Grading Standards in Education Departments at Universities

Cory Koedel

No 1002, Working Papers from Department of Economics, University of Missouri

Abstract: This paper documents a startling difference in the grading standards between education departments and other academic departments at universities – undergraduate students in education classes receive significantly higher grades than students in all other classes. This phenomenon cannot be explained by differences in student quality or structural differences across departments (i.e., differences in class sizes). Drawing on evidence from the economics literature, the differences in grading standards between education and non-education departments imply that undergraduate education majors, the majority of whom become teachers, supply substantially less effort in college than non-education majors. If the grading standards in education departments were brought in line with those of other major academic departments, student effort would be expected to increase by at least 10-16 percent.

Keywords: Grading Standards; Grade Inflation; Grading Standards in Departments of Education; Teacher Training (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I20 I23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 27 pgs.
Date: 2010-02-01, Revised 2011-06-13
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-lab and nep-sog
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

Published in Education Policy Analysis Archives 2011

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:umc:wpaper:1002

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