<p>@gibby,</p>
<p>Actually, the article says nearly 80% responded, but not all completed the survey, so it’s difficult to say which statistics are based on what number of responses. I’m just pointing out that the GPAs cited are estimated in many cases. The kids with one or two A-s in high school may or may not remember whether it was one or two, or may have even forgot that that 93.8% was marked A- rather than A-. Or many students might have said, well, it was 3.9-something or other - I’ll just call it 4.0. The data cry out that this is precisely what happened unless you think that large numbers of students got precisely 3.9s, 3.8s, 3.7s, and so on. In a four-point scale, unweighted, with most kids taking 28 or more courses, those would be arithmetically very difficult to come by.</p>
<p>I’m sure a great number of students who go to Harvard wind up approaching 4.0. In fact, since so many Harvard admits (and other Ivy admits) come from feeder schools, I’d be surprised if it were otherwise. But the data you cite herein makes me doubt that over half of Harvard admits got straight As in high school.</p>
<p>As for athletes, my son’s experience differs a little. Freshmen year, his four-person group shared a bathroom with a group of four athletes on the other side of the entryway. The athletes were very good at puking all over the bathroom after long nights of raucous partying and drinking, but never showed much by way of academic rigor. But they all got along, anyway. As I’ve mentioned, my sons attended a high school that has a fairly prominent sports program, and once they found out where my older son went to high school, he became an honorary jock.</p>