In advisory recently, my advisor asked us to share something we were still curious about from a class. While searching for my answer, I realized that I hadn’t been asked that sort of question in a while. Grades and test scores dominated my academic conversations with fellow students during my four years of high school. As a result, I have at times focused on receiving a good grade at the expense of true learning.
Whenever we got our tests back in my chemistry class last year, my classmates and I would discuss the test. No matter what my peers told me they scored, I would always respond with a neutral “oh, nice.” I felt a competitive tension among my peers. If I received a better grade than one of them, I felt like I was bragging, and if I received a worse grade, I felt like I was pity-seeking. Many of my classmates really wanted an A and wanted to know if anyone else got an A.
When I finally found an answer to my advisor’s question, I talked about my curiosity from calculus about graphing calculators because they use Taylor polynomials to approximate functions. In those five minutes, I enjoyed describing my newfound understanding of a niche part of math and not a grade. I felt none of the tension that I would feel when discussing test scores.
In recent years, teachers have given a significant amount of students A-range grades. Former history teacher Richard Avidon said in an interview that he saw a positive feedback loop that kept grades inflated. Over time, from the 1990s until his retirement in 2025, he saw that students liked that they received good grades and so did their parents. Additionally, the more teachers raised their grades, the more students and parents raised their expectation of a good grade. B-pluses used to signify accomplishment, not defeat.
Avidon’s observations at GDS are reflective of a national trend. Due to grade inflation, students hyper-focus on getting an A and can end up without a full understanding of the course material. GDS should implement a grade-deflation policy, in which the administration requires teachers to cap the number of students who have an A-range grade at 25 percent per class. This policy would destigmatize grades in the B-range, increase the significance of a higher grade and encourage students to seek greater understanding of the course material.
“In the ’90s, my grades tended to be lower than they became later,” Avidon said. Over time, he gave fewer C’s and B-minuses to keep pace with other teachers’ rising grades. His students’ average grades still remained lower than those of most of his colleagues.
A grade-deflation policy wouldn’t be foreign. In the fall of 2027, Harvard plans to cap the percentage of students who can receive an A at about 20 percent per course. Members of a Harvard subcommittee who helped propose the grade cap said the decision will restore the A grade as an “extraordinary distinction.” The Yale Committee on Trust in Higher Education’s April 2026 report floated a policy in which the university would establish a 3.0 mean GPA to combat grade inflation.
Grade inflation makes grades a binary system of failure and success. Since A-range grades are too accessible, B-range grades, to many students, or at least to vocal groups of students, have become a sign of failure. A cap on A’s would create a wider range of grades, so B-range grades would be standard and give students an incentive to work even harder to learn more.
An A-range grade doesn’t mean as much when so many people receive them. Grade inflation hurts academic achievers because the significance of their achievements is diluted by so many other high grades. An A has become an achievement less worthy of pride because students need less and less effort. And if we aren’t rewarding effort and struggle, we ultimately aren’t encouraging learning because learning comes from struggle. If students are adequately challenged, mental nourishment will come as a byproduct.
Students will worry about how a grade-deflation policy will impact college applications. But, having gone through the college process, I may be able to allay some concerns. The college counseling office publishes a school profile, which contains information about things like student organizations, academics and the colleges GDS students have attended in the past. If the administration implemented a grade cap, the college counseling office could include that policy in the school profile.
Many colleges also say that they evaluate students based on the academic standards of their high school, so a GDS student’s GPA would likely not compete side by side with a student’s GPA from a high school without a grade cap.
Students should appreciate the non-quantifiable—yet much more valuable—benefits that a GDS education gives them. In my philosophy class, my teacher instructed me to write a sample test for another student. The work was difficult because I had to think in reverse in order to complete the task. I was motivated to work hard for the sake of learning because I couldn’t just answer questions to get a good grade. I needed to think deeply.
Though the policy would make achieving higher grades more difficult and the adjustment wouldn’t necessarily be easy, our current grading structure and attitude toward grades causes immeasurable harm to our intellectual growth. If we stand by, the issue will only get worse because most people don’t feel incentivized to advocate against continued grade inflation. I urge my fellow students to support this policy that will benefit us intellectually despite appearing cosmetically to harm us.