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Grade inflation emerged hand in hand with the emphasis in American education on the primacy of self-esteem. According to this therapeutic notion, the "Purpose of education is to make students feel capable and empowered. So to grade them, or to grade them strictly, is cruel and dehumanizing. Grading creates stress. It encourages competition rather than harmony. It is judgmental" (Mansfield, 2001, p. 1). Beaver (1997) points out that the formula for building self-esteem is fairly straightforward: "Students should be praised and nurtured while criticism should be held to a minimum so that students' egos will not be harmed (p. 4).
Under the banner of respect for the individual, objective standards of achievement or knowledge become secondary. A poor grade is not only an incursion of the authenticity of an individual, but a devastating form of criticism. Yet, making achievement easier in order that students may feel good about themselves in college opens the door to propelling them to failure later.
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