<p>With the Common App just a couple of weeks away, I was hoping to start an updated thread on Grade Deflation. Most likely D14 will want to attend grad school so attending a school with high grade deflation is probably not the best idea.</p>
<p>What schools have you experienced are confidence killers? Thanks!</p>
<p>By “grad school” do you mean PhD program or professional school (MD, JD, etc.)?</p>
<p>Mostly, there is grade inflation. See [National</a> Trends in Grade Inflation, American Colleges and Universities](<a href=“http://www.gradeinflation.com%5DNational”>http://www.gradeinflation.com) .</p>
<p>I’m thinking more professional - MBA, JD or MD…</p>
<p>Also think about the major or specific college, not just the university as a whole.</p>
<p>Schools that make a conscious decision to have grade deflation usually are trying to correct for previous grade inflation, so grades are still fairly high after the deflation. For example, 10 years ago in the 2002-2003 academic year, roughly half of the grades given to Princeton students were A’s, with that percentage varying quite a lot between different departments. In 2004, Princeton instituted a grade deflation policy that limited the number of A’s to a target of no more than 35% of grades given in undergrad courses and no more than 55% of grades given to independent upperclassmen work. After the first 2 years, the percent of A’s dropped to 41%. The NYT reports that the class of 2009 had a mean grade-point average of 3.39, compared with 3.46 for the class of 2003. I think most on CC would not consider an average GPA of 3.39 to be unreasonably low, even though Princeton is well known for having grade deflation.</p>
<p>My oldest attended a college without grade inflation and did not have a problem being admitted to graduate schools, because admissions was well aware of the quality of her undergrad education.</p>
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<p>PhD program or professional school?</p>
<p>Professional.
<a href=“http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505145_162-37243170/grade-inflation-colleges-with-the-easiest-and-hardest-grades/[/url]”>http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505145_162-37243170/grade-inflation-colleges-with-the-easiest-and-hardest-grades/</a></p>
<p>All due respect, this is not a good way to pick an undergrad college. You could take a program like Cornell Engineering (reputed to have very tough grading and low GPA’s) and compare it to a less rigorous school- and you would undoubtedly notice that the outside world has “corrected” for the tough grading at Cornell. Companies that won’t interview a kid with a 3.0 GPA in Sociology are happy to interview kids with that GPA from Cornell.</p>
<p>And adcom’s in grad school are even more savvy about who grades how.</p>
<p>This seems a tertiary consideration at best.</p>
<p>Wellesley has no problem getting students into grad schools.</p>
<p>Ucbalumnus, in case you’re interested about historical results from Ds undergrad school.
[REED</a> COLLEGE PHD PRODUCTIVITY](<a href=“http://www.reed.edu/ir/phd.html]REED”>Doctoral Degree Productivity - Institutional Research - Reed College)
I believe it also contains a link to medical school acceptance.
Not sure cause I am on my phone & I don’t have my reading glasses.
:o</p>
<p>It only mentions PhD programs, not professional school (MD, JD, etc.). Importance of GPA relative to school reputation, courses taken, etc. varies considerably, so assuming that all such “grad school” is similar in this respect would be misleading.</p>
<p>D1 was a transfer, there’s a .3 difference between the two schools in the long term grade inflation graph. She often regrets not having completed more of her premed coursework at the school with the lower grade inflation as she thinks she would have had a higher gpa. How could that be true? Because of the difference in the cohort of students she was competing with for grades; at the low inflation school she was decidedly at the top of the student pool, while at the higher inflation school she was more in the middle of the pack.</p>
<p>As other members have pointed out, it’s not a simple/on size fits all issue, the devil is in the details.</p>
<p>Ok, I’m having a problem with the list of hardest grades… I don’t think that these lists can be depended on to figure out which college you will get better grades at. If the lists were broken down by major maybe but not using the whole college’s average GPA.</p>
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<p>LOL at Brown (from the link that emeraldkity posted). :)</p>
<p>It’s funny, because Brown is the first name that pops into my mind whenever I think about grade inflation, loose curriculum standards, etc. - interesting to see it confirmed in some way.</p>
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<p>It is interesting that a Canadian school, Simon Fraser is in the list. In my opinion, it is not anywhere as tough as UBC, or her eastern brethrens, Toronto, Queens, and McGill.</p>
<p>In Toronto, for example, you can “graduate with distinction” with a GPA of only 3.2:</p>
<p>[UTSC</a> Calendar 2013-2014](<a href=“http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~registrar/calendars/calendar/Degrees.html]UTSC”>http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~registrar/calendars/calendar/Degrees.html)</p>
<p>Since a grade of D (50%) is a passing grade, and the average grade for a large class is maintained at 65% (C), I truly feel sorry for those kids.</p>
<p>There are a few things to keep in mind about grade deflation. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>In engineering and the hard sciences, frequently, the grades were never being inflated in the first place, so grade deflation policies have no effect.</p></li>
<li><p>One of the objections I’ve heard to grade deflation is that it puts a certain number of students at risk for missing hard GPA cutoffs for programs and scholarships. My suspicion, however, is that students close to that minimum had very little chance of getting in anyway - programs set the GPA bar fairly low to account for students who may have other unusual things going for them. </p></li>
<li><p>If you are talking about grad school in the humanities, at least, all that is going to happen in a school without grade deflation is that a student who may not have a realistic chance of getting in is given false hope. Even coming from a top school, if you want to get into a good PhD program, it isn’t enough to simply be an “A” student in your subject; you’re going to have to be one of the strongest in the department. If 70% of the English department graduates with an A average, all that means is that 70 % of the students think they can go to grad school. In all likelihood, this is only true for the top 10% of the students</p></li>
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<p>I don’t think grade deflation is an issue at all - in fact the prevailing problem is quite the opposite. A simple Google search will bring anyone who is interested up to speed. In many of the High Schools and Universities today - too many students get all A’s.</p>
<p>I had dinner yesterday with a parent whose Son is another “brilliant” one - he has never received a grade below A+.</p>
<p>Check out some interesting articles below.</p>
<p>[Daily</a> Kos: A? is for Average: Grade Inflation in America](<a href=“A’ is for Average: Grade Inflation in America”>A’ is for Average: Grade Inflation in America)</p>
<p>[The</a> Grade Inflation Conundrum](<a href=“http://www.johnson.cornell.edu/About/News-Publications/Article-Detail/ArticleId/6649/The-Grade-Inflation-Conundrum.aspx]The”>http://www.johnson.cornell.edu/About/News-Publications/Article-Detail/ArticleId/6649/The-Grade-Inflation-Conundrum.aspx)</p>
<p>[Rebecca</a> Schuman: Grading Time: I Give Up, You’re All Exceptional](<a href=“HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost”>Grading Time: I Give Up, You're All Exceptional | HuffPost College)</p>
<p>This one is really funny.</p>
<p>[A’s</a> for Everyone!](<a href=“http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/02/AR2005060201593.html]A’s”>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/02/AR2005060201593.html)</p>
<p>The problem is that grade inflation creates more incentives to have more grade inflation. When GPA is important for admission to undergraduate colleges, medical school, or law school, going to a high school or undergraduate college with less grade inflation (relative to the competitiveness of its students) puts one at a disadvantage compared to going to a high school or undergraduate college with more grade inflation. A pre-med or pre-law student may choose Brown over Princeton (or Wisconsin - Green Bay over Wisconsin - Milwaukee) for this reason.</p>
<p>[National</a> Trends in Grade Inflation, American Colleges and Universities](<a href=“http://www.gradeinflation.com/]National”>http://www.gradeinflation.com/)</p>