@Tman1005 I have to agree with you on this. I believe the kind of students that end up at Brown are driven to do well naturally. As the parent of a freshman, I saw this from the beginning. High school was never that difficult for my kid, but the first semester at Brown he worked very hard, as everyone else was also very driven to do well. And as far as dropping a class just because you are not doing well in it, I don’t think students at Brown tend to do that - they are driven to conquer rather than quit. My kid felt unprepared in one class due to other students having had more background in HS. Could have dropped it, and been down to 4 rather than 5 classes (4 STEM) but instead burned the midnight oil and caught up on own time. I really admire the kids at Brown and their work ethic and it irks me to see people pick on the system there. It is set up to help students explore areas they otherwise wouldn’t, not drop a class to preserve their gpa.
Brown knows what other top privates know…grade inflation makes everyone happy and HELPS its students get into grad school. There are data showing an average student from a grade inflation university does much better than an above average student at a grade deflation university for grad school and for jobs. All other factors being equal a med school will take an average student from Yale or Brown with a 3.63GPA and a 33MCAT ahead or a 3.4GPA & 33MCAT from JHU. The numbers just look better even if you known they aren’t.
The students are happy and less stressed, the parents are happy, the faculty are happy, and the administration is happy. The more students that get into grad school or elite jobs the better the university looks to future students.
Is JHU one of the grade deflation schools, bud123? I generally think of Princeton, MIT, Caltech but didn’t know any others.
Your list is good. You could add Cal-B, GATech, BU and maybe WFU. I’m sure there are others.
I’m going to add my input as a current student as to explain the high average gpa at brown:
- Most students who would have ended up with C’s end up dropping before finals, so naturally professors give out less C’s
- Majority of those who would get C’s are taking the class S/NC, thus “less” C’s as a result
- The caliber of the students–enough said. Most professors, in my experience, really do know the level of the work we’re capable of.
IMPORTANT to know: I also want to add that this does NOT mean classes are easy at Brown. In fact, they’re just as rigorous and mind-boggling as they are at other ivies. If you don’t believe me, take a course on Operational Analysis: Probabilistic models in the applied math division. That will challenge you, I promise. Many people struggle throughout the semester fulfilling deadlines, projects, midterms, coding projects, labs, theses, capstone projects, reserach projects, independent projects, etc.
^ I can also add anecdotal information about rigorousness at Brown. I know a kid who is a current student there and he is extremely bright and is generally getting Bs in his classes and feels adequately challenged. He is loving it there.