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• Grades and Grading
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Grades and Grading

Minimum Grades

To graduate, all students must earn a minimum grade average of B. In addition, all students must earn a minimum grade of B- in the courses required by their programs.  For elective courses, D is a passing grade; the student gets credit for the course.

Grade Range

All Kennedy School courses except Reading and Research (RAR) courses are graded with letter grades:

A, A-, B+, B, B-, C+, C, C-, D, E.

RAR courses are graded as SAT (satisfactory) or UNS (unsatisfactory).

Grades that Don’t Exist
Note that there is no A+ in the list of grades. Similarly, there is no F; the failing grade is E.

Pass/Fail
The Kennedy School does not use pass/fail grading in any course. HKS students who cross register into a course in another school must take the course for a letter grade if that option is open.

Special Designations of Status Used by the Office of the Registrar

Note that a course in which any of the following grades is received will not be counted toward graduation.

INC (Incomplete): Awarded at the instructor's discretion if the student has not completed all required written assignments by the end of the semester.  Receiving an INC means the student has until the last day of reading period in the following semester to complete the work. In order to extend beyond the last day of reading period in the following semester the student must submit to the Office of the Registrar a Petition to Extend signed by the faculty member. If the work is not completed and the student does not file a Petition to Extend, the INC becomes a PI, Permanent Incomplete.

PI (Permanent Incomplete). Such permissions are entirely at the discretion of the instructor, who is under no obligation to grant permission for either an INC or a further extension. When the requirements for the course are completed, the instructor submits a Change of Grade Report to the Registrar.

IP (In Progress). Submitted by the instructor in reporting grades at the end of the fall semester for Y courses (yearlong courses) in which the grade is awarded only at the conclusion of the second semester.

ABS (Absent). Used (1) when a student who has not been excused in advance of the exam by the Registrar fails to attend a final exam, or (2) when a student drops a course but fails to submit a petition to drop.

DRP (Dropped). Indicates the student dropped the course by filing a Drop Petition with the Registrar.

WD (Withdrew). Indicates the student withdrew from the course as a result of administrative action, usually because the student left the school in mid-semester.  This designation is also used when a student drops a January course after the drop deadline.

Recommended Grade Distribution

The recommended grade distribution for use by faculty who are teaching HKS courses uses a recommended range rather than a fixed percentage for each grading category:

A	A-	B+	B	B- or lower
10-15%	20-25%	30-40%	20-25%	5-10%

The highest grade distribution falling within these recommended ranges would be:

A	A-	B+	B	B- or lower
15%	25%	35%	20%	5%

The lowest grade distribution falling within the recommended ranges would be:

A	A-	B+	B	B- or lower
10%	20%	35%	25%	10%

Grading and Reporting

Who May Grade
Responsibility for grading rests solely with the listed instructor of the course. CAs and TFs do not have instructional appointments and are not authorized by the school to assign grades.

Grade Sheets
The Office of the Registrar emails the grade sheet for each course to the instructor during the last week of class. It should be signed by the instructor and mailed back or hand delivered, not emailed. Please refer to the Academic Calendar for due dates.

If there is more than one instructor, the grade sheet is sent to the first on the catalog list of instructors, which is ordinarily in alphabetical order. As a practical matter, any one of the instructors who holds an HKS teaching appointment may sign the grade sheet. Typically multiple instructors settle among themselves which one of them will actually sign.

Grades in Jointly Listed Courses
The instructor receives a separate class list from the registrar in each school in which the course is jointly listed, listing the students enrolled under the non-HKS number. Faculty who are co-teaching a jointly listed course should settle early on who will have custody of the grade sheets; in most cases it will be the instructor from the school where the class meets.

Grades from Other Schools
Grades that students earn in another school are recorded using that school’s grading system.

Changing a Grade
To change a grade once it has been filed, the instructor must file a Change of Grade Report with the Office of the Registrar. Please note that for a change of grade the Registrar must have the instructor’s signature; a fax or email is not sufficient. Forms are available from the Office of the Registrar.

Posting Student Grades

Grades may never be posted by student identification number.

Other information which is considered private: any computer printouts, class lists on paper or on a computer, computer display screens, and notes taken during any kind of advising session with a student. Faculty and staff must not allow any students to view, read, or record another student’s ID number while in their workspace.

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA) known also as the Buckley amendment gives students certain rights with respect to the privacy of their educational records. The primary rights afforded are the right to inspect and review the educational records, the right to seek to have the records amended, and the right to have some measure of control over the disclosure of information contained in the records.

As employees of Harvard Kennedy School, faculty and staff have a responsibility to protect all education records in their possession. These include any computer printouts, class lists on paper or on a computer, computer display screens, and notes taken during any kind of advising session with a student. Faculty and staff must now allow any students to view, read, or record another student’s ID number while in their workspace.

Who can see student records? School officials are the only individual permitted to review student records without the permission of the student. “School officials” at HKS are defined as those members of the institution who act in the student’s educational interest within the limitations of their “need to know.” This may include faculty, administrators, and other employees, including student employees and/or part-time employees who manage student educational record information.

Special “Don’ts” for faculty and staff
The bottom line: when in doubt, don’t give it out. Call the Registrar or the Associate Registrar to review the specifics of your individual question or scenario.

To avoid violations of FERPA rules, faculty and staff must not:

• At any time use a student name or ID number in a public posting of grades
• Link the name of a student with that student’s ID number in any public manner
• Leave graded tests in a stack for students to pick up by sorting through them
• Circulate a printed class list with student names and ID numbers or grades as an attendance roster.
• Discuss the progress of any student with anyone other than the student and officially designated academic administrators without consent of the student.
• Provide anyone with lists of students enrolled in the class for any commercial purpose.
• Provide anyone with student schedules or assist anyone other than HKS employees in finding a student on campus.

Faculty and staff who are related to a student or HKS employees who are parents of a student, or spouses, partners, friends, or relatives of any kind, do not have access to information on these students beyond directory information. If faculty are feeling pressure by any of these parties to comply with a request for information beyond that which can be given out, they should refer the requester to the Office of the Registrar.

What information may be disseminated
The HKS has designated the following items as directory information (i.e. information that can be given out to any requester provided that a confidentiality restriction or privacy flag has not been placed on the individual’s record:

• Student name
• Dates of attendance
• Email address
• Degree(s) awarded or expected
• Date of graduation

If asked for directory information about a student who has requested a privacy flag, the correct response is “there is no information available on a person with that name.”


For further clarification on Harvard Kennedy School's policies regarding posting of grades, please contact the Office of Registrar.

How Grades are Calculated

In calculating a student’s average grade to determine whether the student is eligible for a degree, only the required number of credits are included in the averaging process. The grades included in the calculation, however, must include the courses that are required for the degree program in which the student is enrolled. If a student has earned more than the required number of credits, the extra electives in which he or she earned the weakest grades will be dropped.

For example, suppose Jane Doe earned 20 credits, including 8 in the required courses, when only 18 were necessary for her degree. Out of her 12 electives, the 10 in which she received the highest grades would be used, together with the 8 grades in the required courses, in calculating the average. This rule allows students to carry a heavier course load than is required while reducing the risk that it will prevent their graduating.
To determine the average grade, each letter grade is converted to a numerical grade:

A	A-	B+	B	B-	C+	C	C-	D	E
10	9	8	7	6	5	4	3	1	0

A weighted average (course credit = 1, module credit = 0.5) is then calculated for the required number of credits. If the student is to graduate, this calculation must result in an average that is greater than or equal to 7.  As a reminder, students are required to have a minimum average of B to earn a degree.

Course Credits at HKS

Full semester course: 1.0 credit
Module (half a semester) : 0.5 credit
Year long course “Y”) course) 1.0 credit
January course: meets intensively. Earns either 1.0 or 0.5 credit.

Other schools use a variety of credit counting systems; see Student Handbook for conversion details.