"Grades in courses are a necessary evil, but for the exceptionally qualified student they might not be necessary"--Kenneth B. Murdock '16, vice-chairman of the Committee on Educational Policy.

"People are examined too much and too frequently"--Richard T. Gill '48, Senior Tutor of Leverett House and a member of the CEP.

"Brilliant students can be ruined by a police-type exam given in great detail because of the grading system"--Paul H. Buck, former dean of the Faculty.

"Too few students realize that God is not grading their blue books"--Wallace MacDonald '44, director of freshman scholarships.

* * * *

These opinions represent in various ways the attack on grades in Harvard education, part of a broad challenge to the University's educational philosophy.

The issues came into the open a week ago when the Faculty adopted Dean Elder's proposals to reduce course requirements in graduate study. The conflict will recur, for the feeling grows that Harvard's educational methods are unimaginative and old-fashioned, that some or even many students are retarded by the complex of exams, papers, grade-sheets, and course requirements.

Grades draw much attention because they underlie the whole system. Excepting tutorial, all formal education in the College is graded. Lectures, reading assignments, quizzes, 1500-word papers, are all treated as things to be marked, or the stuff from which to make an examination.

A Poor Substitute

If grades themselves spurred students to intellectual achievement, this approach would be reasonable. They are in fact only a poor substitute for personal criticism from a respected teacher, the best incentive to thoughtful learning.

Grades suggest immediately that the ideas and facts taught are not in themselves interesting or at least are not interestingly taught. Grades also bolster the dubious idea that what is worth knowing about a given subject has limits, and that these limits are easily attained. The A symbolizes them, and may thus discourage further study.

Sophisticated students may speak with contempt of the A and those who seek it, but when they accept a lower mark, perhaps a B-, as minimal for self-respect, they still operate under the same false standards. They are misled into believing that B-stands for some important, measurable level of learning.

Grades, courses, and the other IBM-directed trivia of Harvard education actually inhibit a third type of student, the individual whose desire to study some problem deeply is thwarted by the feeling that he must make high marks in all courses, for the sake of the Scholarship Committee, or for a graduate school, or for his parents.

Emphasize Memory

Harvard's emphasis on grades can show worst in the examination which ends the course and completes the process of grading it. Finals can and should be educational tools themselves, but they now tend to emphasize memory, not thought, and to allow for a liberal amount of vaguely knowledgeable generalization.