SMU Prof Gave All Students ‘A’ for a Module to Prove a Point; SMU Said ‘Cannot Lah’

Imagine you own a school, and in one module, you see that everyone has got an “A”.

Either the lecturer/professor is one heck of a teacher, or you’ve students that are extraordinary.

If you think this sounds like fiction from a Netflix drama, think again.

Because this really happened.

In a local public university no less.

Meet Professor Stephen Matthias Harney, The Chillax Prof in SMU

Meet Professor Stephen Matthias Harney, a Professor of Strategic Management (Education) in SMU’s Lee Kong Chian School of Business. The Canadian is a Harvard graduate and got his PhD from Cambridge. Despite his high qualifications, students who were taught by him described him as “chill” and well-liked.

According to one student who stayed unnamed, he/she/it told Straits Times this: “In the first class we attended, Prof Harney said he believes that all students should be able to get an A if they put in hard work, and he feels that it shouldn’t be a competition.”

How I wish my teacher felt the same way.

So, what happened?

SMU Professor DGAF & Gave All His Students “A” for a Module

Prof Harney taught and graded a module called The Capstone: Studying Business Through the Classics. The module’s grade would be based on two essays that make up 40% of the total grade, and a video project for the remaining 60%.

Earlier this month, when students receive their results for the semester, they were shocked to see that the grades for this module that’s taught by Prof Harney were missing.

What happened? Was Prof Harney so laid-back that he forgot to mark the papers?

Well, nothing could be further from the truth.

The professor did the exact opposite: he gave an A for all students. With the same mark. And SMU saw it, so they removed the results.

But…why?

Why did he do that, and why he wasn’t the prof who mark my paper?

Sparing the Students Pressure to Achieve High Grades

Remember what Professor Harney said in his class?

He felt that hard work would mean an A, regardless of competition or whether the bell curve God is in play.

And the good professor walked the talk.

According to The Straits Times, he wanted to “spare students the pressure to achieve high grades and did not want to ‘artificially’ restrict the number of A’s through a bell curve.”

Say what?

In case you’re not aware, a bell curve, when used during grading, means that results of a group would be looked at and kind of distributed evenly.

For example, you get 75 marks and should get an A. But if there are many people getting 90 marks, you’ll get a B instead.

This of course makes everything more competitive, since you’re not competing to get the best results, but competing against your peers as well.

According to Prof Harney, there are rules to ensure that only 1/3 of the class can get an A.

But why would he dare to do this?

Contract Not Renewed Before Incident

Before this incident, Prof Harney was already being informed that his contract wouldn’t be renewed, and that he would be leaving by 30 June 2019.

And that gave him the courage to do this, either to prove a point or as a parting gift to his students.

In his words, he said it was “the opportunity to teach the course and grade it in the way I thought would be best pedagogically, without fearing the consequences from the school.”

But what about his students?

Grades Adjusted

Students who were affected would have their grades being readjusted, this time graded by another professor.

They can either accept the new grades or take a “pass” grade. If they just take the “pass” grade, the module’s result would not be included in the student’s GPA.

In addition, SMU added that they do not use a bell curve, but there are guidelines when grading. This is to “fairness and consistency”.

I don’t know about you, but I’d love to have Prof Harney as my prof #justsaying