What Do the Letter Grades Mean?

Posted: Fri, Aug 9, 2024

While we do not use pluses and minuses for final course grades here at the UofA, I will return your assignments with more fine-grained letter grades.

This reflects how I grade: I will first place the assignment into a broad letter grade category (A, B, C, …), see if an upward or downward adjustment from that broad letter grade is warranted (using pluses and minuses as needed), and then try my best to translate that into a numerical score that D2L requires me to enter.

And that last thing is important—I think of numerical scores as translations of letter grades, which are always holistic. You never “lose points” for anything, and so you should not aim for any particular numbers, especially not 100% (that would be perfection, and nobody, including hopeless perfectionists like myself, is even close to perfect). Try instead to be good enough.

Outstanding

  • A+: This is work that one would expect from a philosophy graduate student who has been at this for quite a while, not an undergraduate student taking an introductory course. Philosophy is the kind of thing that you get better at by doing it more. At least for this class, an A+ shouldn’t be your goal.
  • A: This is so good; it goes well beyond my expectations for students in this class. I don’t give a lot of straight A’s, and if you do get one, it’s well-deserved and something to be proud of.
  • A-: This is truly excellent; it is compelling, sophisticated, insightful, engaging, and beautifully executed. If you would like to pass this class with an A, this is the grade you should aim for.

Very solid

  • B+: This is very strong work that shows a lot of promise. Not only is it thoughtful, interesting, well-written, and genuinely reflective of the serious effort that went into it, but there are moments of genuine insight that, if developed more fully, would make the work stand out even more.
  • B: This is fully competent work that demonstrates a clear, nuanced grasp of the relevant materials. While there may be some minor mistakes, misunderstandings, or obscurities here and there, they are nothing serious.
  • B-: This is the baseline grade that I expect from a class like this. The work is solid, does what it’s asked to do, and shows an overall good understanding of the relevant materials. But perhaps the point it’s making might be a little too obvious in a way that does not go that far beyond our class discussions, perhaps some aspect of the analysis or argument feels rather undeveloped or superficial, perhaps there are some notable mistakes or misunderstandings, or perhaps the writing can sometimes be hard to follow,

Satisfactory

  • C+/C/C-: This is where problems start to get close to either the “not sure I get it” or the “this might be missing the point” territory. Usually, this has to do with some major misunderstanding of the readings, our class discussions, the prompt, and/or the instructions. Two particularly common mistakes are discussions (1) consisting largely of unargued/unsupported opinions and (2) largely uninformed by our class discussions.

Pass

  • D+/D/D-: This is where the writing starts not to make that much sense. Not sure what’s going on, difficult to get through, but still responsive to the prompt.

Fail

  • E/F: Failing grades are given to work that is not relevant, fails to follow the prompt/instructions, or engages in academic misconduct (e.g., plagiarism).