is it hard to graduate from berkeley?

[sakky]

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I don’t know, this sounds fishy to me. I don’t know as much about the engineering process perhaps, but I at least know about the mathematics process in a very detailed way, and grades there are really important. Perhaps the difference is that you cannot really do pure math research as an undergrad, unless it is “Combinatorial + Probabilistic A, B, or C” which doesn’t really count anyway.

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<p>Uh, sure you can do pure math research as an undergrad. Why not? There are math undergrads who have proven some (minor) theorem. Or who have collaborated on a math proof with professors as part of an active research study. Or otherwise contribute to the mathematics literature In fact, that’s the whole point of both the Math 199 independent study designation and the Math 196 thesis designation (for those in the honors program). Why even have these course designations at all if nobody ever uses them? </p>

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I’m not sure how accurate it is that GPA is so worthless in grad school admissions that we no longer even care about it, and that bad grades only serve to hurt prospective law school applicants. If this is really true, fine. I know it’s not true in the math department. I’ll have to speak with Berkeley’s professors who actually are involved in the selection process to see how much they value GPA.

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<p>Please do so. In particular, you should ask whether somebody with an unimpressive GPA but who has stellar LOR’s and demonstrated research potential will be chosen over somebody with a stellar GPA but unimpressive LOR’s and research potential. I am quite certain that they will take the former. It won’t even be a close call. </p>

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They can…but WHY would they? I am only saying we should let grades be an indicator of knowledge of the material. If we implement hooks like MIT’s free pass test run in engineering and reduce rampant grade deflation, and kill off Berkeley’s “engineering trap” as you call it, for the students doing badly, WHY implement even more inflation? Even Stanford makes its classes hard enough that grades actually mean something. It just doesn’t flunk its students out.

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<p>I could equally ask the same question about the humanities and soc-sci majors that you’re asking of me: why did they implement so much inflation? Yet the question is irrelevant, because they did it, whether we like it or not. </p>

<p>It all gets back to my basic question: why exactly should the grading in hum/socsci be so much easier than in the technical majors? If easy grading is fine for the former, then it should be equally fine for the latter. Like I said, if the engineers should be subject to harsh grading, then all of the majors should be subject to the same harsh grading. Otherwise, don’t subject the engineers. I see no reason for differential grading policies. I see no reason for the tech majors to be singled out. </p>

<p>So let me turn the question around - why exactly should the tech majors be graded harder than the nontech majors?</p>