Grades

For almost everyone connected to higher education winter break is behind us. Fall grades have arrived and were a cause for celebration or concern. It is the concern that I want to address, especially for those students whose grades were middling. The role that higher education and majors play as promissory notes for the future has led to the encroachment of what might be termed corporatized thinking about the meaning of grades – especially in terms of ROI (return on investment for payers – often parents) and KPIs (key performance indicators for students). I would propose, as a faculty member and as a parent of a university student, that this mindset obscures something more important about growth and maturation of our students.

This is not a call to disregard grades. They are one of the important ways to measure student success, and underestimating the value of “good” grades is also an error. One of the best indicators for a student’s smooth entry into graduate or professional school is a high GPA (let’s not even get into the role grade inflation plays in all this). But the degree to which they provide an evaluation of key aspects of a student’s maturation and personal growth into adulthood is much more a debatable point.

We ask grades to do a lot of work. They capture mastery of course material, and they provide a measure of student success. But the behind-the-scenes work of students may be more important even in the face of grades that seem lackluster. This includes growing time management skills, professionalizing organization skills, self-discipline, and where applicable, the ability to collaborate. Can these processes be captured by the difference between an A- and a B+, or a B- and a C+? Between a 91 and an 89? We want to see our students set up for adult life and because grades are the most visible measurement tool we place a great deal of emphasis on them when other, more valuable and longer-term changes are happening even if less visibly.

The temptation to rely on the kind of thinking that emphasizes “return on investment” or “key performance indicators” also masks processes of change going on within our students’ support system. These approaches offer us a measure of control over the changes our students are experiencing but that is more of an illusion than not. They are, in part by our own design, slipping further and further from our control as they undergo the processes of independence and maturation that is part of the college and university experience.

So by all means keep an eye on a student’s grades. But also focus on the other ways to map change, success and growth. We should be active supporters of that growth, maturation and independence process and work to loosen our grips over the more granular measurement opportunities no matter how appealing they are. Finally, these changes, and the independence they bring will be a welcome sign of success.