A Proposal for Dealing With Grade Inflation: The Relative Performance Index

Quality point average (QPA) has long been the barometer for judging student performance. The measure often influences the employment decisions of recruiters of business school students, particularly for initial job interviews. Grade inflation, however, has in many cases diminished the usefulness of the QPA. This article introduces a measure that, together with the quality point average, may yield revealing insights into students' performance. The Relative Performance Index (RPI) provides a relative measure of a student's perform- ance vis-à-vis the other students who were subject to the same educational and evaluation environments and thus may enhance the ability of employment recruiters to identify the best and brightest of any college or university's business students.