TA confession: I'm sorry, but most of your children (my students) are average

[OHMomof2]

Some see it as a way to show who has mastered the material, and some see it as a way of distinguishing students from one another.

That makes perfect sense.

The former would likely prefer the vast majority of the class getting an A, if the vast majority mastered the class material; while the latter would likely prefer only a fixed percentage of the class always getting an A to distinguish the ones who have best mastered the material.

Right - in the first case hopefully the majority “got it” and are ready to move on to the next level. I can see uses for the latter, like when there are a fixed number of spaces in the next level course and only the top x number can get in. I can’t really think of a use beyond that (for a course grade, not an individual test), but maybe there are some.

In the first class some professors saying something to the effect of “There are x students in this class, so only y of you will be getting A’s”; Some students refusing to collaborate with or assist classmates to increase the chances of being one of the y students at the top of the class who gets an A;

Yes, I’d be unhappy with that policy, personally, it doesn’t seem like it would foster collaboration (and I think collaboration, problem solving in a group, etc is part of what is expected once these students graduate and go to work).

If the goal of a college course is to learn and master material (whatever “master” may mean), that ought to be how the assessment works as well.

Thanks for the clear and detailed explanation, @Data10 .