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An excellent question and one we thought we could answer in a flash. Not so. After much digging, we found an article in The Washington Post that states the first letter grade given in the United States was a "B" at Harvard University in 1883. Prior to that time and up to about 1900, most institutions of higher learning used the numeric system (0-100) for grading. According to the Georgia State University web site, from about 1900 to the 1960s, colleges and universities became more general in grading. Hence, the letter-grade system became popular. Georgia State University surveyed 1,395 two-year colleges,
four-year colleges, and universities, and found 89.8% use the letter-grading system with a tendency to add plus or minus. About that "E" grade -- some schools have used the E instead of F, but we speculate too many students tried to convince their parents the "E" stood for "excellent." It's much harder to trick parents into believing an "F" stands for "fantastic." Some academics oppose this system of grading. One Stanford University professor claims students tend to take only courses in which they can get good grades. It would be much better, he states, if students explored courses in subjects of interest to them and there were no grades. Where was this guy when we were in school?
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