I have had enough of being told that I’m more than my grades. Every semester, final exams bring a painful end to an already-difficult 15 weeks and the outcome is still the same: a numerical or letter grade. That outcome could be good or bad news, but the classic reassurance we consistently hear that we are more than this valuation isn’t doing us any better. The solution is to change how we think about success. 

Last year, Professor Jan Burzlaff wrote that he thought exams were structurally unfair by classifying students by the type of grade they received. Based on his interpretation, what matters is your learning and the effort that contextualized the grade you received. I find that advice incorrect not because it is wrong, but because it is too basic. 

The problem is not just that academia is structured to reward good grades through Latin Honors and national honor societies. There are two issues. First, certain opportunities, like scholarships, merit aid and internships, lean heavily on grade point averages. Second, there are few ways to recognize leadership, collaboration and other competencies developed through student organizations and experiential learning.

In order to pitch oneself to an employer, graduate school or scholarship administrator, a student must demonstrate competence and potential. The question then becomes, ‘how do I show that?’  The answer is simple: do something noteworthy where you learn something important. The problem, again, is that the most accessible form of ‘noteworthy’ is a good GPA, since individual........

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