Grade inflation

Are your kids knocking down As and Bs? You might want to hold off for a minute on your celebration. Dick Hilker writes that there doesn't seem to be a direct correlation between grades and scores on standardized tests. Remember, our educators want kiddies to feel good about themselves. Here are some of the troubling signs:

For one, letter grades are generally higher than results of state test scores. For another, there is the issue of remedial classes.

According to the 2013 study, 37 percent of all Colorado grads enrolling in state colleges and universities were required at some point to take remedial classes. In other words, they were not "college-ready." (On the positive side, that number is down from 40 percent the year before.)

Last year, students enrolled at our state colleges and universities spent $56 million on remedial classes, courses for which they received no credit.

Perhaps more conclusive are in-depth studies conducted a decade ago by the two companies that administer tests for college entrance, ACT and SAT. Both showed a growing discrepancy between their test scores and the letter grades awarded.

The ACT people claim that overall, grades were inflated 12.5 percent between 1991 and 2003. If that trend has continued, many grades handed out today would be a full point higher than they should be.

Read more here.