When it comes to making the grade, the University’s Charles H. Lundquist College is all about business.
The school — concerned with evidence of grade inflation and aware of problems in variance and fairness of grading — implemented a new guideline this fall to ensure that grades stay within certain ranges.
The implementation of such a policy is a first in the 108-year history of the College of Business and could, according to business school personnel, affect students and teachers alike.
“I think it’s very unlikely that it would affect anybody systematically,” Associate Dean Ray King said. “But it will affect everybody.”
The standards, which outline average grade point ranges by class type, require teachers to ensure overall class GPAs fall within set models. For example, GPAs for undergraduate pre-business classes should fall between 2.3 and 2.8, while GPAs for undergraduate core classes in the major program should fall between 2.6 and 3.1.
Foreseeably, such requirements could force teachers to curve overachieving classes, thereby reducing the number of A’s and B’s given out.
“It’s not reasonable that everyone achieves excellence,” King said. “Instructors need to make course work sufficiently rigorous so it is possible to tell the difference between excellence and mediocrity.”
And to help ensure such evaluation takes place, the business school could potentially take action if teachers fail to follow the new standards.
“If the college has a policy and the instructor doesn’t adhere, that is something they would be evaluated on,” King said.
Carla Meeske, a marketing teacher in the business school’s minor program, told her BA 317 class that she would stand up for her students’ performance if it was exceptional, but conceded that the school is serious in its efforts to deter grade inflation.
“This is not a request,” Meeske said. “This is a ‘You do it or else.’”
But for James Terborg, who frequently teaches MGMT 321 — a requirement for all business majors — the grading guidelines are recommendations and nothing else.
“This is the case where it is a guideline and not a requirement,” said Terborg, who has been at the University since 1980. “That’s my interpretation.”
The guidelines, which have not previously been made public to students of the business school, were implemented to preempt potential problems. While King said grade inflation hasn’t been a significant problem in the college, it is something that has been monitored. Citing a rise in GPAs at some of the nation’s most prestigious institutions, King said the new standards should create a sense of authenticity to academic merits given from the University’s business school.
“This action was to prevent some of the problems that occur at other schools,” he said.
Unsure if the decision to implement such standards is a pioneering achievement at the University, King did say he wouldn’t be surprised if it was a University first.
At the School of Journalism and Communication, the University’s most similar college in size and academic commitment, Dean Tim Gleason said officials work to monitor grade inflation on a quarterly basis, but haven’t implemented any written policy to prevent its existence.
Gleason wouldn’t comment directly on the business school’s guidelines, but did say that as an instructor, he believes evaluation should reflect the quality of work.
“I think it’s important that there be distinctions,” he said.
The business school’s dean, two assistant deans and five department heads — known as the Executive Council — voted this summer to implement the new standards. Previously, there was no such written policy on grading, although King said individual departments within the college had guidelines.
The council first notified faculty and graduate teaching fellows about the guidelines Sept. 3 via a letter distributed within the school. In the letter, the council recognized that variation in student abilities does exist, but noted the guidelines should be broad enough to accommodate objective grading.
“One of the most important roles students and society expect of teachers and educational institutions is the evaluation of student learning and achievement,” the letter said. “If we fail to make these useful and important distinctions, our contribution and value will be debased.”
Related Stories:
Editorial: Other schools should adopt GPA standard
Contact the senior news reporter
at [email protected].