<p>lookingforward, sorry if it seemed like my comments were directly specifically at you. It just seemed to me that a lot of people were dumping on the professor (who may yet turn out to be not up to par) without attributing responsibility on the students for their behavior.</p>
<p>AD, once again it looks like you are taking pot shots at schools that your child can’t get into. Are you trying to justify something or just being your usual controversial self?</p>
<p>We should put “easy” into perspective. Harvard or Ivy level students are very smart, high- achieving, self-motivated kids who worked hard for many, many years to get there. They were the kids in HS who took the hardest curriculum throughout HS, achieved 5s on all their AP exams, graduated in the top 5% of their class. Most likely they thought their AP classes were “easy,” easy being a relative term. They may mean achieving an A is obtainable with a reasonable amount of work whereas other classmates might describe those same classes as “hard.” Depends on who you ask. Consider on average only 1 of those AP kids from HS actually was accepted to Harvard. Everyone of them is capable of achieving an A in a class. Doesn’t make the class easy.</p>
<p>Ivy level kids are used to having incredibly large weekly reading assignments and they are writing 10-20 pages papers throughout the semester (compared to friends who are complaining about writing 5-10 page papers. teachers aren’t spoon feeding them the info. They are expected to read and assimilate the info themselves. </p>
<p>At top academic schools, the emphasis is on critical thinking and writing - not memorization. Take home tests and essays require more analysis and application of knowledge rather than the scantron multiple choice tests. Some professors don’t require students to attend class or recitations because those are set up to help students understand the material assigned or taught in class. Let’s face it. Some students don’t need the help and can do A work without showing up to those study sessions. </p>
<p>Given the intense compeitition to get accepted to Harvard, I would agree that GETTING IN is harder than STAYING IN. These students are all capable of achieving As but that doesn’t mean they will always get As. They may not want to do the work required or they may struggle with a subject that bores them. They are human and may want a break once in awhile and go for an easier class. They may even get Bs or gasp an occasional C because they hate 8am or night time classes, dislike a professor’s teaching style or even choose to party a little too hard.</p>
<p>My son found most of his classes at Penn to be quite challenging.</p>
<p>Annasdad has an agenda and it is driven by sour grapes.</p>
<p>Harvard may well offer some gut courses. Many schools do. But at the other end of the spectrum it also offers many very challenging ones, including Math 55 -said to be the toughest undergrad math class in the country. A lot of very bright math whiz kids, including cross-registrants from MIT, wash out of it.</p>
<p>[Math</a> 55: Rite of Passage for Dept.'s Elite Intimidates Many | News | The Harvard Crimson](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1999/1/6/math-55-rite-of-passage-for/]Math”>Math 55: Rite of Passage for Dept.'s Elite Intimidates Many | News | The Harvard Crimson)</p>
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<p>My D2, who graduated from Bard (which is obviously not an Ivy but does emphasize writing), is of the opinion that a 5 page paper is much harder than a 20 page one. She says it forces you to be focused and concise, and strongly preferred the freedom to have 20 pages to explore a topic. YMMV.</p>
<p>It’s simplistic bs to grab onto one story and call Harvard a diploma mill. I have no connection or particular affection for Harvard, but any non-idiot knows it’s an excellent school. So excellent, that I bet the majority of its students have enough critical thinking skills to know that not everything is black and white, or 100% good or bad. </p>
<p>Even if this class was an easy A, it proves nothing about Harvard as a whole, except that it’s (gasp! shock!) not perfect. Oh the horror …</p>
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<p>I strongly agree. I completely disagree with the idea of arbitrary “weeder” classes that weed out perfectly capable students who have mastered the material. Ridiculous.</p>
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Bingo. Exactly.</p>
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I like curves. I have never felt “hurt” by a curve but I’ve had plenty of classes where the exam average was below 50%. (Because it was a <em>really</em> hard exam.) I am glad that our professors decided not to fail most of us. </p>
<p>Curves are also what keeps the mean GPA at Princeton from rising above a 3.4. At Stanford, the mean GPA is probably around a 3.6. (Stanford hasn’t released official GPA statistics since 2007; it was close to a 3.6 then.) You could argue that most Stanford students work hard enough to deserve an A or A-, but grades become meaningless when they don’t distinguish between students anymore.</p>
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<p>Actually the article did not quote the professor at all: “Dr. Platt and his teaching assistants did not respond to messages requesting comment that were left on Friday.” </p>
<p>Clearly some students believe that’s what he said, but it’s hard to know what really happened here. I don’t understand the rush to judgment in these threads. Why can’t folks just wait and let the investigation play out? </p>
<p>And all professors give out As, so I’m not sure what the disappointment is. Is it the percentage of As that some students believe he promised to give out? Again, this is all hearsay, but even if it’s true, explaining to students the curve you typically grade on is disappointing why exactly? I had many professors do that when I was in college.</p>
<p>I’m no Harvard rah-rah, and frankly just reading about a course of 279 students with multiple TAs confirms for me why I’d prefer my kids attend smaller liberal arts colleges where professors teach their own courses and know the students in their classes, but this is the norm in research universities, so it’s to be expected.</p>
<p>Thre are already 3 or 4 (or more) threads on this topic. Not sure what the point is of starting yet another, especially with the apparent intention of insulting the school. Yawn.</p>
<p>At this point I am getting pretty curious as to how annasdad suggests putting together a college application list. What criteria should be used? How does someone evaluate schools for rigor?</p>
<p>We know what you don’t like. What do you like? Maybe specific schools even?</p>
<p>oh my, alh. Please don’t encourage the repetition of the same old one trick pony/drivel that has been spewed ad nauseum.</p>
<p>Well, fwiw, here’s the link to the Q evals, in case someone’s curious. I didn’t read the other threads. [Student</a> Reviews of Introduction to Congress - Document - NYTimes.com](<a href=“Student Reviews of Introduction to Congress - Document - NYTimes.com”>Student Reviews of Introduction to Congress - Document - NYTimes.com)</p>
<p>jym, I’m just wondering, since someone motivated can get a good education practically anywhere (except the ivies or northwestern), what criteria he suggests using to whittle it down to a manageable list.</p>
<p>Aha! *Finally, * NU gets lumped with the Ivies! LOL.</p>
<p>alh-
Just about any other poster on cc can put a reasoned discussion of how they would narrow down a school list. It appears that for a select few, that list is arrived at with the criteria that it be inexpensive, affordable, cheap, not costly, in the budget and economical.</p>
<p>And there’s nothing wrong with those things – but it’s disingenuous to pretend that only-those-things-that-one-can-afford must not only be the equivalent of, but actually better, than the fancier versions.</p>
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<p>I’ve always thought the same. I’ve never been given a minimum page limit for papers, always just a maximum.</p>