Handling grade disputes in grad school

Question

I'm a rising second-year PhD student at a big state university in the US. I'm seeking advice regarding the possibility of disputing a grade received this past semester in one of my core PhD courses. Here's the background:

The course involved is one of the pre-qualifying exam courses we're expected to take prior to taking the qualifying exam in August. The professor who taught the course is a full professor in the department and one of its lead researchers. However, his teaching record is atrocious. He receives complaints from students pretty much every semester. This largely has to do with the fact that he doesn't like to teach (as he actually told us in class multiple times). He doesn't prepare lectures (because it takes too much work, as he's told us), so typical lectures are just him scribbling random things on the board, then consulting the textbook when (not if) he gets confused. We have no idea what he's even covering in class most of the time because he never says what section of the book he's covering or even what the topic is. Worse, the subject he had to teach us this semester wasn't even his field. He said the department threw the course on him because it was his turn.

The real problem I have, however, is the grading scheme. In his original syllabus, he stated grades would consist of regular homework, a project, a midterm, and an in-class final. However, this wasn't followed at all. We had no homework the whole semester. The project was changed last minute to a one page summary of a section from the book because he didn't bring the topic up until the last class before the final (and he went out of his way to say not more than one page and not to put much effort into it). The midterm turned into a take home exam that consisted of problems assigned from the book (where those problems were determined literally by drawing numbers out of a hat, and we all had different problems often of substantially varying difficulty). The final exam was changed to a take-home exam last minute as well, and consisted of problems that he made up out of his own head (he admitted this). We never received a single graded assignment back once in the course. He also admitted he hadn't graded the midterm yet when he gave us the take-home final.

As frustrating as this is, (especially given this is a qualifier prep class and hence we should really know the material well) neither I nor the other students (around 7 in the class total) said anything to anyone during the semester because our understanding was that we'd all likely receive roughly the same grades anyway in both the class and on the qualifier. However, at the end of the semester this didn't happen. Two got an A, 4 got a B+, and 1 got a B (the B being me).

Now, to me, getting a B in a grad-level class looks really bad, like getting a C or a D in an undergrad class. But what really erks me about it is that based on extensive conversations with others in the course and comparing answers on exams afterwards is that it doesn't appear as of yet that these grades were assigned based on course content at all, but on some other (perhaps even arbitrary) metric (which this professor has been accused of in the past multiple times). I contacted the professor to talk about this, but he brushed me off and said to talk to him about it in a few months when he's back in town.

This leaves me with a real dilemma. What should I do now? Do I just suck it up and let the dispute go? This is a full professor, after all, and he is the one making the qualifying exam in that subject. But on the other hand, I have a very strong reason at this point to believe that something is amiss, and that myself and others are victims of an arbitrary (perhaps even discriminatory) grading scheme. Should we stand for this on principle?

Now, I'm not the type of person who's complained every time I've gotten a bad grade. Usually I know it was my fault and just suck it up and do better next time. But this time really feels different. However, this is obviously complicated by the delicate political situation of grad student vs full professor.

I want to bring this up first with the graduate director. He's a reasonable man who's helped with things like this before with others. But before I did that I wanted to seek advice from you all to see whether this is worth pursuing, and if so, what myself and others in the course should do about this. Thanks for reading this long-winded rant.

Answer 1

There are three basic options with respect to grade disputes that you could pursue:

1. Pursue through formal channels. You could either appeal to the department by by filing something with the DGS or chair. You could talk the graduate school and complain formally in that way.

2. Pursue through informal channels. Again, there are several variants. You could talk to the professor and see if s/he is willing to change the grade. You could talk to the DGS, graduate student representative, or some other intermediary and see if they could help sway the professor to change the grade.

3. You can do nothing about it.

You can also talk to your ombudsman to get general advice (without trying to enlist their assistance in a formal complaint).

Pursuing it formally (and to a lesser extent informally), there may regrettably be negative consequences for you within the department. This might be because not going with the flow can breed animosity, and the additional oversight may annoy powers that be. This is not to say don't consider it, but it is to say that being in graduate school includes a lot more relational management (with your advisor, with your peers, with faculty) than being in undergrad does.

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Separately, you're asking about this because you're interested in switching disciplines and worried that they will care about grades. One avenue is changing the grade. Another idea might be to insure that one of your letter writers explains the arbitrariness of the grade. A further and final resort is to explain it yourself in a supplementary note. (If you end up going for the last one, I'd recommend substantially rewriting it and compressing it down so that it sounds like a more professional explanation than bits like "when (not if!)").

Given your goals, I think the ideal thing would (a) to check some of the less formal resources and see if the grade could be changed and in lieu of that (b) have one of your letter writers address this in passing within a stellar recommendation.

Answer 2

I'm not sure what program you are in (I'm in computer science), but I would say just let it go.

First, in grad school, at least in the computer science and computer science-related disciplines I'm familiar with, grades no longer really matter. When you are on the job market nobody is going to ask for your transcript. The factor that is most important, and that individuals will use to hire you, is your research (as well as letters of recommendations, how well you interviewed, how well you fit in with the department, etc.). The point is: grades don't really matter. Don't believe me, then look here, for instance -- searches will turn up more than this.

So, granted that grades aren't such a big thing (a B is fine -- if you get a C people may start to worry), you are really only left with the fact that this professor is was horrible, didn't do what he said, etc. He is, however: (a) a full tenured professor, and (b) a full professor in your department. Regarding (a): there's nothing to be done here. He's tenured. He will continue on one way or another. Regarding (b): your actions regarding this individual could come back on you. That's all I'll say regarding the matter, but I just don't think it's worth stirring things up within your department over a B grade. My two cents though.