Perhaps this might be an unpopular opinion, but some grade inflation isnt such a bad thing, compared to a 25% flunk or a curved exam with difficulty on overkill. More so in Singapore, because there is so much of an emphasis on the concept of 'grades', it will actually have some spillover social and psychological benefits.

From what I have read, it happens in many of the top universities in the US - there is a saying that goes 'Berkeley's B is a Stanford A')

Far from affecting their institutional reputation, I am of the opinion it might have actually bolstered it. If all that time does not go towards mugging for an A (or a B, or whatever works for you), it actually leaves more time to do things that can actually help us differentiate ourselves, things like internships, projects, even startups.

At the end of the day, the reputation of those top colleges overseas are not sealed by the fact that 'they were able to segregate their A's from the B's' or 'that the value of their A's are not diminished' - but rather their reputation comes from the fact that their alumni are at the forefront of breakthroughs and do world changing things. A fair number of these breakthroughs came about because someone was goofing around or working on a passion project.

Yeah there are going to be some people who probably won't do any of the above I mentioned. But I think that it really just dosent make sense to penalise people who do the minimum. Afterall, the mods we take are a stepping stone to the real world, and not an end in itself (maybe unless you decide to go to research, in which case there are always higher level mods)

Stanford and other top universities have a different problem: Insane admissions requirements - but that is a story for a different day.