REAL COSTS OF NOMINAL GRADE INFLATION? NEW EVIDENCE FROM STUDENT COURSE EVALUATIONS

“Why should a student invest a great deal of time in working for a class, if everybody gets an A? It is therefore not surprising that students have been found to work less hard in leniently graded classes (Babcock, 2010; Greenwald & Gillmore, 1997b). For example, Greenwald and Gillmore (1997b) added questions about exp…”

“Babcock (2010) provides evidence that harsher grade distributions result are associated with more study time.”

“When college students perceive that the average grade in a class will be an A, they do not try to excel (Babcock, 2010).”

“According to Babcock (2010), students significantly tend to enroll in those courses which are taught by lenient instructors.”

“To examine this, it is necessary to control for differences among individuals.”

“Krautman and Sander (1999) have pointed this out, whereas Babcock (2010) finds that higher nom-”

“The same concern applies, to a smaller degree, to Babcock (2010), which relies on within-teacher, cross-class variation, and finds that higher grading standards increase student study time. Because pedagogical skill is difficult to measure, the only practical way to fully address this concern is to identify incentives…”

“Babcock, P. (2010). Real Costs of Nominal Grade Inflation? New Evidence from Student Course Evaluations. Economic Inquiry, 48(4), 983-996. Backes-Gellner, U. and S. Veen (2008). The Consequences of Central Examinations on Educational Quality Standards and Labour Market Outcomes. Oxford Review of Education, 34(5): 569-…”

“This builds upon descriptive evidence of grade inflation (Sabot & Wakeman-Linn (1991), Johnson (2003), and Babcock (2010)), policy experiments to curb grade inflation (Butcher et al. (2014) and Bar et al.”

“[17] P.”

“…student course satisfaction (Betoret, 2007; Bolliger, 2004; Rivera and Rice, 2002), or just simply student course evaluation (Anderson et al., 2005; Babcock, 2010; Bembenutty, 2009; Chen, 2016; Duggan and Carlson-Bancroft, 2016; Huynh, 2015; Pravikoff and Nadasen, 2015; Stark and Freishtat, 2014).”

“…suggests that instructor effectiveness (Lee, Yoon, and Lee 2009; Paechter, Maier, and Macher 2010) and instructor leniency (in relation to grading) (Babcock 2010) can be factors in course selection, but we attempted to mitigate for these variables by using matched courses taught by the same…”

“⁴There is relatively little quantitative evidence on the mechanisms for how grading standards might affect achievement, but research at the college level finds a connection between higher anticipated grades and less time spent studying (Babcock, 2010).”

“is Babcock (2010), who addresses concerns related to grade inflation in college.”

“Most notably, in the general university context, Babcock (2010) shows that student effort responds negatively to low grading standards.”

“Many issues surrounding grade inflation have been discussed and investigated in a number of other studies (e.g., Achen and Courant 2009; Babcock 2010; Butcher, McEwan, and Weerapana 2014; Kostal, Kuncel, and Sackett 2016), so it is not the focus of the current study.”

“…2008; Harrison, 2007; Malmstrom, 2006); 6. future success of the student after the course (Sadler, 2009); 7. students’ evaluation of faculty (Babcock, 2010; Centra, 2003; Germain & Scandura, 2005; Krautmann & Sander, 1999; Millea & Grimes, 2002; Nelson & Lynch, 1984; Olds & Crumbley,…”

“4 Johnson (2003), Pressman (2007) and Babcock (2010) all suggest that a further real cost of grade inflation is that students tend to work less hard, and learn less, when good grades are relatively easy to come by.”

“Babcock (2010) finds evidence that efficiency concerns are important, with inflated grades seemingly reducing student effort.”

“When current college students enrolled in a course where a grade of A was commonly expected, they invested 50 percent less study time then when they enrolled in a course where C was the commonly expected grade (Babcock, 2010).”

“This builds upon descriptive evidence on the heterogeneity of grading policies over time and across departments (Babcock (2010), Johnson (2003), Sabot & WakemanLinn (1991)), policy experiments to reduce grading differences (Butcher et al. (2014), Bar et al.”

“However, the study time period was relatively short, and so we believe this would not be a significant confounding factor.(47)”

“In another instance, it was reported that grades have increased from 2.83 to 2.97 between 1993 and 2004 (Babcock, 2010).”

“If their entry knowledge puts them ahead, they spend their time going further (Allgood 2001; Babcock 2010; Babcock and Marks 2011).”

“4 In higher education, inflated grades are associated with lower study effort (Babcock 2010; Babcock and Marks 2011), and graded assignments in economics courses tend to increase effort and course performance relative to ungraded work (Grove and Wasserman 2006; Grodner and Rupp 2013; Artés and Rahona…”

“These problems include their realistic fears that increasing rigor will lead to low marks on student evaluations (BABCOCK 2010); their declining capacity for accurate assessment due to larger class sizes and decreasing teaching support services (BOUND, LOVENHEIM and TURNER 2009); as well as the…”

“We also note that students’ effort levels (Babcock 2010) across courses and years may vary and affect the grade distribution of a course from year to year.”

“8See for example: Kang (1985), Betts and Grogger (2003), Figlio and Lucas (2005), and Babcock (2010).”

“Similarly, Babcock (2010) finds that study time at college is lower in courses with better grades.”

“It is generally believed that grades do not carry the same quality as before due to grade inflation (Babcock, 2010; Henderson, 2011; Kariya, 2011; Kuhn, Warren, Maletta, & Branford, 2011; Sadler, 2009; Smith & Fleisher, 2011; Qiang & Wolff, 2009).”

“Student evaluations that reward instructors for low expectations and high grades help to reinforce this pattern (Babcock 2010).”

“Lenient grading lowers effort: holding the course and the instructor fixed, Babcock (2010) finds that study time is about half as large when the class expects an A as when it expects a C. Students of teachers with higher grading standards do better in later math courses (Gershenson, Holt, and…”

“Alternatively, false test scores may lead students to overestimate their ability and put less effort into their studies (Babcock, 2010).”

“Studies have shown that when grades are highly inflated, it negatively impacts student’s motivation to study hard [3], and students receiving inflated grades are not well-grounded in the fundamentals of the course material, which may lead to difficulties in upper-level courses [1].”

“Babcock (2009), in surveying a large number of students at the University of California, San Diego, concluded that”