The Impact of Grading Standards on Student Achievement, Educational Attainment, and Entry-Level Earnings / Julian R. Betts, Jeff Grogger.

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Betts, Julian R

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Material type: Text

TextSeries: Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) ; no. w7875.Publication details: Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2000.Description: 1 online resource: illustrations (black and white)Subject(s):

I2 - Education and Research Institutions

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Abstract: Despite recent theoretical work and proposals from educational reformers, there is little empirical work on the effects of higher grading standards. In this paper we use data from the High School and Beyond survey to estimate the effects of grading standards on student achievement, educational attainment, and entry level earnings. We consider not only how grading standards affect average outcomes but also how they affect the distribution of educational gains by skill level and race/ethnicity. We find that higher standards raise test scores throughout the distribution of achievement, but that the increase is greatest toward the top of the test score distribution. Higher standards have no positive effect on educational attainment, however, and indeed have negative effects on high school graduation among blacks and Hispanics. We suggest a relative performance hypothesis to explain how higher standards may reduce educational attainment even as they increase educational achievement.

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Item type	Home library	Collection	Call number	Status	Date due	Barcode	Item holds
Working Paper	Biblioteca Digital	Colección NBER	nber w7875 (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Not For Loan

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September 2000.

Despite recent theoretical work and proposals from educational reformers, there is little empirical work on the effects of higher grading standards. In this paper we use data from the High School and Beyond survey to estimate the effects of grading standards on student achievement, educational attainment, and entry level earnings. We consider not only how grading standards affect average outcomes but also how they affect the distribution of educational gains by skill level and race/ethnicity. We find that higher standards raise test scores throughout the distribution of achievement, but that the increase is greatest toward the top of the test score distribution. Higher standards have no positive effect on educational attainment, however, and indeed have negative effects on high school graduation among blacks and Hispanics. We suggest a relative performance hypothesis to explain how higher standards may reduce educational attainment even as they increase educational achievement.