To The Editor:

In rejecting my proposal to combat grade inflation at Fairfield, Dr. Alan Katz stated that “as long as the standards remain high,” we need not be concerned about grade inflation. Yet exit surveys of Fairfield seniors show that 68 percent of the class of 2001 (77 percent of the men), spent ten hours or fewer studying outside of class. “Or fewer” can reach as low as 4 hours per week; in 1996, 17 percent of the Fairfield senior class reported spending 3-5 hours per week studying outside of class. Given a five-course load, this means that the majority of undergraduates are passing through Fairfield on approximately 20 hours of work per week.

How can any university claim to be maintaining “high standards” when it is possible to pass through its core and a major program with a 20 hour work week? What standard of academic performance is Dr. Katz thinking of that can be achieved on four hours a day, five days a week? What full-time job or career path requires so little time?

If in fact grade inflation is not a problem at Fairfield, then let us make every professor’s and every department’s grading patterns a matter of public record. If there is no reason for concern, why not post every professor’s grading patterns on their doors for all to see? If a professor is ashamed of his or her grading patterns, then those patterns should be changed, but if not, then surely the professor would not be afraid of revealing them.

Sincerely,

William Abbott Associate Professor Department of History

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