shock. He then changed it so that only the top 5% received an A. There were people with 95% getting A-s, and people that had above 90% received B+s. It was frustrating that we weren't graded on our merit, but because our school has a quota on grades according to some professors. I understand that going to Ivy league supposedly leads to some (very small) advantage, but sometimes it's a lot of disadvantages.
I get that life isn't fair, so I sucked it up. But still haha

I had a friend who had the same issue; I don't know how far his appeal went but in the end he got where he wanted to be. I guess in these circumstances, (and I imagine this shouldn't happen regularly) you can always explain in your medical application your numerical score, provided it was above an 80 and your curve score was below that.

 

[efle]

because our school has a quota on grades according to some professors. I understand that going to Ivy league supposedly leads to some (very small) advantage, but sometimes it's a lot of disadvantages.

There's no Ivy with a policy capping 5% As lmao. Professor is an outlier

 

[Moko]

 

[GinnyWeasley]

There's no Ivy with a policy capping 5% As lmao. Professor is an outlier

"because our school has a quota on grades according to some professors. I understand that going to Ivy league supposedly leads to some (very small) advantage, but sometimes it's a lot of disadvantages."

^

 

[efle]

"because our school has a quota on grades according to some professors. I understand that going to Ivy league supposedly leads to some (very small) advantage, but sometimes it's a lot of disadvantages."

^

The profs are who I'm laughing at! Sorry if that came across rudely. Princeton was famously the bastion against Ivy inflation with a policy capping A's at ~1/3rd of grades (they recently did away with this policy, too). Avg Ivy GPAs are in the mid 3.xs now, some of the worse offenders up to an A- average. Whatever prof(s) told you there was a secret school policy capping As to 5% are apparently in an extremely tiny minority that got the memo

 

[GinnyWeasley]

The profs are who I'm laughing at! Sorry if that came across rudely. Princeton was famously the bastion against Ivy inflation with a policy capping A's at ~1/3rd of grades (they recently did away with this policy, too). Avg Ivy GPAs are in the mid 3.xs now, some of the worse offenders up to an A- average. Whatever prof(s) told you there was a secret school policy capping As to 5% are apparently in an extremely tiny minority that got the memo

No you're fine haha. And my school does deflate grades, but not to the extent of the professor I mentioned. I'm sure the school didn't tell them that, but that's what they think the school should do? Idk haha. My school is one of the lower, if not the lowest averages out of the Ivys. But yeah, for the majority of my classes, the curve was fine/helpful. This class was just insane lol

 

[efle]

No you're fine haha. And my school does deflate grades, but not to the extent of the professor I mentioned. I'm sure the school didn't tell them that, but that's what they think the school should do? Idk haha. My school is one of the lower, if not the lowest averages out of the Ivys. But yeah, for the majority of my classes, the curve was fine/helpful. This class was just insane lol

I think the lowest has always been Princeton, after that Cornell. Honestly, they probably had a personal issue with giving As, there have been some threads before about professors thinking the class all had As because of cheating and backwards curving so few got As despite 90%+ correct, that sort of thing. Then say it's the school policy to deflect blame! Brilliant really.

 

[Lucca]

Nah, I like undergraduate tears.

While I love tears as much as the next guy, bell curves are pretty dumb and serve no real educational purpose

 

[Boogy'sChick15]

If it weren't for the major curve I'm my physics mechanics class, the entire class wouldn't have passed. The average grade after the midterms and the final was a whopping 23%. The professor made the cutoff for a C- at 20%. Even then, when we moved on to part II of that class the next quarter, around 60% of the students passed with a 20% or higher and were able to move on. The other 40% failed and had to wait till winter quarter the following year to take it.

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[Lost in Translation]

An ochem professor can easily fail an entire class if they actually want to.

Yea maybe if you suck at science or try to cram 8 hours the night before the test. Orgo is a class that requires repetition in addition to knowing the concepts. Outside of actually devoting time to studying for it, it's not hard.

Spoiler

Got A's in both I and II.

 

[Lawpy]

If it weren't for the major curve I'm my physics mechanics class, the entire class wouldn't have passed. The average grade after the midterms and the final was a whopping 23%. The professor made the cutoff for a C- at 20%. Even then, when we moved on to part II of that class the next quarter, around 60% of the students passed with a 20% or higher and were able to move on. The other 40% failed and had to wait till winter quarter the following year to take it.

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Upper level mechanics? Because i can see that happening since the class was really brutal for me as well (it took >30 min to derive equations of motion of a double pendulum attached to a moving cart). The engineers in my class struggled the most.

 

[Lawpy]

Yea maybe if you suck at science or try to cram 8 hours the night before the test. Orgo is a class that requires repetition in addition to knowing the concepts. Outside of actually devoting time to studying for it, it's not hard.

Spoiler

Got A's in both I and II.

 

[Lost in Translation]

Without a bunch of other reagents that's impossible, unless I'm allowed to write in any reagent I want to use no matter how unstable it may be.

 

[Boogy'sChick15]

Upper level mechanics? Because i can see that happening since the class was really brutal for me as well (it took >30 min to derive equations of motion of a double pendulum attached to a moving cart). The engineers in my class struggled the most.

Yeah, it was upper division PHY 321/322. I believe our class was for physics majors only, it was called "principles of physical mechanics". I didn't see a single engineering major in there. I could be wrong though, there could have simply not been any engineers taking the class the quarter I took it.

Nevertheless, the material was extremely difficult, and adding a terrible professor that spends the entire lecture just talking about theories and not actually applying anything just made it impossible. I could care less for curves in any other class, but that one was necessary for any physics major to continue.

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[Turkishking]

My Biology course is curved. I think there are 500 individuals in my lecture? Anyway Top 10-20% get A's not so sure. I like the idea of a bell curve because it brings out competition. I enjoy competing against my peers.

 

[efle]

I like the idea of a bell curve because it brings out competition. I enjoy competing against my peers.

 

[Turkishking]

Yeah. I have glasses similar to Mr. Chang's.

 

[Geo16]

Orgo is a class that requires repetition
Got A's in both I and II.

Repetition was a requirement.. so he repeated his grade in Orgo I at Orgo II.

 

[DameJulie]

I was both a beneficiacy and victim of a curve. Some of my classes had an average of 60%, so if there's no curve half of class would failed miserably.
However I also suffered when the average was 85 and I got a 95, and my grade got curved down.

 

[Geo16]

Perhaps we should base our data on UC Berkeley.
Since there is an official tool to see the grade distribution

https://schedulebuilder.berkeley.edu/explore/courses/SP/2016/261
If you click on the Grade Distribution tab, you'll see all of the grades distributed for Chemistry 3A at UC Berkeley. (Chem 3A is Orgo I)
A lot of students (most of them) got an A in their 3A lab portion (3AL).. it's important to look at the lecture portion for this grade.

Professor Levin's Chem 3A on Fall 2014:
32 students out of 228 got a solid A (A+ and A) - 14.04%
100 students out of 228 got at least a B (A+,A,A-,B+, and B) - 43.86%

Professor Pedersen's Chem 3A on Fall 2014:
34 students out of 276 got a solid A (A+ and A) - 12.32%
124 students out of 228 got at least a B (A+,A,A-,B+, and B) - 44.93%

Not sure how to understand this bell curve..
But everyone will agree that getting an A in Orgo is not easy. Bell curve or not..

 

[Mad Jack]

While I love tears as much as the next guy, bell curves are pretty dumb and serve no real educational purpose

They prevent grade inflation and make high grades actually mean something.

 

[Lucca]

They prevent grade inflation and make high grades actually mean something.

Grades are pointless too. They are a signal for grad school and employers and basically nothing else since they don't necessarily mean you learned anything. The only reason for a bell curve to exist is if everyone at the same university follows exactly the same grading policy (because then it can mean something internally) and the reason undergrad tears are great is because the "student as consumer" model is literally toxic

 

[MareNostrummm]

Yea maybe if you suck at science or try to cram 8 hours the night before the test. Orgo is a class that requires repetition in addition to knowing the concepts. Outside of actually devoting time to studying for it, it's not hard.

Spoiler

Got A's in both I and II.

Woah we got a badass over here... You've never had class averages in the 40%, 50%, or 60% in general chemistry, biology, physics, and ochem? When the highest raw score doesn't even break 90%? Face it, if the professor wants to they can really challenge the students...

 

[Lost in Translation]

Woah we got a badass over here... You've never had class averages in the 40%, 50%, or 60% in general chemistry, biology, physics, and ochem? When the highest raw score doesn't even break 90%? Face it, if the professor wants to they can really challenge the students...

Maybe we were just smart(er)? I've seen low raw scores on exams in every one of those tests, but the averages were normally around low 70s (except for biology, where averages were in the mid 80s; this class was actually graded on a curve). I've seen raw scores in the 90's in every one of those classes as well. I know for a fact that the gen chem and orgo exams were not easy. Physics could have been made more difficult so I'm not going to comment on that course at my school.

Here's an example of one of the orgo questions:

 

[MareNostrummm]

Maybe we were just smart(er)? I've seen low raw scores on exams in every one of those tests, but the averages were normally around low 70s (except for biology, where averages were in the mid 80s; this class was actually graded on a curve). I've seen raw scores in the 90's in every one of those classes as well. I know for a fact that the gen chem and orgo exams were not easy. Physics could have been made more difficult so I'm not going to comment on that course at my school.

I go to a UC with nobel laureate professors, we had a 45% orgo midterm average and every bio midterm was low 60% averages...same for physics and gchem, in classes with hundreds of people. I'm sure your entire student body is flat out smarter than what we can recruit at a top public research institution.

Mid 80's biology averages is completely unheard of...since you could just actually just make the test harder.

 

[Lost in Translation]

Mid 80's biology averages is completely unheard of...since you could just actually just make the test harder.

Yea intro bio was a joke at my school (not that intro bio should be that difficult of a course since it's literally just memorization).

Care to try my question?

 

[LizzyM]

I don't understand giving exams where the best student achieves only 60%. Instructor, did you or did you not teach the material? If the reason for the low grades is too much material, is there a reason for awarding points, and better grades, for speed. I don't test on anything that wasn't in the material covered in the class. Someone would have to completely fall apart to score less than 60% on one of my exams...

 

[MareNostrummm]

I don't understand giving exams where the best student achieves only 60%. Instructor, did you or did you not teach the material? If the reason for the low grades is too much material, is there a reason for awarding points, and better grades, for speed. I don't test on anything that wasn't in the material covered in the class. Someone would have to completely fall apart to score less than 60% on one of my exams...

For intro biology every single midterm had a class average of 63-67%, in a class with 700+ people at my UC... its done every year just to weed people out. The intention is to fail and not to teach, as backwards as that seems.

 

[freak7]

Without a bunch of other reagents that's impossible, unless I'm allowed to write in any reagent I want to use no matter how unstable it may be.

If that's the case, I'm just writing a delta.

 

[Cotterpin]

My undergrad had very low averages on exams. (And no, your school's students were not "smarter" than mine. Come on. ) The professors explained it as they made the exams super hard because they wanted to give the very exceptional students a chance to distinguish themselves.

 

[MareNostrummm]

My undergrad had very low averages on exams. (And no, your school's students were not "smarter" than mine. Come on. ) The professors explained it as they made the exams super hard because they wanted to give the very exceptional students a chance to distinguish themselves.

Finally someone who actually went to a challenging university.

 

[Lucca]

Low averages don't actually mean anyone is being "challenged" other than being forced to work a lot harder. Low averages alone (or high averages) do not guarantee a course is actually focusing on teaching people how to think about a subject or use a set of tools to identify and solve appropriate problems or think critically about observations.

 

[Lost in Translation]

Low averages don't actually mean anyone is being "challenged" other than being forced to work a lot harder. Low averages alone (or high averages) do not guarantee a course is actually focusing on teaching people how to think about a subject or use a set of tools to identify and solve appropriate problems or think critically about observations.

Exactly. If this was 3 years ago and the information was still fresh in my mind, if @MareNostrummm showed me one of his California orgo tests I could probably do very well on it. That's a function of my professor actually teaching me the material in a way I can understand and grasp.

 

[Cotterpin]

Low averages don't actually mean anyone is being "challenged" other than being forced to work a lot harder. Low averages alone (or high averages) do not guarantee a course is actually focusing on teaching people how to think about a subject or use a set of tools to identify and solve appropriate problems or think critically about observations.

Exactly. If this was 3 years ago and the information was still fresh in my mind, if @MareNostrummm showed me one of his California orgo tests I could probably do very well on it. That's a function of my professor actually teaching me the material in a way I can understand and grasp.

In the case of my school, that's exactly what the low averages meant. Please don't assume that your school was somehow exceptional and genuinely challenging with smarter students, whereas other people's schools were just stupidly hard and mindless just for the sake of it. That's very condescending.

 

[Lost in Translation]

In the case of my school, that's exactly what the low averages meant. Please don't assume that your school was somehow exceptional and genuinely challenging with smarter students, whereas other people's schools were just stupidly hard and mindless just for the sake of it. That's very condescending.

If people were actually being taught how to think about a new and difficult topic, why are they still getting low averages over and over? On the first exam I can understand that because it's new. But by the second midterm, if [figurative] you are as good a student as you claim you are, your grade should go up. That they stay down is either a reflection on the professor's ineptitude (just because you're a Nobel Laureate doesn't make you a good teacher; just because someone is a HoF player doesn't make them a good coach) or the students' lack of knowledge about the material or ability to grasp it.

 

[Lost in Translation]

I don't understand giving exams where the best student achieves only 60%. Instructor, did you or did you not teach the material? If the reason for the low grades is too much material, is there a reason for awarding points, and better grades, for speed. I don't test on anything that wasn't in the material covered in the class. Someone would have to completely fall apart to score less than 60% on one of my exams...

No LizzyM you're too easy on your students you should be intentionally failing them so that your school appears more academically rigorous than others.

Just because someone goes to Harvard doesn't automatically make them smarter than a student scoring in the top 5% of their class at a smaller, less selective college.

 

[Lost in Translation]

Finally someone who actually went to a challenging university.

This girl went to UCLA. A school that's ranked (not much) higher than my alma mater.