Three things are visually obvious from this graph:First, there’s a spike of high grades in Spring 2020 — presumably due to the chaos of the early days of the pandemic.Second, the percentage of As is higher in recent years than in earlier years.Third, the percentage of DFWs has remained about the same across the period.
In Fall 2013, 32% of enrolled students received As. In Fall 2023, 45% did. (DFW’s were 9% in both terms.)
One open question is whether the new normal of about 45% As reflects a general trend independent of the pandemic spike or whether the pandemic somehow created an enduring change. Another question is whether the higher percentage of As reflects easier grading or better performance. The term “inflation” suggests the former, but of course data of this sort by themselves don’t distinguish between those possibilities.
The increase in percentage As is evident in both lower division and upper division classes, increasing from 32% to 43% in lower division and from 33% to 49% in upper division.
How about UCR philosophy in particular? I’d like to think that my own department has consistent and rigorous standards. However, as the figure below shows, the trends in UCR philosophy are similar, with an increase from 26% As in Fall 2013 to 41% As in Fall 2024: