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University degree inflation: leaked e-mail instructs staff to mark students up

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A leaked internal e-mail from Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) advises university staff to mark student assignments up so as to increase the number of top degrees. In the e-mail, staff are encouraged to consider factors other than the academic quality of students' work and to grade more students in the top degree range in order to keep up with other competing universities. The wish to boost student satisfaction and to improve the public image of universities are the main reasons for degree manipulation.

The leaked e-mail, which was sent several months ago, seems to confirm last week's headlines describing the "rotten" state of the British university grading system. Over the past decade, the number of UK students graduating with a first class degree has more than doubled with 61% of last year's university leavers scoring in the first class or upper second class range.

This raises the question of what British degrees are worth today and how academic standards can be maintained without harming a universities reputation.
JanaPokana

6 responses // University degree inflation: leaked e-mail instructs staff to mark students up

  • I thought universities generally marked much harder to make it look like their school is "tougher." Hmm...
    milkradio
  • Is this just Manchester? I imagine as they are generally not perceived amongst the top UK Universities they want to up their image.
    rwylie
  • I think it is a more general problem and has been for some time. Only last week, the Quality Assurance Agency, the university watchdog in Britain, has released a report in which the British degree system was described as 'meaningless', 'unreliable' and 'rotten'. In addition, academics from many different universities have expressed their concern about the grading criteria and the external pressures that force them to give better grades than usual. Furthermore, employers have said they don't know how to judge potential future employees because of the inflation of top degrees.
    JanaPokana
  • I probably could have used this for Biology and Algebra...
    SilenceNoMore
  • Shame my university didn't do the same.
    cassius
  • Sorry to disappoint, but most universities mark students up these days! It is just a sad reality and it really makes top grades worthless.
    dadapapa

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