<p>It's not THAT big a difference. I'd put grade deflation lowering a student's overall GPA by .1--at MOST.</p>
<p>Qwertulen: roflmao</p>
<p>quirkily: no, it's a big difference...there were studies that showed that the median gpa for yale students was a 3.7 and the median gpa for a princeton student was a 3.4...of course they might not be accurate...but still...</p>
<p>I don't believe it, and I won't until I see these studies.</p>
<ol>
<li>If grade deflation really lowered students' GPAs by .3, that'd mean MORE than one full grade lowered EVERY semester. With four classes, one lowered grade (assuming a FULL A to B, instead of A to B+, A- to B/B+, etc), that'd be a decrease of .25. With five classes, .2.</li>
</ol>
<p>Now, consider that grade deflation is pretty much nonexistent (or at least plays much less of a role in grades) in upper-level classes. This means to maintain that .3 decrease, grade deflation would have to lower two or three grades for pretty much all underclassmen. Sound reasonable? I don't really think so.</p>
<p>And also: <a href="http://gradeinflation.com/princeton.html%5B/url%5D">http://gradeinflation.com/princeton.html</a>
Median GPA pre-Malkiel and pre-grade deflation never got above 3.40, much less 3.7.</p>
<p>welcome professor (?) Powis to the discussion
makes it a lot more interesting</p>
<p>ivyboy05, law is tough in that there is a significant emphasis on GPA, which I suppose is why you brought it up. I think it depends on the school...those schools that are truly looking for the best students (I feel like Yale law fits here...) will not care, however schools looking to rise in rankings will want the higher GPAs to boost there standing. That being said, I feel like msot of the law schools that Princeton students would have trouble getting into would be of the first kind...At the end of the day relative performance compared to the rest of the student body at a specific college is still the best indicator both of aptitude and of the potential for future performance, I think, and this has not changed at all</p>
<p>Princeton's grading system is no secret. Employers, grad schools, professional schools, etc., all know about the curve and the 35% rule. So the actual "lowering" of a GPA has a neglible effect on how you do.</p>
<p>However, there is more stratification as a result. Instead of 50% (or more) of the kids in a class getting some form of A, there's a maximum of 35% in lower level classes. The bottomline is this: if you are a stellar student the grade deflation actually <em>helps</em> you since you distinguish yourself from the rest of the class, and if you are not as good of a student it hurts you.</p>
<p>Think about the top 10 students in a class of 200. If they share As with the top 75 even though they know the material better and did better on tests, etc., their extra proficiency at that class will not be evident in their grade. But if you make the grades and tests hard enough so that there's almost no overlap, the "ranking" of the class via grades is more accurate, and the kids who do best are rewarded for their efforts.</p>
<p>
[quote]
And also: <a href="http://gradeinflation.com/princeton.html%5B/url%5D">http://gradeinflation.com/princeton.html</a>
Median GPA pre-Malkiel and pre-grade deflation never got above 3.40, much less 3.7.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>See, that's exactly what I've been hearing. A lot of people complain about grade deflation, but apparently not all that much has changed since before it was implemented. Certainly not enough has been affected to warrant sweeping generalizations like how this policy is disadvantaging low-income students or whatever. Regardless of what role the policy plays in grading, the professor should give you a grade based exclusively on your work, not a grade that's going to take into consideration prior educational background or any other irrelevant information. This is college (and Princeton, for that matter), and there are plenty of resources available if you need tutoring or other help. It's up to you, though, to find them. And I can certainly understand the doing-A-work-but-not-getting-an-A argument, but that was there in high school as well. It's just the way the curve works, unfortunately. Minute details end up costing you big time, which is why the grading system as a whole (i.e. not just at Princeton but in higher education in general) could stand a little review.</p>
<p>I'm not the biggest fan of some of Malkiel's policies either, but I think the effects are exaggerated to be more far-reaching than they are.</p>
<p>this was the article...i mean these statistics can't be entirely reliable and accurate but it's still kind of scary...</p>
<p>Well, I'm thinking of applying to Princeton. </p>
<p>My question: What does grade deflation actually mean? I think that really would clear up this debate. </p>
<p>Is it literally precision in examination, as in better test questions, oral examinations, or is it same tests and a Soviet style quota system? </p>
<p>(P.S. I can explain the Russia reference if someone doesn't know; but in short they had a ethnicity based quota system as to who can get what on oral placement tests and admission tests to certain top universities, such as the higher ranked polytechnical, foreign languages/diplomacy, or medical institutions. If too many people did well from a certain group or another, they would drop whole grades based on anything they could find bad to level out the quota based on percent representation of population.)</p>
<p>umm I don't know what to say to that...</p>
<p>Not sure what the Soviet system was, but here's how it works (it's quite simple.)</p>
<p>Roughly 35% of students in any given department will get some form of A. Usually it's a smaller percentage for lower level classes and a higher percentage for upper level courses.</p>
<p>I think most of the rest of the class gets some form of B, and maybe the bottom 20% or so get Cs or below.</p>
<p>Personally, I'm not sure what to make of a grade inflation or grade deflation system. Now I doubt that all 15 out of 15 or 20/20 will get either A or A-, but if say 7/7 in a smaller class do, what happens? Do the 92's become B's, the 91's or 90's become C's, and the full A's become A-? Then likewise, if 1/10 get A, and the rest get B, B-, C+, do some B's move upwards into A-? </p>
<p>(sorry about posting theoretical situations BTW, as I'm sure that such situations are rather very unlikely, but still...)</p>
<p>Well it's across a department not across a class, so there is considerable flexibility for small class sizes. In the event where there are multiple sessions of one class (like 500 kids divided into 5 sections) then the curve is done for the whole class and not just one section.</p>
<p>If its deparment wide it's not as bad as I thought, as on average about 20-40% recieve some sort of A in most courses anyway don't they?</p>
<p>The problem I see with grade deflation (and the reason I chose not to apply to Princeton), is that it injects superfluous competition in an already tense academic environment. I was talking to a recent grad from Princeton (ORFE major) and he was telling me about a particular seminar class he had. It was with a brilliant professor, very nice classroom, brilliant students. </p>
<p>Except, the first thing he thought of was not "Sweeeeeet", it was taking a look around the room and realizing only 3 people will receive A's.</p>
<p>And don't kid yourself. a 3.8 at any of the Ivies will be viewed more favorably than a 3.5 at Princeton. The reason being unless the company/gradschool is actively trying to recruit Princeton kids... why should they accept a 3.6 at Princeton over a 3.8 at Harvard ceteri paribus? </p>
<p>Also it is very important to note that this system hurts the kids who are very smart--- but not Brilliant (IMO level). Why? Because the IMo'ers are going to pull off 3.9+'s anyway. It's the very smart kid, but not brilliant who's gonna get his GPA trounced on. Now at another grade inflated school, (i.e rest of the Ivies less Cornell), he/she can get a 3.9 as opposed to a 3.6-3.7 at Princeton. You can bet the higher GPA is viewed as better ESPECIALLY in Law school admissions.</p>
<p>
[quote]
quirkily: no, it's a big difference...there were studies that showed that the median gpa for yale students was a 3.7 and the median gpa for a princeton student was a 3.4...of course they might not be accurate...but still...
[/quote]
To make you Princeton kids feel better, the median GPA at Yale isn't actually 3.7. The study cited claiming that it was between 3.6 and 3.7 was based entirely on a survey of graduating seniors (and was completely unscientific, it was basically a poll done by the YDN). If I remember correctly, something like 50% of the respondents had graduated with honors (compared to only 30% of total graduates). So the GPAs were definitely biased upwards, which is hardly a surprise, since students with good grades are more likely to want to report them in a survey. 3.5 is a more likely average GPA. That's still higher than at grade-deflated Princeton, but it's very different from 3.7.</p>
<p>Truazn, this is just scare talk. </p>
<p>The change under this new policy is not nearly as drastic as critics from other schools are suggesting and while plenty of current Princeton students are upset about it, I predict that they will soon come to accept it. My conversations with many of them have suggested that they are already growing accustomed to it as they understand it better and see its actual effects. In fact, many students are even supportive of it and proud that the standards at Princeton have been set higher than at most of its competitors. The policy is still new and cultural changes are uncomfortable, but over time, it will cease to be even a point of discussion. In fact, in the hard science and engineering departments, the average GPAs have always been lower. The grade inflation had occurred primarily in the humanities departments.</p>
<p>Furthermore, while the change is real its also modest and professors have continued to award appropriate grades. An oft-misunderstood aspect of the policy is that it is across entire departments and not within individual classes. This is not well-understood even by current students (one of the reasons for their fears) but Princeton continues to have classes of ten or fewer students in which (assuming they deserve it) nearly all get A-range grades. Malkiel has been very vocal about this but the myths regarding the implementation of the policy have continued. </p>
<p>Heres an example of the real effect. In 2003, approximately 48.3% of grades awarded at Harvard were in the A-range and Princetons were similar. The following year, after the grade deflation policy, 41% of the grades at Princeton were in this range. If all other grades were Bs, the Harvard students GPA would be a 3.48 while the Princeton students would be a 3.41, hardly dramatic and nowhere near the difference you are suggesting. It is highly doubtful that the policy will actually reach its goal of A-range grades being limited to just 35% but even if it does, the Princeton students GPA would only drop to 3.35, a difference of .13 on a 4-point scale.</p>
<p>The good news about the policy change is that the significance attached to an A is now greater and the most brilliant students are better recognized for their accomplishments. It also simply returns the grade distribution to where it was around 1990. The upward creep in grades continues at nearly all of Princetons competitors and its hard to know when it will end. Harvard was embarrassed in 2001 when the Boston Globe reported that 91% of seniors were graduating with honors. This was not directly related to GPA inflation but it prompted a number of faculty members to begin a more serious discussion of needed changes there. Yale has not officially reported grade distributions since 1981 but the Yale Daily News recently queried graduating seniors and found that the average GPA was around 3.6. Eventually those other schools will be forced to tackle the problem as well but while most have expressed concern over the upward drift at their own schools, no others have had the courage to do anything about it.</p>
<p>Before Princeton instituted this policy it consulted with the nations leading graduate schools and a host of employers and it continues to provide detailed information about the change to all of them each time it sends out a transcript. In fact, since the policy was adopted, the acceptance rate for Princeton graduates at the top professional and graduate schools has actually increased from what was already one of the highest rates in the country.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>You are simply wrong about the ceteri[s] paribus. In fact, all other things are not equal! Princetons policy change is both understood and respected by those companies and grad schools to which you refer. Actually, your argument can simply be turned on its head. Those same graduate schools and companies increasingly see transcripts from Princetons competitors that display their grade inflation and may come to discredit those inflated GPAs. As for your claim that this will hamper Princeton applicants to law schools, there is no evidence of this at all. Here are a couple of quotes from a Newsweek article that speak directly to that issue.</p>
<p>"Schools that are not part of this inflation trend we certainly make note of," says Andy Cornblatt, dean of admissions at Georgetown University Law School. Recruiters at Accenture and Goldman Sachs say they also recognize that different schools have different grading cultures, and they consider this when hiring graduates and student interns.</p>
<p>For general reviews of the issue see the following:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2007-03-27-princeton-grades_N.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2007-03-27-princeton-grades_N.htm</a>
<a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=508118%5B/url%5D">http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=508118</a>
<a href="http://www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/18226%5B/url%5D">http://www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/18226</a></p>