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Journal of Education for Business
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Is Grade Inflation Related to Faculty Status?
Boualem Kezim , Susan E. Pariseau & Frances Quinn
To cite this article: Boualem Kezim , Susan E. Pariseau & Frances Quinn (2005) Is Grade
Inflation Related to Faculty Status?, Journal of Education for Business, 80:6, 358-364, DOI:
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Is Grade Inflation Related to
Faculty Status?
BOUALEM KEZIM
SUSAN E. PARISEAU
FRANCES QUINN
Merrimack College
North Andover, MA
I
n the Chronicle of Higher Education,
Kohn (2002) reported charges of grade
inflation at Harvard as early as 1894. He
cited the Harvard University Report of
the Committee on Raising the Standard,
1894, as stating “Grades A and B are
sometimes given too readily—Grade A
for work of not very high merit, and
Grade B for work not far above mediocrity” (p. B7). Advancing forward over
100 years, in October 2001, the Boston
Globe headlines proclaimed, “Harvard’s
Quiet Secret: Rampant Grade Inflation”
and “Harvard’s Honors Fall to the Merely Average” (Healy, 2001a, 2001b).
Healy’s reports (2001a) in the Boston
Globe suggested that grade inflation at
Harvard was exacerbated by the war in
Vietnam and that “inflated grades
became the moral equivalent of opposition to the war” (p. A1). Whereas grade
inflation seems to be most rampant at
Harvard, other elite universities have
capped honors. For example, although
“91 percent of Harvard seniors graduated with honors in 2001, the honors rate
was 51 percent, 44 percent, 42 percent,
40 percent, 25 percent, and 8 percent at
Yale, Princeton, Brown, Dartmouth,
Columbia, and Cornell,” respectively
(Healy, 2001b, p. B1).
In 1966, 22% of Harvard undergraduate students received As, and in 1973,
31% of undergraduates at Princeton
received As (Ivy League Grade Infla-
358
Journal of Education for Business
ABSTRACT. The authors performed
a statistical analysis to investigate
whether grade inflation existed in the
business school at a small private college in the northeast region of the
United States. The results showed that
grade inflation existed and exhibited a
linear trend over a 20-year period.
The authors found that grade inflation
was related to faculty status with significant differences seen between
mean grade point averages of students
being taught by tenured and adjunct
faculty and between those students
taught by nontenured and adjunct faculty. They also found that average
grades given by adjunct faculty were
higher than those of either tenured or
nontenured faculty. Thus, the results
indicate the increased use of adjunct
faculty exacerbates grade inflation in
higher education.
tion, 2002). By 1996 and 1997, respectively, 46% of Harvard students and 43%
of Princeton students received As (Ivy
League Grade Inflation, 2002). In 1997,
88% of all grades at Princeton were
above B range. Between the 1995–1996
and 1999–2000 school years, Central
Michigan University’s examination of
grades showed an increase in grade
inflation in all academic colleges, except
the health professions (Central Michigan
University, n.d.).
Arthur Levine, president of the Teachers’ College at Columbia University, and
Jeanette S. Cureton (1998) compiled
results from a national study of under-
graduates at all types of universities. The
results of the study showed that grades
of A grew from 7% to 26% and grades of
C fell from 25% to 9%, respectively, for
the years 1969 and 1993.
Rojstaczer’s (2003b) results suggest
that grade point averages (GPAs)
increased on average by 0.6 from 1967
to 2001. Although both public and private schools showed trends indicating
grade inflation over that 35-year period,
the mean GPA at private schools was 0.3
higher than public schools, and the rate
of inflation was also 25% to 30% higher
at these institutions. Over the past 35
years, GPAs increased by approximately
0.15 per decade. In a previous article by
Rojstaczer (2003a), he suggested that
the “marketplace mentality,” in which
employers, parents, and students all
expect higher grades, may be responsible for grade inflation. Parents, in particular, suppose that if they are to pay high
costs for education, their students should
receive higher grades to obtain better job
opportunities.
Several researchers have examined
the relationship between grades and status of college instructors with respect to
either tenure or their full-time or adjunct
relationship with their institutions.
Moore and Trahan (1998) examined the
hypothesis that untenured and part-time
faculty submit higher grades than
tenured faculty. They argued that “since
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merit, tenure, and promotion decisions
are based on the performance of an
instructor in the classroom which is predominately measured by course evaluations, the less secure the faculty position, the greater the benefits of using a
grading scale based on low academic
standards” (Gohmann & McCrickard,
2001, p. 2). Moore and Trahan sampled
417 introductory courses. These courses
were across disciplines and taught by
faculty of all ranks. They concluded that
untenured faculty and part-time faculty
tended to grade higher than tenured faculty. They offered reasons substantially
different from those of Rojstaczer
(2003a). They concluded that higher
grade inflation from adjunct and
untenured faculty could result from lack
of teaching experience and therefore an
inability of the faculty to distinguish
grades. They also offered the explanation that new teachers are better trained
and more motivated, which leads to
more effective teaching. Finally, they
concluded that untenured faculty may
“buy” tenure through higher faculty
evaluations, which have a direct correlation to higher grades.
Greenwald and Gilmore (1997) similarly found that if students are given
grades even one standard deviation
above, rather than below, the mean, they
will increase the instructor’s percentile
rank in student ratings by one full standard deviation.
Gohmann and McCrickard (2001)
examined two of Moore and Trahan’s
(1998) grade inflation relationships: (a)
new faculty is less experienced in determining grades and (b) tenure and grade
inflation are linked. They examined
grade distributions of faculty in a southern college school of business during the
8 years from fall 1991 to spring 1998.
They concluded that faculty grade better
as they gain experience in distinguishing
good student performance from poorer
performance. Using time series data,
they found that untenured faculty actually grade harder over time. Their results
showed that untenured faculty members
raise their grading standards as they
approach tenure, which supports the
notion that faculty start off grading
leniently, but gradually grade harder as
they gain experience. Their results do
not, however, support the hypothesis that
untenured faculty give higher grades to
receive better evaluation results.
Sonner (2000) conducted a study
over a 2-year period at a small public
university where approximately 70% of
the courses are taught by part-time faculty. Initial analyses indicated that class
size, subject, and class level were factors related to average class grades.
After controlling for these factors using
analysis of covariance (ANCOVA),
Sonner found that average grades given
by adjunct instructors were still significantly higher than average grades given
by full-time faculty. Sonner suggested
that it was reasonable to conclude that
adjunct faculty is reluctant to give lower
grades that might result in student complaints and failure to be rehired in subsequent quarters.
During the period from 1980–1999,
Eiszler (2002) studied 983,491 students
in over 37,000 sections at a mid-sized
public university in the midwestern
United States. The number of students
expecting to receive grades of A and Awas mostly stable during the 1980s but
increased during the 1990s with 47% of
the students reporting expectations of A
or A- in spring 1999. He found a similar
pattern in examining ratings of teaching. Eiszler found the correlation
between expected grades and teaching
ratings to be statistically significant. At
this public university, a new president
was hired in 1992 and established the
principle of the “student as a customer”
(Eiszler, p. 499). Although the faculty
was encouraged to provide multiple
indicators of teaching effectiveness, student ratings were considered to be the
primary basis for evaluation. Thus, there
is some evidence that the grade inflation
found at the university was driven by
the extensive use of student evaluations
of teaching in the reappointment,
tenure, and promotion process.
METHOD
In this study, we examined the GPAs
of business students at a small private
undergraduate college in the northeast
region of the United States over a 20year period from fall 1983 through
spring 2003. During fall 1983, approximately 44% of the students enrolled at
the college were studying business
administration. In spring 2003, approximately 39% were enrolled in business.
The ratio of students by gender
remained fairly stationary with male
students representing 57% of the population in 1983 and 56% in 2003. During
spring 2003, the ethnicity of more than
93% of the students was classified as
Caucasian or unknown. Most of the students enrolled at the institution were of
traditional college age (i.e., they
enrolled at the college immediately following high school).
During the 20-year period from
1983–2003, 29% of business administration courses at the college we studied
were taught by adjunct professors. The
percentages ranged from a low of 23%
in 1988–1989 to a high of 41% in
1999–2000. Three of the highest four
percentages occurred during the last 4
years of the study. The increasing use of
adjunct professors is endemic in higher
education today. A Yale study concluded that “full-time tenure-track faculty
taught only 30 percent of Yale’s classes,
while adjunct instructors and graduate
students taught the other 70 percent”
(Arenson, 1999, p. B4). A 2004 report
in Business Week concluded that “Bschools are relying more on adjuncts
with fewer students getting doctorates
in business and fewer of those choosing
to teach” (Chambers, 2004, p. 94).
We performed a statistical analysis to
investigate whether the widely reported
grade inflation existed at the institution
we studied and to test whether there
were differences in mean GPAs among
students of adjunct, untenured, and
tenured faculty.
RESULTS
We examined the grade distributions
for all classes, both introductory and
advanced, taught in the business school
at the college over a 20-year period
from fall 1983 to spring 2003. The data
consisted of the grades recorded for any
faculty member employed during that
period of time. We grouped the faculty
members into three categories: (a)
adjuncts, (b) nontenured, and (c)
tenured. This partition allowed us to
compare the mean GPAs of students
taught by faculty among the three categories, and we used it to investigate how
July/August 2005
359
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ANOVA: Differences Among
Faculty
priately used when variances cannot be
assumed equal, to perform a post hoc
pairwise comparison to determine
which means differed significantly. As
Table 3 shows, we found statistically
360
Journal of Education for Business
Nontenure
Tenure
3.1
3.0
2.9
2.8
2.7
2.6
2.5
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
Sequence Number
FIGURE 1. Mean grade point averages (GPAs) by faculty classification
and year.
TABLE 1. Descriptive Statistics of Grade Point Averages by Faculty
Category
Category
Sample size
M
SD
Adjunct
Nontenured
Tenured
20
20
20
2.8268
2.7363
2.6872
0.1366
0.1066
0.0816
Total
60
2.7501
0.1233
TABLE 2. ANOVA Results of Grade Point Averages by Faculty Category
Source
To determine whether the difference
in the mean GPAs we observed (see Figure 1) was statistically significant, we
performed a one-way ANOVA. Table 1
shows the descriptive statistics of the
GPAs of students taught by the three
faculty categories and Table 2 contains a
summary of the ANOVA results, which
indicate clear evidence of significant
differences between at least two classifications of faculty.
The Levene test results (p = .003)
indicate that the assumption of homogeneity of variances is violated. We
used the Tamhane test, which is appro-
significant differences between adjunct
and tenured faculty and, to a lesser
extent, between adjunct and nontenured
faculty. Differences in mean GPAs
between students taught by tenured fac-
Adjunct
GPA
grade inflation varied among them. We
attempted to answer the following questions: (a) Does the adjunct faculty have
a tendency to inflate grades in an effort
to retain positions as suggested by Sonner (2000)? (b) Does the nontenured
faculty inflate grades to help secure
tenure and promotions as suggested by
Eiszler (2002)? To respond to these
questions, we first performed an analysis of variance (ANOVA) to determine
whether there were significant differences in mean GPAs for students taught
by the three categories of faculty. Next,
to measure the difference in the mean
GPAs given among these groups, we
performed a multiple regression analysis. Moreover, we performed a paired t
test to determine whether differences
existed in the mean GPAs given by faculty before and after tenure.
Figure 1 shows plots of GPAs of students taught by adjunct, nontenured, and
tenured faculty over the 20-year period
from fall 1983 through spring 2003. An
examination of these plots reveals differences among the mean GPAs of students
taught by the three faculty groups. Overall, and for the majority of years, the
mean GPAs of students taught by
adjunct faculty are higher than those
taught by either the tenured or nontenured faculty. Clearly, beginning with
the academic year 1993–1994, the mean
GPAs of students taught by adjunct faculty are consistently higher than those of
students taught by the others. During
that same period of time, the variability
increased radically.
Between groups
Within groups
Total
Sum of squares
df
MS
F
p
0.201
0.697
2
57
0.100
0.012
8.209
.001
0.898
59
TABLE 3. Post Hoc Comparison
Factor
Adjunct compared with nontenured
Adjunct compared with tenured
Nontenured compared with tenured
Mean difference
SE
p
0.0925
0.1397
0.0491
0.0387
0.0356
0.0300
.074
.001
.297
ulty and those taught by nontenured faculty were not significant.
Multiple Regression: Trend and
Status
Next, to measure the difference in the
mean GPAs among these groups, we
developed a multiple regression model
for the GPAs, incorporating trend with
dummy variables to account for the
three categories of faculty classification.
The multiple regression model was
defined as follows:
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Model 1: GPA = β0 + β1 year + β2 adj +
β3NT + ε,
where GPA = grade point average; year =
the year of the study, 1–20; adj = 1 if
adjunct professors, and 0 otherwise; and
NT = 1 if nontenured, 0 otherwise. The
variable tenured was the reference group.
We assumed the error terms to be independent and identically normally distributed with mean zero and variance σ2.
The fitted model we obtained was:
E(GPA) = 2.569 + 0.0113 year + 0.140
adj + 0.049NT, with R2 = .507 and an
adjusted R2 = .48. Table 4 shows the
estimated coefficients we obtained with
the regression model.
All the coefficients, with the exception
of the nontenured variable, were highly
significant and it appeared that we had a
good fit. A significant positive coefficient
on the variable year indicated the mean
GPAs did increase at a rate of 0.0113
points (on a 4-point scale) for each year
over the study period. The coefficient on
the variable adj was also significant,
inducing that there was a significant
mean difference between the adjunct
variable and the tenured variable. On the
one hand, the GPAs for students graded
by adjunct faculty were higher, on average, by 0.140 points. On the other hand,
the mean difference between nontenured
and tenured faculty had weak statistical
significance. The GPAs for students
graded by nontenured faculty were higher, on average, by 0.049 points.
DISCUSSION
Multiple Regression: Trend,
Status, and Autocorrelated Errors
Because data collected over time are
often found to exhibit autocorrelations
among the observations, we used the
Durbin-Watson (DW) test to determine
if serial correlation was present. The
value of the Durbin-Watson statistic was
0.891, clearly indicating positive serial
correlation among the residuals.
Because DW = 0.891 < 1.00 = DW
lower bound with three independent
variables, we concluded that the residuals were positively correlated at the 5%
level of significance. Furthermore, a
plot of the residuals clearly exhibited a
known pattern of clusters of residuals
with the same sign, thus illustrating the
presence of positive serial correlation.
Therefore, the assumption of uncorrelated errors in the regression model was
violated. This definitively invalidated
the inferences (t and p) we made using
the usual assumption of independent
error terms. Moreover, a plot of the
residual autocorrelations for the first 16
lags showed dependence among the
error terms with a Ljung-Box statistic
equal to 70.061 (p = 0.000). The results
of this test supported our findings and,
thus, we concluded that the residuals
could not be considered as white noise.
The first step in correcting the model
was to replace the presumed independent
errors in the regression model for GPAs
with a possibly dependent series of noise
terms, ut, t = 1, 2, …, n. An analysis of the
residual autocorrelations and partial autocorrelations indicated that residuals could
be modeled using an autoregressive
model of order one, ut = φut-1 + εt, t = 1, 2,
…, n. We developed the following multiple regression model, which incorporated
autocorrelated errors:
Model 2: GPA = β0 + β1 year + β2 adj +
β3NT + u,
where the random variable u follows an
autoregressive process of order one. A
SAS program (version 8.01, SAS Institute, Cary, NC) generated the results we
present in Table 5.
The multiple regression analysis provided evidence that, overall, GPAs significantly increased at a rate of 0.0075
per year over the period from fall 1983
through spring 2003. Although using
the model incorporating autocorrelated
errors (Model 2) provided results similar to the first multiple regression analysis we presented (Model 1), the values
of the estimates and their respective t
values have been affected by incorporating an autocorrelation parameter among
the error terms. In Model 2, all the coefficients were significant except nontenured. This implies that there was no
significant difference in the average
GPAs of students graded by nontenured
and tenured faculty. In Model 1, we
TABLE 4. Least Squares Estimates
Variable
Constant
Year
Adjunct
Nontenured
Coefficient
t(56)
p
2.569
0.0113
0.140
0.049
89.054
5.671
4.967
1.7460
.000
.000
.000
.086
TABLE 5. Maximum Likelihood Estimates
Variable
Constant
Year
Adjunct
Nontenured
Autoregressive parameter
Estimate
SE
t(55)
2.6097
0.0075
0.1136
0.0738
0.6354
0.04414
0.00265
0.05656
0.04998
0.10356
59.12**
2.84**
2.01*
1.48
6.14**
*p = .05. **p = .01.
July/August 2005
361
faculty before and after tenure appeared
similar. We did, however, notice an
upward trend in GPAs for students who
were graded by professors both before
and after the faculty members were
appointed tenure. This is interesting
because the faculty have been ordered
according to the year in which they were
awarded tenure. During the 20-year time
period, Professor 1 was the first to
receive tenure; Professor 7 was the last.
This provides some additional evidence
of grade inflation over time because the
first faculty member awarded tenure
tended to grade lower than the last.
A paired t test (Table 6) showed that,
according to student GPAs, there was
no significant difference in the way
professors graded before and after
receiving tenure. This corroborated our
visual inspection of the graph shown in
Figure 2.
Conclusion
An examination of grades in business
administration courses at this small pri-
362
Journal of Education for Business
After Tenure
3.5
3
Paired t Test: Before and After
Tenure
To determine whether grades given by
faculty were higher before tenure, we
examined the mean student GPAs by
year for all faculty teaching at the college during the period of study who met
the following criteria: (a) were awarded
tenure during the 20-year period, (b)
were at the college 5 years before gaining tenure and these 5 years occurred
during the period of study, and (c) were
at the college 5 years after gaining
tenure and these 5 years occurred during
the period of study. Joint use of these
three criteria resulted in a sample size of
seven. Figure 2 shows the mean GPAs of
the seven professors for the 5 years
before and after tenure. The graph shows
that for two faculty members, the averages were lower after tenure with the
remaining faculty showing increases in
average GPAs of their students. Overall,
the mean GPAs of students graded by
vate undergraduate institution revealed
that the percentage of grades in the A
category (A and A-) did not indicate the
same dramatic climb as seen in the Ivy
League universities. During the 1st year
of our study (1983–1984), 23.6% of the
grades were in the A category and 24.3%
were in the C category (C-, C, C+). During the final year of the study
(2002–2003), the percentages of As and
Cs were 26.4 and 20.9, respectively. The
percentage of A category grades (26.4%)
was far less than the 47% reported by
Eiszler (2002) in a 1999 study of a midsized public university in the midwestern United States. A grade of C was far
more prevalent (20.9%) than the 9%
reported by Levine and Cureton (1998)
in a 1993 study of higher education.
Rojstaczer (2003b) reported a GPA
increase of 0.15 per decade, whereas,
using our multiple regression analysis
(Model 2), incorporating autoregressive
errors, we found an increase of only
0.075 per decade. At the same time,
using Model 1, which incorrectly
assumed independent error terms, we
Before Tenure
2.5
GPA
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observed mild significance (p = 0.086)
between these two faculty classifications. The annual rate of increase in
GPAs found in Model 2 (0.0075) was
less than the annual increase found in
Model 1 (0.0113), a decrease of 34%.
The difference in mean GPAs of students of adjunct faculty and those of
tenured faculty decreased to 0.1136 in
Model 2 from 0.140 in Model 1, a
decrease of approximately 19%. Clearly, the addition of the autoregressive
parameter had changed the coefficients
and provided evidence that the change
in average GPAs resulting from trend
and from faculty classification was less
than initially suspected.
The autoregressive parameter has an
estimated value of 0.6354 with a highly
significant t value, t(55) = 6.14. As
expected, this indicated a moderate
autocorrelation among the observations.
The autocorrelations of the residuals
from Model 2 were all negligible. The p
value for the Ljung-Box statistic,
defined as a weighted sum of squares of
residual autocorrelations for a group of
consecutive lags, was not significant.
This provided evidence that the errors
were white noise and supported the use
of the multiple regression model with
autocorrelated errors (Model 2).
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
1
2
3
4
5
Individual Professor
6
7
FIGURE 2. Plot of grade point averages (GPAs) by professor before and
after tenure.
TABLE 6. Paired Two Samples Test for Means
Status
Before tenure
After tenure
Years
M
SE
t(6)
p
5
5
2.5991
2.6923
0.2494
0.2883
–1.0987
.3140
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found an increase of 0.113 per decade.
Although the results yielded by our
incorrectly stated model were closer to
those reported by Rojstaczer, our corrected results showed less inflation.
Moore and Trahan (1998) concluded
that the grades given by both untenured
and part-time faculty tended to be higher than those given by tenured faculty
for introductory courses. However, our
study, which included grades for both
introductory and advanced courses,
negated the conclusion with respect to
the nontenured faculty, it supported the
conclusion regarding the adjunct faculty. In Model 2, the coefficient for
adjunct was significant with an increase
of 0.1136 over the mean GPA of students graded by tenured faculty.
One of the explanations offered by
Moore and Trahan (1998) was that
untenured faculty may “buy tenure” by
giving higher grades. From our paired
t test results, comparing the mean
GPAs of students taught by individual
faculty both before and after tenure,
we found no difference in mean GPAs.
This finding offers additional support
for the lack of significance of the nontenure parameter in our model incorporating autoregressive error terms
(Model 2) and provides additional evidence for disagreement with the
hypothesis that untenured faculty may
buy tenure. Thus, our findings support
those of Gohmann and McCrickard
(2001).
In a study conducted over a 2-year
period at a small public university where
approximately 70% of the courses were
taught by part-time faculty, the author
found that the grades of students taught
by adjunct professors were higher (Sonner 2000). In our study, conducted over
a 20-year period, we came to the same
conclusion for a small private institution
where only 29% of the courses were
taught by adjunct professors. Sonner
demonstrated that a relationship exists
between grades and faculty status using
ANCOVA, whereas, in our study, we
quantified the relationship using a multiple regression model incorporating autocorrelated errors.
Eiszler (2002) found positive correlation between expected grades and teaching evaluations and surmised that extensive use of student evaluations of
teaching in the reappointment process
could lead to grade inflation. This, and
the argument proposed by both Moore
and Trahan (1998) and Sonner (2000),
stating that less secure faculty reap
more benefits from giving high grades,
may be supported by our findings. The
adjunct faculty members have the least
secure positions in the academic environment and so, to maintain their positions, they may inflate grades to obtain
higher teaching evaluations.
Despite the call for increased rigor
and differentiation in the grading
process, an increase in the proportion of
courses taught by adjunct faculty may
contribute to increased grade inflation
in higher education. Our 20-year study
showed a significant increase in students’ GPAs at a rate of 0.0075 per year
for all faculty classifications. The mean
GPAs for students of adjunct faculty
were 0.1136 points (on a 4-point scale)
higher than the mean GPAs of students
of tenured faculty. Thus, an increase in
the proportion of courses taught by
adjunct faculty will result in additional
grade inflation.
Limitations and Future Research
Generalization of the results of this
study is limited because of the use of
data from one business school at a small
private undergraduate college in the
northeast region of the United States
with a homogeneous student population
with respect to age, ethnicity, and domicile. However, we provided a methodology that may be used by others in the
study of institutions with greater diversity in their demographics.
NOTE
For further information, please direct correspondence to: Susan E. Pariseau, Merrimack College,
Girard School of Business and International Commerce, 315 Turnpike Street, North Andover, MA
01845, susan.pariseau@merrimack.edu.
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USA Today. Retrieved February 24, 2004, from
http://www.usatoday.com
Kohn, A. (2002, November 8). The dangerous
myth of grade inflation. Chronicle of Higher
Education, p. B7.
Levine, A., & Cureton, J. S. (1998). When hope
and fear collide: A portrait of today’s college
student. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Moore, M., & Trahan, R. (1998). Tenure status
and grading practices. Sociological Perspectives, 41(4), 775–781.
Rojstaczer, S. (2003a, January 28). Where all
grades are above average. Washington Post, p.
A21.
Rojstaczer, S. (2003b, March 17). Grade inflation
at American colleges and universities.
Retrieved February 24, 2004, from http://www.
gradeinflation.com
Sonner, B. S. (2000). A is for ‘adjunct’: Examining grade inflation in higher education. Journal
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July/August 2005
363
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Is Grade Inflation Related to Faculty Status?
Boualem Kezim , Susan E. Pariseau & Frances Quinn
To cite this article: Boualem Kezim , Susan E. Pariseau & Frances Quinn (2005) Is Grade
Inflation Related to Faculty Status?, Journal of Education for Business, 80:6, 358-364, DOI:
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Is Grade Inflation Related to
Faculty Status?
BOUALEM KEZIM
SUSAN E. PARISEAU
FRANCES QUINN
Merrimack College
North Andover, MA
I
n the Chronicle of Higher Education,
Kohn (2002) reported charges of grade
inflation at Harvard as early as 1894. He
cited the Harvard University Report of
the Committee on Raising the Standard,
1894, as stating “Grades A and B are
sometimes given too readily—Grade A
for work of not very high merit, and
Grade B for work not far above mediocrity” (p. B7). Advancing forward over
100 years, in October 2001, the Boston
Globe headlines proclaimed, “Harvard’s
Quiet Secret: Rampant Grade Inflation”
and “Harvard’s Honors Fall to the Merely Average” (Healy, 2001a, 2001b).
Healy’s reports (2001a) in the Boston
Globe suggested that grade inflation at
Harvard was exacerbated by the war in
Vietnam and that “inflated grades
became the moral equivalent of opposition to the war” (p. A1). Whereas grade
inflation seems to be most rampant at
Harvard, other elite universities have
capped honors. For example, although
“91 percent of Harvard seniors graduated with honors in 2001, the honors rate
was 51 percent, 44 percent, 42 percent,
40 percent, 25 percent, and 8 percent at
Yale, Princeton, Brown, Dartmouth,
Columbia, and Cornell,” respectively
(Healy, 2001b, p. B1).
In 1966, 22% of Harvard undergraduate students received As, and in 1973,
31% of undergraduates at Princeton
received As (Ivy League Grade Infla-
358
Journal of Education for Business
ABSTRACT. The authors performed
a statistical analysis to investigate
whether grade inflation existed in the
business school at a small private college in the northeast region of the
United States. The results showed that
grade inflation existed and exhibited a
linear trend over a 20-year period.
The authors found that grade inflation
was related to faculty status with significant differences seen between
mean grade point averages of students
being taught by tenured and adjunct
faculty and between those students
taught by nontenured and adjunct faculty. They also found that average
grades given by adjunct faculty were
higher than those of either tenured or
nontenured faculty. Thus, the results
indicate the increased use of adjunct
faculty exacerbates grade inflation in
higher education.
tion, 2002). By 1996 and 1997, respectively, 46% of Harvard students and 43%
of Princeton students received As (Ivy
League Grade Inflation, 2002). In 1997,
88% of all grades at Princeton were
above B range. Between the 1995–1996
and 1999–2000 school years, Central
Michigan University’s examination of
grades showed an increase in grade
inflation in all academic colleges, except
the health professions (Central Michigan
University, n.d.).
Arthur Levine, president of the Teachers’ College at Columbia University, and
Jeanette S. Cureton (1998) compiled
results from a national study of under-
graduates at all types of universities. The
results of the study showed that grades
of A grew from 7% to 26% and grades of
C fell from 25% to 9%, respectively, for
the years 1969 and 1993.
Rojstaczer’s (2003b) results suggest
that grade point averages (GPAs)
increased on average by 0.6 from 1967
to 2001. Although both public and private schools showed trends indicating
grade inflation over that 35-year period,
the mean GPA at private schools was 0.3
higher than public schools, and the rate
of inflation was also 25% to 30% higher
at these institutions. Over the past 35
years, GPAs increased by approximately
0.15 per decade. In a previous article by
Rojstaczer (2003a), he suggested that
the “marketplace mentality,” in which
employers, parents, and students all
expect higher grades, may be responsible for grade inflation. Parents, in particular, suppose that if they are to pay high
costs for education, their students should
receive higher grades to obtain better job
opportunities.
Several researchers have examined
the relationship between grades and status of college instructors with respect to
either tenure or their full-time or adjunct
relationship with their institutions.
Moore and Trahan (1998) examined the
hypothesis that untenured and part-time
faculty submit higher grades than
tenured faculty. They argued that “since
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merit, tenure, and promotion decisions
are based on the performance of an
instructor in the classroom which is predominately measured by course evaluations, the less secure the faculty position, the greater the benefits of using a
grading scale based on low academic
standards” (Gohmann & McCrickard,
2001, p. 2). Moore and Trahan sampled
417 introductory courses. These courses
were across disciplines and taught by
faculty of all ranks. They concluded that
untenured faculty and part-time faculty
tended to grade higher than tenured faculty. They offered reasons substantially
different from those of Rojstaczer
(2003a). They concluded that higher
grade inflation from adjunct and
untenured faculty could result from lack
of teaching experience and therefore an
inability of the faculty to distinguish
grades. They also offered the explanation that new teachers are better trained
and more motivated, which leads to
more effective teaching. Finally, they
concluded that untenured faculty may
“buy” tenure through higher faculty
evaluations, which have a direct correlation to higher grades.
Greenwald and Gilmore (1997) similarly found that if students are given
grades even one standard deviation
above, rather than below, the mean, they
will increase the instructor’s percentile
rank in student ratings by one full standard deviation.
Gohmann and McCrickard (2001)
examined two of Moore and Trahan’s
(1998) grade inflation relationships: (a)
new faculty is less experienced in determining grades and (b) tenure and grade
inflation are linked. They examined
grade distributions of faculty in a southern college school of business during the
8 years from fall 1991 to spring 1998.
They concluded that faculty grade better
as they gain experience in distinguishing
good student performance from poorer
performance. Using time series data,
they found that untenured faculty actually grade harder over time. Their results
showed that untenured faculty members
raise their grading standards as they
approach tenure, which supports the
notion that faculty start off grading
leniently, but gradually grade harder as
they gain experience. Their results do
not, however, support the hypothesis that
untenured faculty give higher grades to
receive better evaluation results.
Sonner (2000) conducted a study
over a 2-year period at a small public
university where approximately 70% of
the courses are taught by part-time faculty. Initial analyses indicated that class
size, subject, and class level were factors related to average class grades.
After controlling for these factors using
analysis of covariance (ANCOVA),
Sonner found that average grades given
by adjunct instructors were still significantly higher than average grades given
by full-time faculty. Sonner suggested
that it was reasonable to conclude that
adjunct faculty is reluctant to give lower
grades that might result in student complaints and failure to be rehired in subsequent quarters.
During the period from 1980–1999,
Eiszler (2002) studied 983,491 students
in over 37,000 sections at a mid-sized
public university in the midwestern
United States. The number of students
expecting to receive grades of A and Awas mostly stable during the 1980s but
increased during the 1990s with 47% of
the students reporting expectations of A
or A- in spring 1999. He found a similar
pattern in examining ratings of teaching. Eiszler found the correlation
between expected grades and teaching
ratings to be statistically significant. At
this public university, a new president
was hired in 1992 and established the
principle of the “student as a customer”
(Eiszler, p. 499). Although the faculty
was encouraged to provide multiple
indicators of teaching effectiveness, student ratings were considered to be the
primary basis for evaluation. Thus, there
is some evidence that the grade inflation
found at the university was driven by
the extensive use of student evaluations
of teaching in the reappointment,
tenure, and promotion process.
METHOD
In this study, we examined the GPAs
of business students at a small private
undergraduate college in the northeast
region of the United States over a 20year period from fall 1983 through
spring 2003. During fall 1983, approximately 44% of the students enrolled at
the college were studying business
administration. In spring 2003, approximately 39% were enrolled in business.
The ratio of students by gender
remained fairly stationary with male
students representing 57% of the population in 1983 and 56% in 2003. During
spring 2003, the ethnicity of more than
93% of the students was classified as
Caucasian or unknown. Most of the students enrolled at the institution were of
traditional college age (i.e., they
enrolled at the college immediately following high school).
During the 20-year period from
1983–2003, 29% of business administration courses at the college we studied
were taught by adjunct professors. The
percentages ranged from a low of 23%
in 1988–1989 to a high of 41% in
1999–2000. Three of the highest four
percentages occurred during the last 4
years of the study. The increasing use of
adjunct professors is endemic in higher
education today. A Yale study concluded that “full-time tenure-track faculty
taught only 30 percent of Yale’s classes,
while adjunct instructors and graduate
students taught the other 70 percent”
(Arenson, 1999, p. B4). A 2004 report
in Business Week concluded that “Bschools are relying more on adjuncts
with fewer students getting doctorates
in business and fewer of those choosing
to teach” (Chambers, 2004, p. 94).
We performed a statistical analysis to
investigate whether the widely reported
grade inflation existed at the institution
we studied and to test whether there
were differences in mean GPAs among
students of adjunct, untenured, and
tenured faculty.
RESULTS
We examined the grade distributions
for all classes, both introductory and
advanced, taught in the business school
at the college over a 20-year period
from fall 1983 to spring 2003. The data
consisted of the grades recorded for any
faculty member employed during that
period of time. We grouped the faculty
members into three categories: (a)
adjuncts, (b) nontenured, and (c)
tenured. This partition allowed us to
compare the mean GPAs of students
taught by faculty among the three categories, and we used it to investigate how
July/August 2005
359
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ANOVA: Differences Among
Faculty
priately used when variances cannot be
assumed equal, to perform a post hoc
pairwise comparison to determine
which means differed significantly. As
Table 3 shows, we found statistically
360
Journal of Education for Business
Nontenure
Tenure
3.1
3.0
2.9
2.8
2.7
2.6
2.5
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
Sequence Number
FIGURE 1. Mean grade point averages (GPAs) by faculty classification
and year.
TABLE 1. Descriptive Statistics of Grade Point Averages by Faculty
Category
Category
Sample size
M
SD
Adjunct
Nontenured
Tenured
20
20
20
2.8268
2.7363
2.6872
0.1366
0.1066
0.0816
Total
60
2.7501
0.1233
TABLE 2. ANOVA Results of Grade Point Averages by Faculty Category
Source
To determine whether the difference
in the mean GPAs we observed (see Figure 1) was statistically significant, we
performed a one-way ANOVA. Table 1
shows the descriptive statistics of the
GPAs of students taught by the three
faculty categories and Table 2 contains a
summary of the ANOVA results, which
indicate clear evidence of significant
differences between at least two classifications of faculty.
The Levene test results (p = .003)
indicate that the assumption of homogeneity of variances is violated. We
used the Tamhane test, which is appro-
significant differences between adjunct
and tenured faculty and, to a lesser
extent, between adjunct and nontenured
faculty. Differences in mean GPAs
between students taught by tenured fac-
Adjunct
GPA
grade inflation varied among them. We
attempted to answer the following questions: (a) Does the adjunct faculty have
a tendency to inflate grades in an effort
to retain positions as suggested by Sonner (2000)? (b) Does the nontenured
faculty inflate grades to help secure
tenure and promotions as suggested by
Eiszler (2002)? To respond to these
questions, we first performed an analysis of variance (ANOVA) to determine
whether there were significant differences in mean GPAs for students taught
by the three categories of faculty. Next,
to measure the difference in the mean
GPAs given among these groups, we
performed a multiple regression analysis. Moreover, we performed a paired t
test to determine whether differences
existed in the mean GPAs given by faculty before and after tenure.
Figure 1 shows plots of GPAs of students taught by adjunct, nontenured, and
tenured faculty over the 20-year period
from fall 1983 through spring 2003. An
examination of these plots reveals differences among the mean GPAs of students
taught by the three faculty groups. Overall, and for the majority of years, the
mean GPAs of students taught by
adjunct faculty are higher than those
taught by either the tenured or nontenured faculty. Clearly, beginning with
the academic year 1993–1994, the mean
GPAs of students taught by adjunct faculty are consistently higher than those of
students taught by the others. During
that same period of time, the variability
increased radically.
Between groups
Within groups
Total
Sum of squares
df
MS
F
p
0.201
0.697
2
57
0.100
0.012
8.209
.001
0.898
59
TABLE 3. Post Hoc Comparison
Factor
Adjunct compared with nontenured
Adjunct compared with tenured
Nontenured compared with tenured
Mean difference
SE
p
0.0925
0.1397
0.0491
0.0387
0.0356
0.0300
.074
.001
.297
ulty and those taught by nontenured faculty were not significant.
Multiple Regression: Trend and
Status
Next, to measure the difference in the
mean GPAs among these groups, we
developed a multiple regression model
for the GPAs, incorporating trend with
dummy variables to account for the
three categories of faculty classification.
The multiple regression model was
defined as follows:
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Model 1: GPA = β0 + β1 year + β2 adj +
β3NT + ε,
where GPA = grade point average; year =
the year of the study, 1–20; adj = 1 if
adjunct professors, and 0 otherwise; and
NT = 1 if nontenured, 0 otherwise. The
variable tenured was the reference group.
We assumed the error terms to be independent and identically normally distributed with mean zero and variance σ2.
The fitted model we obtained was:
E(GPA) = 2.569 + 0.0113 year + 0.140
adj + 0.049NT, with R2 = .507 and an
adjusted R2 = .48. Table 4 shows the
estimated coefficients we obtained with
the regression model.
All the coefficients, with the exception
of the nontenured variable, were highly
significant and it appeared that we had a
good fit. A significant positive coefficient
on the variable year indicated the mean
GPAs did increase at a rate of 0.0113
points (on a 4-point scale) for each year
over the study period. The coefficient on
the variable adj was also significant,
inducing that there was a significant
mean difference between the adjunct
variable and the tenured variable. On the
one hand, the GPAs for students graded
by adjunct faculty were higher, on average, by 0.140 points. On the other hand,
the mean difference between nontenured
and tenured faculty had weak statistical
significance. The GPAs for students
graded by nontenured faculty were higher, on average, by 0.049 points.
DISCUSSION
Multiple Regression: Trend,
Status, and Autocorrelated Errors
Because data collected over time are
often found to exhibit autocorrelations
among the observations, we used the
Durbin-Watson (DW) test to determine
if serial correlation was present. The
value of the Durbin-Watson statistic was
0.891, clearly indicating positive serial
correlation among the residuals.
Because DW = 0.891 < 1.00 = DW
lower bound with three independent
variables, we concluded that the residuals were positively correlated at the 5%
level of significance. Furthermore, a
plot of the residuals clearly exhibited a
known pattern of clusters of residuals
with the same sign, thus illustrating the
presence of positive serial correlation.
Therefore, the assumption of uncorrelated errors in the regression model was
violated. This definitively invalidated
the inferences (t and p) we made using
the usual assumption of independent
error terms. Moreover, a plot of the
residual autocorrelations for the first 16
lags showed dependence among the
error terms with a Ljung-Box statistic
equal to 70.061 (p = 0.000). The results
of this test supported our findings and,
thus, we concluded that the residuals
could not be considered as white noise.
The first step in correcting the model
was to replace the presumed independent
errors in the regression model for GPAs
with a possibly dependent series of noise
terms, ut, t = 1, 2, …, n. An analysis of the
residual autocorrelations and partial autocorrelations indicated that residuals could
be modeled using an autoregressive
model of order one, ut = φut-1 + εt, t = 1, 2,
…, n. We developed the following multiple regression model, which incorporated
autocorrelated errors:
Model 2: GPA = β0 + β1 year + β2 adj +
β3NT + u,
where the random variable u follows an
autoregressive process of order one. A
SAS program (version 8.01, SAS Institute, Cary, NC) generated the results we
present in Table 5.
The multiple regression analysis provided evidence that, overall, GPAs significantly increased at a rate of 0.0075
per year over the period from fall 1983
through spring 2003. Although using
the model incorporating autocorrelated
errors (Model 2) provided results similar to the first multiple regression analysis we presented (Model 1), the values
of the estimates and their respective t
values have been affected by incorporating an autocorrelation parameter among
the error terms. In Model 2, all the coefficients were significant except nontenured. This implies that there was no
significant difference in the average
GPAs of students graded by nontenured
and tenured faculty. In Model 1, we
TABLE 4. Least Squares Estimates
Variable
Constant
Year
Adjunct
Nontenured
Coefficient
t(56)
p
2.569
0.0113
0.140
0.049
89.054
5.671
4.967
1.7460
.000
.000
.000
.086
TABLE 5. Maximum Likelihood Estimates
Variable
Constant
Year
Adjunct
Nontenured
Autoregressive parameter
Estimate
SE
t(55)
2.6097
0.0075
0.1136
0.0738
0.6354
0.04414
0.00265
0.05656
0.04998
0.10356
59.12**
2.84**
2.01*
1.48
6.14**
*p = .05. **p = .01.
July/August 2005
361
faculty before and after tenure appeared
similar. We did, however, notice an
upward trend in GPAs for students who
were graded by professors both before
and after the faculty members were
appointed tenure. This is interesting
because the faculty have been ordered
according to the year in which they were
awarded tenure. During the 20-year time
period, Professor 1 was the first to
receive tenure; Professor 7 was the last.
This provides some additional evidence
of grade inflation over time because the
first faculty member awarded tenure
tended to grade lower than the last.
A paired t test (Table 6) showed that,
according to student GPAs, there was
no significant difference in the way
professors graded before and after
receiving tenure. This corroborated our
visual inspection of the graph shown in
Figure 2.
Conclusion
An examination of grades in business
administration courses at this small pri-
362
Journal of Education for Business
After Tenure
3.5
3
Paired t Test: Before and After
Tenure
To determine whether grades given by
faculty were higher before tenure, we
examined the mean student GPAs by
year for all faculty teaching at the college during the period of study who met
the following criteria: (a) were awarded
tenure during the 20-year period, (b)
were at the college 5 years before gaining tenure and these 5 years occurred
during the period of study, and (c) were
at the college 5 years after gaining
tenure and these 5 years occurred during
the period of study. Joint use of these
three criteria resulted in a sample size of
seven. Figure 2 shows the mean GPAs of
the seven professors for the 5 years
before and after tenure. The graph shows
that for two faculty members, the averages were lower after tenure with the
remaining faculty showing increases in
average GPAs of their students. Overall,
the mean GPAs of students graded by
vate undergraduate institution revealed
that the percentage of grades in the A
category (A and A-) did not indicate the
same dramatic climb as seen in the Ivy
League universities. During the 1st year
of our study (1983–1984), 23.6% of the
grades were in the A category and 24.3%
were in the C category (C-, C, C+). During the final year of the study
(2002–2003), the percentages of As and
Cs were 26.4 and 20.9, respectively. The
percentage of A category grades (26.4%)
was far less than the 47% reported by
Eiszler (2002) in a 1999 study of a midsized public university in the midwestern United States. A grade of C was far
more prevalent (20.9%) than the 9%
reported by Levine and Cureton (1998)
in a 1993 study of higher education.
Rojstaczer (2003b) reported a GPA
increase of 0.15 per decade, whereas,
using our multiple regression analysis
(Model 2), incorporating autoregressive
errors, we found an increase of only
0.075 per decade. At the same time,
using Model 1, which incorrectly
assumed independent error terms, we
Before Tenure
2.5
GPA
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observed mild significance (p = 0.086)
between these two faculty classifications. The annual rate of increase in
GPAs found in Model 2 (0.0075) was
less than the annual increase found in
Model 1 (0.0113), a decrease of 34%.
The difference in mean GPAs of students of adjunct faculty and those of
tenured faculty decreased to 0.1136 in
Model 2 from 0.140 in Model 1, a
decrease of approximately 19%. Clearly, the addition of the autoregressive
parameter had changed the coefficients
and provided evidence that the change
in average GPAs resulting from trend
and from faculty classification was less
than initially suspected.
The autoregressive parameter has an
estimated value of 0.6354 with a highly
significant t value, t(55) = 6.14. As
expected, this indicated a moderate
autocorrelation among the observations.
The autocorrelations of the residuals
from Model 2 were all negligible. The p
value for the Ljung-Box statistic,
defined as a weighted sum of squares of
residual autocorrelations for a group of
consecutive lags, was not significant.
This provided evidence that the errors
were white noise and supported the use
of the multiple regression model with
autocorrelated errors (Model 2).
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
1
2
3
4
5
Individual Professor
6
7
FIGURE 2. Plot of grade point averages (GPAs) by professor before and
after tenure.
TABLE 6. Paired Two Samples Test for Means
Status
Before tenure
After tenure
Years
M
SE
t(6)
p
5
5
2.5991
2.6923
0.2494
0.2883
–1.0987
.3140
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found an increase of 0.113 per decade.
Although the results yielded by our
incorrectly stated model were closer to
those reported by Rojstaczer, our corrected results showed less inflation.
Moore and Trahan (1998) concluded
that the grades given by both untenured
and part-time faculty tended to be higher than those given by tenured faculty
for introductory courses. However, our
study, which included grades for both
introductory and advanced courses,
negated the conclusion with respect to
the nontenured faculty, it supported the
conclusion regarding the adjunct faculty. In Model 2, the coefficient for
adjunct was significant with an increase
of 0.1136 over the mean GPA of students graded by tenured faculty.
One of the explanations offered by
Moore and Trahan (1998) was that
untenured faculty may “buy tenure” by
giving higher grades. From our paired
t test results, comparing the mean
GPAs of students taught by individual
faculty both before and after tenure,
we found no difference in mean GPAs.
This finding offers additional support
for the lack of significance of the nontenure parameter in our model incorporating autoregressive error terms
(Model 2) and provides additional evidence for disagreement with the
hypothesis that untenured faculty may
buy tenure. Thus, our findings support
those of Gohmann and McCrickard
(2001).
In a study conducted over a 2-year
period at a small public university where
approximately 70% of the courses were
taught by part-time faculty, the author
found that the grades of students taught
by adjunct professors were higher (Sonner 2000). In our study, conducted over
a 20-year period, we came to the same
conclusion for a small private institution
where only 29% of the courses were
taught by adjunct professors. Sonner
demonstrated that a relationship exists
between grades and faculty status using
ANCOVA, whereas, in our study, we
quantified the relationship using a multiple regression model incorporating autocorrelated errors.
Eiszler (2002) found positive correlation between expected grades and teaching evaluations and surmised that extensive use of student evaluations of
teaching in the reappointment process
could lead to grade inflation. This, and
the argument proposed by both Moore
and Trahan (1998) and Sonner (2000),
stating that less secure faculty reap
more benefits from giving high grades,
may be supported by our findings. The
adjunct faculty members have the least
secure positions in the academic environment and so, to maintain their positions, they may inflate grades to obtain
higher teaching evaluations.
Despite the call for increased rigor
and differentiation in the grading
process, an increase in the proportion of
courses taught by adjunct faculty may
contribute to increased grade inflation
in higher education. Our 20-year study
showed a significant increase in students’ GPAs at a rate of 0.0075 per year
for all faculty classifications. The mean
GPAs for students of adjunct faculty
were 0.1136 points (on a 4-point scale)
higher than the mean GPAs of students
of tenured faculty. Thus, an increase in
the proportion of courses taught by
adjunct faculty will result in additional
grade inflation.
Limitations and Future Research
Generalization of the results of this
study is limited because of the use of
data from one business school at a small
private undergraduate college in the
northeast region of the United States
with a homogeneous student population
with respect to age, ethnicity, and domicile. However, we provided a methodology that may be used by others in the
study of institutions with greater diversity in their demographics.
NOTE
For further information, please direct correspondence to: Susan E. Pariseau, Merrimack College,
Girard School of Business and International Commerce, 315 Turnpike Street, North Andover, MA
01845, susan.pariseau@merrimack.edu.
REFERENCES
Arenson, K. W. (1999, March 30). Staff on tenure
track is teaching less at Yale, a study says. The
New York Times, p. B4.
Central Michigan University Office of Institutional Research and Planning (n.d.). An examination of grades assigned Central Michigan University’s undergraduate students. Mt. Pleasant,
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