Harvard Faculty Approve Grade Cap As University Faces Soaring Grade Inflation

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Harvard Faculty Approve Grade Cap As University Faces Soaring Grade Inflation

Harvard faculty voted to impose a 20 percent grade cap in an attempt to curb surging grade inflation at the university, the Harvard Crimson reported Wednesday.

After a week of voting, 69.5 percent of faculty elected to curb the number of As given in a class to 20 percent at most, with an additional 4 awarded at the discretion of the professor. Over 75 percent of faculty also approved a measure to use percentile measures to determine student honors and awards, rather than GPA.

The faculty rejected an additional proposal that would allow professors to opt out of the grade regulations.

Harvard will implement the new grading procedures beginning in the 2026-2027 academic year. The grade cap is limited to A grades alone and will not affect the number of A minuses awarded in class. (RELATED: ‘Harvard Is Woke; The War Department Is Not’: Pentagon Terminates Academic Partnerships With Ivy League University)

A faculty committee chaired by Computer Science Professor Stuart Shieber in February 2026 on the university’s rising grade inflation. The proposal recommended a three-stage plan to overhaul a grading system that, in the faculty members’ opinions, no longer awarded students for true academic excellence.

The faculty report followed on the heels of a study released in October 2025 by Harvard Dean of Undergraduate Education Amanda Claybaugh, which found that just over two-thirds of students received As in 2025, a dramatic increase from the one-third who received As in 2010. Nearly 80 percent of all students had received either As or A minuses.

The February report underwent heavy scrutiny and alterations before the May faculty vote, according to the Harvard Crimson. While the original report had included the 20 percent grade cap and the percentile-based honors system as a single measure, the two were later split into separate voting issues.

Students expressed outrage in response to the February report’s grading recommendations, complaining that the changes would exacerbate cutthroat competition and damage undergraduates’ job prospects. Roughly 85 percent of students said they disapproved of the measures in a survey conducted by Harvard in February, according to the Harvard Crimson. (RELATED: Harvard Students Melt Down Over ‘Soul-Crushing’ Plan To Stop Inflating Grades)

Prior to Wednesday’s vote, Harvard professors were already attempting to curb the university’s rising grade inflation. A January email from Claybaugh reported to faculty that the number of As awarded in the fall semester had dropped from 60.2 percent during the 2024-2025 academic year to 53.4 percent in the fall, according to the Harvard Crimson.

Claybaugh praised Wednesday’s vote in a statement, calling it an “important step” in fixing Harvard’s grading system. “It will, I believe, strengthen the academic culture of Harvard; it will also, I hope, encourage other institutions to confront similar questions with the same level of rigor and courage,” she continued.

National trends show the starkest rise in grade inflation during the years surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. ABC News reported that Yale awarded an A to nearly 80 percent of its students during the 2022-2023 academic year, a number that jumped significantly during the virtual 2021-2022 academic year. Harvard awarded a similar 79 percent during 2021-2022, according to the Harvard Crimson.

While Harvard’s grade inflation trends are steeper than those of other universities, the national average remains high. The average U.S. college GPA in 1990 was 2.81, rising by more than 16 percent to 3.15 in 2020.