Cornell used to list publicly list median grade by class. Unfortunately they stopped doing this a decade ago. However, there are some student created public lists of median grades by class, such as the one at at Cornell Median Grades Masterlist - Google Sheets . The overall mean median among the hundreds of listed Cornell classes was a GPA of 3.62, which seems reasonably consistent with expectations based on selectivity (see earlier post). The largest portion of classes seem to have a median grade of A-. A significant portion also had medians grades of A or B+. Few classes had median grades below B+.
Among the few classes with B median grades (not B+), the following fields seem overrepresented:
Chem – 6 classes
CS – 3 classes
Math – 3 classes
Bio – 3 classes
I expect extremely few students flunk out of Cornell, just like extremely few students flunk out of other Ivies or similar highly selective private colleges. A few students do fail to graduate within 6 years. However, those few usually do not flunk out. There are many other reasons why a student may fail to graduate such as financial, family, personal, and medical issues.
If I were applying somewhere and came across this question I’d know the place definitely isn’t a good fit for me, and scores wouldn’t be the issue (mine were extremely high). Our values wouldn’t align.
Yes, that is exactly what the study suggests. LDC applicants averaged higher than non-ALDC applicants in everything. The gap was particularly large in the personal rating (41% LDC applicants have high personal rating vs 21% non-ALDC) and alumni interview rating (55% LDC applicants have high interview rating vs 36% non-ALDC). Even without special preferences, LDCs are expected to have a significantly higher admit rate than non-ALDC.
However, there appears to be a significant preference beyond just the stronger applicant pool, so among admits, the ratings gaps change to the other direction. LDC admits were rated significantly lower than non-ALDC admits in all listed categories besides athletic.
I am also not in favor of legacy preferences. Going test optional/blind is likely to negatively impact legacies more than other groups since test scores appear to typically be a relatively strong point among the application for legacies. In the Harvard freshman surveys, legacies usually average higher test scores than non-legacies, in spite of LDC admits averaging lower ratings in every category except athletic in the study (study did not have category for SAT score, only combined “academic”).
Note that table is labeled in a misleading way. When they say “% of applicants”, they mean admit rate. The actual numbers for Princeton 2018-19 were:
My daughters have internships this year and one had one last summer (the other one worked for her brother’s startup), neither has ever been asked that question and while I assume their GPAs are on their resumes they have never had to provide their transcript or proof of those grades for any of these internships. Does this not happen these days? I would think jobs care especially in wanting to make sure they’re hiring honest people.
As for my oldest, I recall since he didn’t go to college some company, and I don’t remember if it was just one he interviewed for or one he actually worked for (he’s only worked for Uber as an intern and another start up before getting funding for his own) asked for his high school transcript but that was only to verify he actually graduated high school not to see his grades. So clearly no place cared about grades or test scores.
Some bachelor’s degree holders already may not have scores to offer. For example, someone never took the SAT/ACT in high school, started college at a community college, transferred to a state university that admits based only on college record, and graduated may not have scores to offer.
Perhaps the employer contracts with a service that does a school / GPA / previous-employment check on the applicant before hiring, and has the prospective employee sign something agreeing to such a thing.
It is always possible that there is an outlier, but apparently the filter works well enough for the vast majority. Just like the vast majority of applicants would have a high school diploma, but it is possible that someone dropped out and got a GED instead. The filters are set for the vast majority of applicants in places screening tens of thousands of applicants quickly.
The current solution to this chasm, in our rural state, is to offer online classes (usually with no live interaction) to the above-average students. It drives me nuts. There’s also the “option” of free early college senior year, even though the classes at the community colleges offering this option are not considered strong enough to count as honors or AP classes.
It depends on the firm. Some don’t even verify that an applicant has the degrees s/he claims to have on the resume. We all heard stories about some CEOs (and others) who faked their college credentials.
The “academic” rating score includes more than just SAT score. One likely possibility is legacies tend to get a higher SAT score than would be predicted by their transcript.
I’m not sure how much weight these firms give to the test scores. Perhaps none if someone has many years of work experience. It likely varies for others. A test score is just one data point. I guess that’s their version of holistic evaluation, whether we like it or not.
Neither have done anything. They only had them provide their resumes and the offer agreements were nothing except agreeing to a drug test and background check for one. Maybe it’s part of that? I sure hope so.
I get clusters of resumes from schools where I’m recruiting. If they don’t have grades on the resume, it’s no bueno. I advise MBAs to put 3.5 or higher GPA and 700+ GMAT. There are plenty to choose from but in grad school a big question is if the student requires sponsorship.
And years ago I asked for a BBA student’s transcript. I noticed he took a lot of semesters with just 12 hours. He said he had a lot of AP credit and CC work. To me, it seemed lazy to only take 12 hours to boost the GPA and allow lots of “fun time.”
Seems like the more understandable common reason for taking only 12 credits per semester would be if the student had to work a lot of hours to earn the money to pay for school.