The grade inflation at top American universities is general knowledge. Is there a similar trend in Britain? The Norrington table, introduced in 1963, ranks Oxford colleges annually according to the number of 1st, 2.1, 2.2 and 3rd class honours degrees awarded to students graduating. (These degree levels are awarded by university committees, not by the individual colleges of the university.)

This last academic year Merton College came top of the Norrington table with the following numbers of graduating students and the classes of their degrees:

1st class: 34
2.1’s. 43
2.2’s. 5
3rd class. 1

Astonishing! Go back fifty years and there was a 4th Class Honours degree offered by Oxford, and a lot of people got Thirds. In those days the Seconds were not split into 2.1 and 2.2’s. But the point is that 1st Class Honour Degrees were confined to the brilliant. Granted that Merton had top honors, it is nevertheless extraordinary that over 90 percent of the graduates received 1st or 2.1 degree.

Tomorrow I would like to elaborate on this by comparing 1963 results with those in 2014 in another college which is currently middle-ranking.