This paper investigates the prevalence, mechanisms, and drivers of grade enhancement at a large Central European business school, examining how often teachers raise marks, why they do so, and whose grades benefit. A sequential mixed-methods approach was applied: in-depth interviews with academic staff revealed motives and practices (Study 1); next, an anonymous faculty survey assessed self-reported behaviours (Study 2); finally, an archival analysis of 873,899 course outcomes spanning ten academic years searched for statistical abnormalities indicative of grade enhancement, such as the bunching of scores just above pass or letter-grade thresholds (Study 3). We found that approximately 70 % of instructors acknowledged at least occasional grade enhancement. Scores cluster immediately above key thresholds; typically, one or two points are presumably added instead of penalizing borderline cases, supporting the notion of “helpful rounding”. The dominant motives are empathy, perceptions of measurement imprecision, and recognition of student effort, whereas institutional pressure via student evaluations of teaching plays a smaller role. Contrary to common claims in the literature, female instructors are not more lenient than male colleagues; the practice has not intensified over the decade, and a small but significant bias favors female over male students. The study offers one of the largest multi-method examinations of grade enhancement, introduces “helpful rounding” as a distinct micro-mechanism, and extends a literature dominated by Anglo-American contexts to a post-transition European setting.
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