<p>In 1997 UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall School of Law
did a ranking of the toughest schools to get an "A".</p>
<p>Are they still ranking the schools accordingly?</p>
<p>The L.A. Times ran an article 7/16/97 "Grading the Grades:
All A's Are Not Created Equal "on how the admissions dept.
from UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall re-formulated the law school's
applicant's G.P.A. The formula ranked each college
according to how its students perform on the standardized
law board exam, the LSAT, and how common a certain
G.P.A. is at that school.</p>
<p>The following is UC Berkeley's rankings of toughest schools
to get an "A"</p>
<p>Swarthmore 89.5
Williams 89.0
Duke 88.5
Carleton 88.0
Colgate 88.0
J. Hopkins 87.5
Chicago 87.0
Dartmouth 87.0
Wesleyan 87.0
Cornell 86.5
Harvard 86.5
Middlebury 86.0
Princeton 86.0
Bates 85.5
MIT 85.5
Haverford 85.0
Pomona 85.0
Virginia 85.0
Amherst 84.5
Reed 84.5
Vanderbilt 84.5
Wm & Mary 84.5
Bowdoin 83.5
Tufts 83.5
Vassar 83.5
Bryn Mawr 83.0
Hamilton 83.0
Oberlin 83.0
Rice 83.0
U. Pennsylvania 83.0
Clrmt. McK. 82.5
Yale 82.5
Brandeis 82.0
Northwestern 82.0
Colby 81.5
Michigan 81.5
Notre Dame 81.5
Wash. U. 81.0
Barnard 80.5
Columbia 80.5
Stanford 80.5
Brown 80.0
Georgetown 80.0
Smith 80.0
Wellesley 80.0
Emory 79.5
U. North Carolina 79.5
Whitman C. 79.5
Rochester 79.0
UC Berkeley 78.5
UC San Diego 78.5
Illinois 78.0
SUNY Bing 78.0
Texas 78.0
Trinity U. 77.5
Boston College 77.0
UC S. Barbara 77.0
Wisconsin 77.0
Florida 76.5
U. Washington 76.5
Santa Clara 76.0
Geo. Wash. 75.5
UC Davis 75.5
UCLA 75.5
Colorado 75.0
Michigan State 75.0
Boston University 74.5
Cal Poly SLO 74.5
Massachusetts 74.0
Penn State 74.0
Iowa 73.5
Purdue 73.5
SMU 73.5
SUNY Albany 73.5
BYU 73.0
Minnesota 73.0
Ohio State 73.0
Oregon 73.0
UC Irvine 73.0
Indiana 72.5
NYU 72.0
SUNY Buff 72.0
SUNY Stony 72.0
Mills 71.5
American 71.0
Arizona 71.0
Loyola Mary. 71.0
Maryland 71.0
Fordham 70.5
Kansas 70.0
Syracuse 70.0
USC 70.0
Arizona St. 69.5
CS San Diego 69.5
Catholic U. 69.5
Oklahoma 69.5
Pacific 69.5
Hofstra 69.0
UC Riverside 68.5
Utah 68.5
CS Chico 68.5
Miami 68.0
New Mexico 68.0
San Diego 68.0
CS Northridge 67.0
Pepperdine 67.0
CS San Fran. 66.0
CS Sacramento 65.0
Hawaii 64.5
Denver 63.5
CS Fullerton 63.0
CS Hayward 63.0
CS Long Beach 63.0
CS San Jose 63.0
CS Fresno 62.5
St. Mary's 61.5
CCNY 59.0
CS LA 58.5
Howard 57.5
San Francisco 57.5</p>
<p>That's an interesting list. I had heard that Berkeley had some kind of "weighting" factor that they used for evaluating GPAs from various schools, but I had never seen it published. In a way, this an effort to quantify a "seat of the pants" weighting that admissions offices use, much in the way college adcoms view transcripts from an ultra-competitive magnet school to those from an regular public high school.</p>
<p>I'm not sure that I completely buy their methodology -- a ratio of GPA to test scores. Is there a link to the underlying article that provides a little more detail?</p>
<p>If I understand what they are doing, they multiply the GPA times their correction factor. So, for example, a 4.0 at Brown (4.0 x .80 correction = 3.20) would be viewed the same as a 3.58 at Swarthmore (3.58 x .895 correction = 3.20). Doesn't seem totally unreasonable to me, but spread across the list may be a little too wide.</p>
<p>The basis of this material is more than 10 years old. Since then, there has been really major grade inflation at Cornell (more than any of the other Ivies), the average GPA at Williams has soared, the avg. GPA at Swarthmore is significantly higher, and as for Harvard (well, see other threads....)</p>
<p>I agree ID- it is probably much more difficult to get an A at Reed than at Harvard
but what would be interesting to see the majors of students who applied to Cal law school.</p>
<p>ID, I am surprised you missed that chart in the past. It has been floating around for a LONG while, and surfaces about everytime someone starts a discussion with a theme such as "Easiest Ivy" or "Which school is known for grade inflation"</p>
<p>FYI, here's an excerpt of an article that should pass your test of acceptability: </p>
<p>
[quote]
"Swarthmore College has no official policy of maintaining low grades," said Maurice Eldridge, Vice President and Executive Assistant to the President. "It was an unofficial approach that has come to be a tradition over the years." </p>
<p>While Swarthmore does not have official standards for grades, statistics indicate that across the board, professors give grades centered roughly on a B to B+ average. In a recent study of Swarthmore GPAs conducted by the Registrar's Office, the grade point average was adjusted to fit in ungraded Honors courses. Swarthmore's average GPA rose from a 3.08 in 1982 to a 3.24 in 1994, where it has since leveled off. </p>
<p>Such numbers are considerably below most of the nation's undergraduates. The University of California at Berkeley Law School used to use a quantitative GPA analysis chart before this official method of analysis was outlawed earlier this decade. In Berkeley's chart, Swarthmore students had the lowest GPAs of any school in the country, with only Colgate, Duke, Johns Hopkins, and Williams coming relatively close."
<p>For the record, I always found it quite amusing that a good number of objections about different grading "policies" originate from schools that have mastered the art of muddying the GPA waters with the liberal uses of Pass/Fail, Credit/NC, or other highly subjective -if not entirely optional- grading methods. </p>
<p>Yeah, yeah, i know that correlation ain't causation. :)</p>
<p>Interestingly, I believe that 1997 was the year when Harvard launched its study of grade inflation. It does not appear that it was worse than many other schools that did not incur the same scrutiny.</p>
<p>EK:
Unless I read that chart wrongly, it was easier to get an A at Reed than at Harvard.</p>
<p>Maybe the way to rank schools is to look at what the school policy is. Pton is the first to come out with a limit of 35% As (55% for junior/senior research work). Seems like they are leading the way combating grade inflation and not many of the rest are following their lead stating policy. Their leadership in eliminating loans as part of financial aid had some followers but not on this hot potato.</p>
<p>You can't characterize an entire university as being "easy" or "tough" to get an A. It is very major-dependant. For example, if you look at Cornell Engineering versus the rest of Cornell, there is a big difference in median grades.</p>
<p>Remember, this was for law school applicants only. It was based on the GPA's OF PEOPLE WHO APPLIED TO LAW SCHOOL from that college. So it tells nothing about those who did not. Since law school apps are common from some majors, and rare from others, it systematically reflects both the grading standards in across colleges, and, for any given college, who applies to law school.</p>
<p>It is normalized against the LSAT, which is a timed test of certain kinds of verbal analytic thinking that prove useful in law school, but it is far from a general test of how "educated" someone may be.</p>
<p>In other words, even if it were still in use, even if it were up to date, it would still be only a comparison of gpa to lsat for a selected subset of students, and it would not tell anything about grading standards over all.</p>
<p>EK:
Unless I read that chart wrongly, it was easier to get an A at Reed than at Harvard.
right- that is how i read it too- but considering that Harvard and Reed have similar quality of admitted students- and that the average gpa at Reed is 2.7 and the avg gpa at Harvard is 3.5- i would have assumed that it was more difficult to get an a at Reed( and that reed graduates a higher percentage of students who recieve a Phd than harvard)
Of course maybe going to law school doesn't seem like a very reedie thing to do- I know some who are in med school or at uchicago to get a phd in math or physics, even some who are in NYC trying to break into acting or tanzania in the peace corp but noone in law school.</p>
<p>ALthough I am the holder of a Ph.D., I do not consider the percentage of PhDs from a college to be indicative of much more than future career plans. There are a lot of very smart lawyers and doctors, not to mention Peace Corps volunteers (some of whom end up in academia later on).</p>
<p>"but considering that Harvard and Reed have similar quality of admitted students"</p>
<p>Is that a consideration or an assumption? I realize that a lot of idle speculation surrounds the quality of Reed's eductation and student body, but there are NO facts whatsover to support such claim about the quality of tyhe admitted students. Inasmuch as the USNews rankings might not provide an exact deternination of a college's quality of education, the statistics of admission DO reflect the selectivity of the student body. While there exist some overlap between students at Harvard and some LAC, it does not appear that Reed is one of those LACs. If you're basing yourself on that PhD report, it may be illustrative to check the admission statistics of the LACs that ARE ranked on top of the report. </p>
<p>Reed:
SAT/ACT 25th-75th percentile (2004): 1270-1460
Freshmen in top 10 percent of high school class (2004): 59%
Acceptance rate (2004): 47%</p>
<p>Harvard:
SAT/ACT 25th-75th percentile (2004): 1400-1580
Freshmen in top 10 percent of high school class (2004): 96%
Acceptance rate (2004): 11%</p>
<p>I guess that then says even more about Reeds style of education, then if they take students with lower gpas and sat scores than harvards and manage to produce disporptionally more students who recieve pHds ;)</p>
<p>or graduate about 70% of its students versus Harvard's close to 100%. But, of course, the interpretation of the statistics can take different paths. :D</p>
<p>EK, do not construe my comments as being an attempt to belittle Reed. The school is one institution that defies simplistic comparisons. It attracts a slightly different type of student and does a wonderful job for them. It also seems to make the students who find the school appealing extremely happy. </p>
<p>emeraldkity4: Well said. And you can add UChicago to the list as well. High admittance rate, very bright students.</p>
<p>I am surprised that Reed is so low. I have heard that virtually no one there earns an 'A.'</p>
<p>And, from my experience, UChicago should be higher as well, though it is not grossly low. An 'A' earned there is well-deserved, as one probably spent day and night at the Reg to earn it.</p>
<p>xiggi i don't disagree that harvard and several other schools have a much higher 4 or 5 year graduation rate than Reed.
Reed really seems to weed out students - as do some other programs in some other schools.
i haven't attended a 4 year college- but i know many who have- some who attended Reed and then went on to ivy schools & or medical school etc- but when past alums from neurosurgeons to professors at top 10 universities , have told me that Reed made what came after comparatively a "piece of cake", I have come away with the impression that the reputation ( that it shares especially with swartmore and Uchicago) Reed has of not giving out As to anyone, is definitely not just a rumor.</p>