UTD’s commitment to outdated, harsh grading breeds anti-intellectualism

Anxiety settles deep in my chest, looming large as I read each exam question to myself. An hour and 20 minutes later, my heart hammers as I hand my jumbled papers to the preoccupied TA. The feeling comes over me again two weeks later as I check my grade. Unsurprisingly, I’m left disappointed.  

Over my 14 years of education, I’ve become quite familiar with the uneasy feeling I get when presented with a number or letter signifying how I’ve done in a class. My satisfaction with high letters in my history, language and humanities classes suddenly disappears at the sight of lower ones in math or science. Ironically, the classes I perform poorly in are, more often than not, the ones in which I feel I am learning the most. Friends of mine share similar sentiments, like one who improved her writing skills greatly during a semester of rhetoric yet received a B- as a final grade. As burnout inevitably encroaches, it’s increasingly evident that outcome-based grading — which relies on assigning numerical or letter grades — is unsuccessful in general, especially at UTD, and needs to be replaced. 

Founded to establish a method of uniformity in student evaluations, the letter grading system became popular throughout the 1900s, modeled after Yale University President Ezra Stiles’ arrangement of student ratings. While this structure of evaluating student learning may benefit university administrators, it troubles students as they take in multitudes of information with little time to process and intense pressure to succeed. As university students seek out knowledge, letter grades only hinder their exploration by prioritizing performance over learning.

As university students seek out knowledge, letter grades only hinder their exploration by prioritizing performance over learning.

In addition to hindering exploration, letter and number grades fuel the dissatisfaction around academics while leaving little room for feedback. In fact, studies show that a student’s perception of their own academic competence and ability to perform well impacts academic performance, especially as education progresses. Further, low grades are correlated with poor self-perception among students, which can lead to a cycle of poor grades and poor academic performance over time. Assigning an arbitrary grade to a student without requiring instructors to detail where improvements can be made only reinforces a student’s negative self-perceptions without providing them any motivation to improve.  

Erratic grading, oftentimes inconsistent from professor to professor, also undermines the purpose of learning and creates unnecessary stress and competition among students. Pressure to score highly in hopes of landing a seat at a prestigious graduate program or internship often clouds students’ motivations behind pursuing education. Losing sight of the intent of gaining long term knowledge, students often consume copious and dense information serving their short term memory, only to forget key concepts after the final exam. The price of cramming over a short period is considerable too, as students often experience intense periods of stress during exam seasons. Combined, the improper motivations and high stress among students creates a toxic culture of competition. 

Lastly, the letter grading system rewards students with better memory and prior knowledge while deterring those who consistently work to improve over time in any given class. For example, the final score of a student who started the semester with failing grades but showed significant improvements during the second half will never appropriately reflect the new knowledge they gained or the skills they learned in the process. On the contrary, a student who finds it easy to understand concepts in a class or one with prior knowledge will likely earn a higher grade despite lower overall effort.  

Consistently showing students that their efforts to learn are not as important as their initial understanding breeds students who resent the current education system and discourages them from pursuing learning for their own sake. Further, when a university is centered away from the pursuit of gaining more knowledge and rather in the pursuit of rigid student evaluations which don’t serve students in the slightest, societies are more susceptible to misinformation and stagnation. With anti-intellectualism already on the rise, our university’s ignorance to the ways in which it is failing students academically only contributes to the problem.

Consistently showing students that their efforts to learn are not as important as their initial understanding breeds students who resent the current education system and discourages them from pursuing learning for their own sake.

Specifically, UTD has an academic culture that makes burnout inevitable. Given our university’s rigid GPA scale, where an A- warrants a 3.67 and a B- a 2.67 despite the Princeton Review standard of 3.7 and 2.7 respectively, students have little room for learning through trial and error. Similarly, the strict course requirements for STEM majors make it harder for these students to explore areas of interest outside what they may deem vital for their future professions. These uncompromising standards make alternative grading systems even more necessary because they give us a chance to restore the love of learning in university students who have long felt it a chore to acquire knowledge through the function of current education. 

Other universities across the U.S. have long implemented solutions to the ineffective grading system. A plethora of colleges and universities, notably Brown University and the University of California Santa Cruz have implemented narrative assessments written by professors to give adequate feedback about student’s performance. In addition, many institutions have also opted to expand pass/fail and no GPA courses to alleviate the burden of grades on students. Finally, institutions are also starting to adopt labor-based grading practices in which students are evaluated based on the effort and work put into a course rather than their performance on an exam.  

But despite growing disdain for traditional grading, UTD has yet to adopt adequate alternative grading systems. Aside from the opportunity to take a few pass/fail electives, UTD has not implemented narrative assessments or labor based grading for its students.  

While some may argue that shifting away from the letter grading system may be incompatible with graduate school admissions, the letter grading system itself makes it difficult to determine a student’s real academic achievements because of the prevalence of grade inflation. Inconsistencies in grading both within classes at the same university and between classes across different universities already make it difficult for graduate schools to determine how a student has performed. For instance, students at universities such as Harvard and Yale experience high grade inflation while others experience grade deflation.

The letter grading system itself makes it difficult to determine a student’s real academic achievements because of the prevalence of grade inflation.

Others argue that shifting away from traditional grading methods may reduce students’ academic motivation. However, research disproves this, even suggesting that alternative grading systems improve motivation. 

Ultimately, taking into account UTD’s harsh grading policies and strict major requirements with little interdisciplinary focus, alternative grading systems could significantly decrease stressful circumstances for students while simultaneously encouraging exploration of new knowledge and centering learning instead of performance. To achieve this, the UT Board of Regents and UTD leadership should explore and expand alternative grading systems, allowing them to foster a student body that views learning positively.