Beginning during the Fall 2025 semester, students enrolled in introductory courses in the political science department could find the following statement in their syllabi:
“As of Academic Year 2025-2026, the Department has decided to adopt a grade policy for all its introductory courses (POLS 2, POLS 3, POLS 4, POLS 11, POLS 12): the average grade will typically be a B+ (i.e., 3.33).”
In an email correspondence with The Phoenix, Department Chair and Professor of Political Science Ayse Kaya explained that the decision was approved through “a unanimous vote of the faculty.” She further clarified that while the new policy establishes a benchmark, professors still retain autonomy in their grading; the B+ average is not mandatory.
Kaya noted that the policy change was proposed in response to a number of faculty concerns. She listed “grade inflation, the importance of distinguishing different levels of student performance, and the need to ensure that faculty — especially junior faculty — feel supported in assigning grades they believe accurately reflect student work” as reasons for the development.
In a fall Phoenix poll, 73% of faculty respondents agreed that there has been grade inflation at Swarthmore in recent years. Of faculty that agreed or were unsure, 71% believed grade inflation to be at least somewhat, if not very, concerning. However, only 20% of students polled believed that grade inflation was occurring, reflecting a stark disparity between the two groups’ experience of the performance evaluation process.
While Kaya stated that students were not formally involved in the new policy’s creation, “Since the guideline was adopted, [she has] not personally received complaints about it, nor have department members reported concerns to [her].”
Honors political science major Reina Jones ’27 believes the policy will help boost engagement for students enrolled in introductory classes. “I think establishing a B+ average will help students think of intro courses as necessary, foundational starting points for engaging with political science rather than a way to get an easy A.”
“It also creates an incentive and opportunity for students in those classes who are more familiar with the subject to push the bounds of discussion further if they are aiming for a higher grade; I know I’d personally enjoy an intro course where [political science] majors trying to fulfill a distribution were complicating or expanding on the basic concepts presented by the professor,” Jones said.
MC Grimes ’28 agrees with the policy. “I’m alright with it. The intro courses in the department can be pretty tough if you have never previously taken a course in [political science] and dealt with the field’s material.” However, she notes a potential drawback of the shift: “It could also discourage people from taking those courses if they’re afraid that they will negatively impact their GPA.”
The policy was created solely for the introductory courses, which Kaya explained “are typically larger and enroll a broader cross-section of students from across the College, raise somewhat different grading considerations than smaller, more self-selected upper-level courses such as seminars or honors seminars.” With the new guideline, the department hopes to see more “transparency and consistency” in those courses even as professors maintain individual judgment.
Kaya ended her response by highlighting the general implications of departmental policy changes and discussion of norms. “More broadly, I think these issues point to the value of open, constructive, community-wide conversations about academic standards, transparency, and how best to support students while maintaining rigor.”
This feels like FIDE coming in and subtracting points from Magnus Carlsen’s peak chess rating because it’s “too good.” Just as elite chess players are better at chess now than they were 30 years ago, so too are elite students better at school than they were 30 years ago.
In light of this, I would want to see empirical evidence that demonstrates rigor has been compromised. I’ve met graduates from more recent classes than my own and they exhibit no less rigor in thought than my peers from my own class, when average grades were terrible compared to now. If you asked these professors if they, as individuals, have been less rigorous in their teaching and grading in the last few years than they were 10 or 20 or 30 years ago, how would they answer?
If the ‘importance of distinguishing between different levels of student performance’ is what’s driving this, and if these students are better at school than students of yesteryear, and likely would have all been among the top students in my own class way back when Kasparov was at his peak, some 31 points short of Carlsen’s, then what we have here is grade deflation. Arbitrary, and dare I say reactionary, grade deflation, stemming from a decision to prioritize the importance of distinguishing between different levels of student performance, I guess to better assist Goldman-Sachs in narrowing down its next crop of prospects?