<p>Is it harder to get into a top ranked college such as HYPSM or graduating from that college? The college admission process seems harder and occasionally impossible.</p>
<p>Tens of thousands of students who are denied admission by A-list schools every year would have actually done fine, maybe even excelled in them. Take a rejection with a grain of salt; it really does have little to do with your success as a college student, especially if you get accepted to and choose to attend a different elite university.</p>
<p>So is it actually easier getting through school than getting accepted?</p>
<p>HYPSM all have very high graduation rates. Yes, getting in is the hard part. Unless you are a major screw up and fail out of school you will graduate. Even if you finish with a 2.0 you will still be a HYPSM graduate.</p>
<p>I think filling out a quick application is quite a bit easier than four years of serious college work, so "easier" isn't an appropriate expression to use for going through college. But there's less chance involved with graduating college than there is with college admissions.</p>
<p>Most people I've known over the years say that their prep schools were much harder than their Ivies....</p>
<p>What is HYPSM? I have never heard of it. What does it stand for?</p>
<p>HYPSM stands for Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and I'm guessing MIT.</p>
<p>HYPSM? It should be MSPHY!</p>
<p>HYPS (hypes) rolls of the tongue much better than misfee</p>
<p>Most people who say college is easier than their high school typically have the following schedule:</p>
<p>Principles of Economics
Dinosaurs and the History of Mankind
The Universal Timekeeper
Any business class
Gym</p>
<p>An Ivy education (and most educations in general) are as hard as you want to make them. If you want it to be worthless, then they have no problem letting you do so to keep you occupied and paying tuition, but for those who are serious about doing anything consequential, the resources are there.</p>
<p>Well, when you're paying $40,000 a year for an education and are surrounded by brilliant people, working hard for grades comes almost naturally, I would imagine.</p>
<p>Can you actually take Gym in college for credit?</p>
<p>A relative who graduated not long ago and who took mostly science courses at a top Ivy (he now is an MD) still says his "public" high school was more difficult.</p>
<p>If one wants a challenging curriculum, rather than simply prestige, one should look at Reed College, only 49% graduate in 4 years, and 70% in 6 with an average GPA of 2.8.</p>
<p>Just because less people graduate does not prove that it is tougher academically. I recognize that Reed is a very academically challenging and excellent school but statistics like that are not convincing.</p>
<p>Pre-medical students don't take the most difficult science courses offered at their college; they take med school requirement courses (basic physics, basic calculus, basic inorganic chem, organic chem, and bio). Most of these are difficult only to pre-medical students. To up their GPA, most premeds will take pre-med requirements + really easy classes. Overall GPA and premed GPA are the most important factors on a medical school application -- why go out on a limb by taking hard classes?</p>
<p>Take a look at their core curriculum and syllabi posted at the Reed site. I think you will see why many students avoid Reed, simply too rigorous. M S had many friends admitted to and now on their way to Stanford, all said they were not applying either to Reed or Chicago because they did not want to work quite that hard. Why, they asked, do that, when one can get the prestige and be able to take it at least a little easier?</p>
<p>Well, there are a lot of people who are only interested in profit through prestige and reputation (and this does, indeed, profit a lot) while others are interested in profit through great and challenging academics (which also profits a lot).</p>
<p>Reed doesn't have a real grading system -- no pressure.</p>
<p>They do distribute grades though...
The idea that at schools like Reed and St. John's, where grades are not regularly given out, students don't care about grades is false. Even though they are not encouraged to look at their grades, they have the right to go to the registrars office and have a looksy. I work at the Registrars office at St. John's and at the end of each grading period a FLOOD of students come in.</p>
<p>The only true "no grades" school I know of is New College of Florida.</p>
<p>And of course, you can't blame Reed and St. John's students for wanting to see thier grades. These things are important if they want to make it into law/graduate school.</p>