The fact is that the average cumulative grade for undergraduates at Iowa State since the fall of 1995 is 2.78 — much closer to a “B-” than a “C.”

The discrepancy between the average grade given at ISU and what is normally considered average, 2.00, has raised questions about grading systems used at colleges and universities nationwide.

To Iowa State Associate Provost Ed Lewis, however, the heightened grades are simply a reflection of students entering college more prepared than ever before.

Lewis credits rising grades to an increasing level of background knowledge he feels students today are acquiring in high school.

“I certainly would like to think that students are coming into the university with a higher level of knowledge and background,” Lewis said.

He also feels college curricula are being tailored more toward what students both want and need for their majors, which may have a role in the higher-than-average grades.

“Having fewer curriculum requirements in some areas now than in the past has helped motivate students by giving them more interesting curriculum choices within their desired areas,” Lewis said.

Kenneth Jolls, ISU professor of chemical engineering, calls himself a “stickler for standards” in grading.

“I may be old-fashioned,” Jolls said, “but I haven’t altered my grading procedures since the time I started teaching.”

Jolls said he has always taught the most difficult classes in the department.

“I’m very accessible to students, and I’ll attempt to help them as much as I can,” he said, “but I feel justified in sticking to my standards of grading. I just call the pitches the way they come across the plate.”

According to university data, grade increase has, in fact, been slight over the past years.

The average cumulative undergraduate grade in 1980 was 2.73, only 0.05 lower than today’s average, said Steve Sullivan of the ISU News Service.

Sullivan pointed out the plus-minus portion of the grading system was only implemented after 1980.

Though the College of Engineering cumulative grade average for 1995 was the highest for the university at 2.88, Associate Dean David Holger said this only reflects the high level of academic ability possessed by students in the College of Engineering.

“Most of the students that enter the College of Engineering have already gone through a sort of self-selection process,” Holger said.

Holger said testing scores and class rank in high school often play a big role in which students choose to enter the college.

“So we are starting with this sort of top slice of students to begin with,” Holger said.

Holger also said students of the College of Engineering take only one or two actual engineering classes during their first year of study, often concentrating on areas such as mathematics and physics.

“After the first year, there is a second self-selection among students of the college. Due to the classes they have taken, many of these good students choose to transfer to other colleges within the university,” Holger said. “We start out with students who are very good, and what we are left with after the first year are students who are select.”

Lewis said he does not believe instructors handing out grades closer to “B” than “C” is really a cause for concern.

“Certainly, if a teacher was giving out a great deal of ‘F’s,’ we would look into it,” Lewis said, “but right now I don’t think there is a problem with the grading systems of most of the individual faculty members.”

While some may worry that an inflated grade average could devalue the worth of a college degree, Lewis disagrees.

“I don’t think inflated grades really have any effect on the worth of a degree,” Lewis said. “There is more emphasis on having a college degree today than ever before in the work force. The college degree is critical.”

In addition, Lewis said that he does not feel that the 2.78 grade average at ISU has anything to do with attracting or retaining more students.

“I can see how this might be possible at private schools where financial survival depends solely upon tuition, but I don’t see this as a factor at state run schools in any way,” Lewis said.

One returning ISU student said the entire system of grading is overemphasized at ISU and at most universities in general.

Eric Hiatt, a sophomore in genetics, said he feels grades rarely reflect understanding in classes.

“People who believe in grades like to think that students are doing above-average work,” Hiatt said, “but grades can be manipulated very easily due to curved grading systems. Instructors lower their standards in order to raise the grades.”

Recalling a class from a few semesters back, he said, “Once I got the highest score in my class on an exam, but my score was actually something like a 32 out of 50. So I got an ‘A’ for actually knowing less than 65 percent of the answers.”

Hiatt also said that, for many students, high grades are simply too intense a focus. “Grades become the only focus for most people. Students can work really hard to make the grades without really understanding the material or retaining it.”

Though Hiatt said he realizes some people need to use grades as motivation in their classes, he said they can also get in the way of actual learning. “I worked hard my last semester to get the grades I did,” Hiatt said, “but I could’ve worked half as hard and still gotten a 4.0 if I wasn’t concerned with actually learning and retaining the material.”