Volume CXXXIII, Number 6 October 24, 2003

Bowdoin college, where every child is above average
JIM MCDONALD
COLUMNIST

Late Friday night in the library, one can get to thinking: "Why am I staring at this economics instead of pissing my life away like that belligerent drunk outside my window?" I flash forward two years when the drunk and I are both graduating on a majestic May day. Barry Mills proudly exclaiming, "Graduating at the top of his class, a Theater and Women's Studies major, Mr. Belligerent Drunk." Mills continues in a more subdued tone, "And finishing somewhere in the middle, an Economics major, Jim Q. Me." Bowdoin is in a dire situation. Grade inflation has become so laughable that it threatens Bowdoin's reputation. The struggles I faced acquiring information for this article bear witness to the fact that the administration has a problem it can't control. I'd like to welcome you all to Lake Bowdbegon, where all the faculty want tenure, all the administrators want money, and all the students are above average.

Before addressing the dangers of inflationary trends in grading, I must recount my troubles acquiring departmental grade distributions. I believe the story that follows illustrates how touchy an issue grade inflation has become for the administration. I had come to learn that the lowest grading departments at Bowdoin for the 2002-2003 school year were Physics (2.93-on a 4 point scale) and Economics (3.03). I sought to confirm this information. So I walked to Moulton Union and the Office of Student Records and politely asked to see the grade distribution by department for last year. I was referred to Institutional Research at the end of the hallway, where my request was greeted with disinclination to put it kindly. I spoke with the Asst. Director of Institutional Research, who informed me that this information is not usually available to the students. I reminded her of the Orient's publishing of this data two years ago. She told me that her supervisor was "really upset" with that publication, and she did not want to repeat that situation. Unsure about whether to release the pages to me, she went to confer with Student Records. Two minutes later she returned with paper and pen, asked me for my name and phone number, informed me that they had to discuss what they could release to me, and said that she would contact me with whatever information was appropriate. Unsatisfied with this answer, I inquired into the cover-up. She informed me that when this information is published by the Orient, it is then scanned by companies (Lexis-Nexis I assume) and made available to the rest of the country. Stunned at this revelation, I interrogated further: "So, what?" Her response was that Bowdoin could not risk having that information made public. In addition, students might use the information to choose classes in easier departments, which would mark a revolutionary new trend in class selection. By the time she emailed me that she could only release the general Bowdoin distribution, the departmental information had already been leaked to me through a personal Karl Rove.

I will return to the administration's role later. Some general facts about Bowdoin's trend. In 1993-1994, the average grade was 3.14, it was 3.30 in 01-02 and 3.28 last year. 45.0% of all grades were A's, 43.0% were B's. That means 88.0% of grades are above average, a fact which somehow fits Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon better than a prestigious liberal arts college. D's and F's make up only 1.6% and C's 10.5%.

A student's concern for this matter should vary depending on what major he or she has chosen. For a Physics, Economics, Philosophy (3.07), Mathematics (3.17), or Government (3.18) major, it might be wise to express trepidation about the astronomical numbers of some other departments. Students in Theater/Dance (3.64), Women's Studies (3.63-down from 3.86 in 01-02), German and Italian (3.61 each), Environmental Studies (3.55), Geology (3.46), and Sociology (3.45) may consider an extra apple for their professors. Before you leave thinking that the latter departments are unique, I add a cautionary note. If we compare 93-94 averages with 02-03, although we find that Sociology has gone from 3.08 to 3.45 as an average, Biology has jumped from 3.01 to 3.24, Chemistry 2.86 to 3.26, and History 3.03 to 3.22. Economics, Physics, and Philosophy have been the only departments to show consistency in grading over the last decade.

A hypothesis that students who tend to underachieve gravitate toward the more traditional areas of study-math, philosophy, government, and economics-seems implausible. Without entering into an analysis of students in varying departments, I believe that the inflationary data incriminates professors in smaller departments that focus on less concrete subject matter. Professors in inflationary departments, knowing that tenure review is always around the corner, have attempted to boost enrollment to increase personal and departmental funding or job security. There is a qualification to this statement. This is not always department specific, it occurs in every building at Bowdoin and every school in the country. I hypothesize that it is more prevalent in smaller departments because a professor may view his or her position at this college to be based primarily on student perceptions of the professor's grading instead of scholarly ability.

Although it easy to blame faculty members for inflating grades, they are simply conforming to the standards, or lack thereof, that the administration has set. Knowing that successful graduates make successful alumni contributors, Bowdoin administrators have allowed, if not encouraged, professors to "think favorably" of their students come transcript time. If Bowdoin provides better achievers to graduate schools and the marketplace, the endowment finds itself increasing at an accelerated rate. Bowdoin has jumped on a bandwagon that is sweeping through elite institutions-who can get their graduates hired by the best and paid the most. Grade inflation temporarily pushes one institution's students over another's, a move which the latter counters by raising its grades. The adverse selection situation that is created will eventually harm American productivity-and institutional endowments-if the best qualified students are unable to be discerned from their less able peers.

My challenge to Bowdoin students is to reform the measures with which you judge success. Whether the administration realizes it or not, it is already public knowledge which professors treat their students advantageously in June. Students need to move from class selection based upon the words of unqualified junior and senior house advisors to one based on academic inquisitiveness. Every Bowdoin professor has something to offer. Students must find their professors gifts in the classroom and not the transcript. Professors need to remember that the position they have attained was not based upon the reviews and thoughts of hormone charged, judgment impaired nineteen year olds, and the administration needs a touch of reality. Instead of hiding the facts from the Bowdoin community, make an earnest attempt to set standards and foster academic achievement over personal popularity.

Bowdoin cannot arrest the national problem of grade inflation, but it can set a national standard with reform here at home (much like Vanderbilt University did with its athletics program two weeks ago). Reforming Bowdoin's standards will become public knowledge to graduate schools and employers who will be able to discern an outstanding Bowdoin student from a run-of-the-mill Dartmouth graduate. Within Bowdoin, we will be able to accurately compare outstanding Economics students and outstanding Women's Studies students without a qualifier. Our honors awards at graduation will again have significance, the best professors will be tenured and the others will go, and Bowdoin will recapture some of the academic excellence which has undoubtedly escaped the bubble over the last ten years.

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