<p>How is stanford's GPA system? inflated like most of the ivies?</p>
<p>According to [National</a> Trends in Grade Inflation, American Colleges and Universities](<a href=“http://www.gradeinflation.com/]National”>http://www.gradeinflation.com/), Stanford’s average GPA is higher than all of the Ivies’ except Brown’s. What makes you say that the Ivies have inflated grades?</p>
<p>For example, Princeton has a grade deflation policy.</p>
<p>i personally have never trusted gradeinflation.net but that’s my preference</p>
<p>stanford does have inflation
other data would show that stanford’s grade inflation is similar to yale, less than harvard and brown, but there is no one single measure of grade inflation</p>
<p>just know that humanities and social sciences are generally inflated, and sciences are not so much.</p>
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<p>Can you link to those data? According to the link that I posted, Harvard has a lower average GPA than Stanford and Yale, which suggests that Harvard has less (if any) grade inflation, not more.</p>
<p>^Princeton does have a grade-deflation policy that it implemented a few years ago in response to widespread criticism that their grades had been especially inflated prior thereto. Now, of course, the deflation policy is under fire for disadvantaging students in the grad-school and job markets. Many grad schools, and some employers, are aware of the policy, but others are not.</p>
<p>I’m under the impression that Stanford’s grade inflation is about on par with that of most of its peer schools, and that the vast bulk of inflation at all of these schools pertains to the fuzzy courses as opposed to the math/science/tech disciplines.</p>
<p>Thank you for the responses, and Silverturtle for the link. I have no reason to believe that it is not accurate, as it has sources for its data. I’m surprised that Princeton’s grade deflation is not that bad? According to gradeinflation.com</p>
<p>Yeah it’s hard for me to imagine getting a B- in a fuzzy class at Stanford. It seems like if you do the readings or whatever, show up in section, and spend enough time on the essay to put together a somewhat coherent argument, that a B (probably more like a B+) is all-but guaranteed. I think that’s a good way to do it. Most of the A essays, for instance, that you’d read in a philosophy class will be very strong and creative arguments. To give half of those papers a B or B+ to deflate grades seems cruel. It’s like giving a B to a work of art that someone slaved over for the past week or two. At that point your basically giving a B to the person himself. </p>
<p>Now on a math test or whatever, if you get a problem wrong, you get it wrong. It’s not really an insult to give someone a B on a math-test; they just weren’t able to get all the problems right. You’re not critiquing their worth as persons, but rather their ability to write down a correct answer for a problem. </p>
<p>That’s why (at least imo) that fuzzy classes have higher GPAs. And I think that’s fair (for most scenarios, one exception being if a prospective employer/program only cared about GPA with no respect to the major, which does happen unfortunately).</p>
<p>Also I’d like to point out that at Stanford, and probably schools like Harvard as well, although there is grade inflation, that still does not mean you can slack off and get an A. Haha not a chance. Though the class average may be a B+, remember you’re going up against top students from around the country. So you gotta be smart, and work pretty darn hard, to get an A. </p>
<p>Granted there are exceptions. Like I coulda actually put in five/six hours of work total for this one class last quarter and still gotten an A, because I went to lecture and retained a lot of the material (and knew a lot beforehand as well thanks to a great bio teacher in HS). As it happened, my HW grade actually didn’t count for anything (two grading schemes- one factored in HW, the other didn’t, we received whichever grade was better). Also as it happened, I was one MC question on the final exam away from an A+ (grr haha!). Not to mention a few days later I found out I was right on the borderline for getting an A- in IHUM and didn’t get it. Haha I woulda freaked if I were still in HS. But I digress.</p>
<p>I would say that unlike the Ivies, there is no such thing as the Gentleman’s C at Stanford. There is, however, the “I like you and I think you’re a great student but I have to give you an” F. Thjs is especially common in chemistry and engineering. So even though the average GPA is high, grade spreads are more volatile at Stanford than they are at its peer institutions.</p>
<p>The amount of effort does not always correlate into a good grades, and this is highly dependent upon your department whether or not you are an athlete. For example, my roommate freshman year was in Science, Technology and Society (STS). He put forth zero effort and came out freshman year with a 3.5. My roommate was also an athlete, and Stanford offers a special course exclusively to athletes called PAE, some bulls*** roundtable about the trials and tribulations of being a student athlete. Basically athletes go to complain how hard their lives are. It’s only one unit, but is a guaranteed A if you just show up. No doubt this class was engineered to keep athletes eligible. My friend down the hall, who was in political science, busted his butt trying to eek out a 3.2.</p>
<p>It’s true that if you want that A, you really gotta work for it, but usually the B is in the bag.</p>
<p>I should also say that GPAs are so high because of a lot of student collaboration. Stanford is great in that kids often help each other to succeed, so curves often go out the window. </p>
<p>I think a Stanford A is harder-earned than, say a Yale or a Harvard A. I hated Stanford’s social scene like a disease, but academically I don’t think anyone can ask for more.</p>
<p>I know it’s pretty bad form to post three times in a row, but things just keep coming to me after the editing function times out!</p>
<p>There are courses at Stanford that are specifically designed to put the fear of God in freshmen (<em>ahem</em> IHUM and PWR <em>ahem</em>), where effort and grades are almost entirely decoupled. So any frosh out there, don’t be discouraged if your freshman year GPA is a little low.</p>
<p>^^What’s bad about the social scene?</p>
<p>And thanks for the responses!</p>
<p>There is a lot great about the social scene, a lot not so great, but I’m not sure discussions of the social scene belong in a thread about grade inflation. If you would like a more detailed description of my experience, feel free to PM me.</p>