Harvard College faculty voted to cap the number of A grades instructors can award, escalating a long-running grade-inflation debate at elite institutions. The policy, approved by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, limits A-range grades to 20% of enrolled students in fall 2027 letter-graded courses, plus four additional A grades. Faculty members said the move is intended to make Harvard grades “mean what they say they mean,” pointing to data showing more than 60% of undergraduate grades have recently landed in the A range. The reform follows months of discussion after an internal review examined how A grades increased over time. The faculty also approved a change to how students are compared for internal honors and prizes, shifting from GPA to average percentile rank. A separate proposal that would have allowed instructors to petition to opt out of the A cap was voted down. The decision is likely to reverberate across selective higher education as students weigh grade distributions in job and graduate school competition, and as faculty governance groups increasingly treat assessment practices as an accountability issue rather than a private classroom matter.