<p>Within the science and the pre-med studies, how competitive are the student with each other. Are classes graded on a curve, if so does this create a more cut-throat environment between the students to try and get the top grade. I was just wondering because I know GPA is very important to get into Med School.</p>
<p>Anna</p>
<p>Hey Anna,</p>
<p>Classes ARE curved. But usually the curves are pretty generous. For example in my physics class, one of my tests had an average of 46/100, and that was a B. So it’s nice. People are definitely driven to do well here, but we don’t really talk about premed much… People just do their own thing.
JHU is a competitive school, doesn’t mean you can’t get a good GPA here.
Hopkins '15</p>
<p>I would say that grades are adjusted more so than curved. Like miffystanford said, a lot of times, the cutoffs for A/B/C are adjusted to give a reasonable proportion of students each letter grade. I only ever saw these adjustments being made to help grades- I’ve never seen or heard of a situation where the professor pre-decided that only X% of the class would get A’s and “curved” people’s grades downward (ie at some schools, I’ve heard of professors deciding that only 15% are allowed to get A’s so even if 40% of students score above a 90 on the exam, only the top 15% get A’s - I’ve never seen anything like that at Hopkins.)</p>
<p>Hopkins is competitive in the sense that everyone wants to do well, but that does not imply or mean at all that it is a cut-throat environment. People tend to be very collaborative when it comes to homeworks and studying for tests, and while I too heard the rumors of people destroying each others textbooks and lab setups before I came to Hopkins, I never saw or heard of anything like that actually happening on campus.</p>