@feifei3000:
Remember that QSS must be coupled with another department/major (one can do environmental science with it…methinks)
Also, that which you posted about Duncan’s course isn’t particularly reflective on lenient grading. Those cut-offs likely reflect how difficult the exams are (may be difficult as he says he curves the already scaled grades: Appears Duncan toys around with upper classmen, but perhaps the department does not want that with freshmen who may become majors, because the idea is to train them extremely well for advanced courses and oppurtunities in math and other quantitative fields. Soria took this approach when he taught freshman ochem, and his students were disproportionately successful. Basically you make students sweat and improve over the semester, but find a reasonable grading scale to not punish most for taking an advanced course). Leniency suggests that many/most students end up with B+ or higher. I do not absolutely know if this is true in Duncan’s case, but suspect it may be. It is just typical for an accelerated course specifically for freshmen to be far more challenging than traditional renditions, but have higher grades because of a) more ambitious students and b) instructor may be nicer with regards to grading things. This looks like one of those courses where he may make exams tough, so you maximize performance on HW to off-set a rough time on either test. Dr. Soria and Weinschenk in chemistry give very challenging exams that look more like what you expect to see (in fact, generally W and S are harder) at the VERY top privates (so imagine places like Harvard, MIT, Caltech…where there are a decent amount of International Olympiad medalists), so those who score in those ranges published by Duncan or lower end up at about those grade breaks (Weinschenk applies a curve so it depends on how strong the cohort is for that semester, but generally it would look something like that).
Ideally, at schools like Emory, if you are in math or something like physical sciences, or even life sciences, and the course requires a lot of critical thinking, the grading scale/curve should perhaps look like that. They know students, especially younger ones, usually must adjust to that style, so curve grading and adjusted scales allows them to write exams with a meaningful level of challenge, but much room for error.
*Typical diatribe/words of wisdom I give (because as a freshman, likely a more prepared than many at that): As long as the instructor is decent, and you care about learning, you are honestly more likely to get more from these types of STEM instructors and courses than those who write exams so simple/low level that they can apply the normal scale. There are some examples where there is nuance (like evolutionary biology. Some instructors give “good” exams emphasizing recognizing evol. biol phenomenon in the context of real data and scenarios from the field/sub-fields, but evolutionary bio concepts are just plain simple, even much of the more quantitative stuff), but usually courses in STEM that have exam averages in the 80s (or even constant high 70s) are too easy…are not doing much for students’ thinking skills, which may be okay in moderation if you are pre-health, but is not okay if you are considering a research career, grad. school, or a job where you practice in a field/similar field right after college. Taking the courses that require high level thinking and give harder exams than you are used may feel not so good at first, but your brain will thank you once you adjust to it.
Theoretically, all elite private schools should be trying to sort of compete with one another in terms of the type of student/thinker they produce, so a lower tier elite(so that includes Emory and basically all other elites), than say HYPSM should still try to compete with them academically even if they aren’t quite as selective, or have a decent history. Those schools tend to air on the side of “actually challenge the high achieving students in STEM and force them to think at high levels even if the mean on an exam is 40-50”. Making stuff too easy just strokes egos and lies to students basically saying:“You got into a highly selective school, so you must know everything and think at extremely high levels, even in STEM”. When you encounter STEM courses like that you should think: “Wow, this teacher is lazy or doesn’t think we can do more without complaining”. You can and perhaps should take some to balance out a tough schedule, but if most/all your STEM courses seem very memorization and algorithm focused and have fairly high exam averages, you are paying too much, and certainly getting anything close to what you could at very top tier private schools Emory likely wants to compete with seriously. What is fortunate is that you can get something close at Emory…and this cannot be as easily said for all schools in or near Emory’s tier of elite. The place really cares about UG STEM education a lot, so lots of reforms have happened and many faculty who also care have been recruited through various efforts. It is simply up to you, the student to care and have some perspective of what a good STEM education is supposed to look like. If it feels anything close to a faster, more voluminous version of HS STEM, then that’s wrong unless you went to some very top STEM magnet, or boarding school and took the most advanced courses even beyond AP/IB offerings. If you take a class that is supposed to help with research/general understanding of your field, you probably shouldn’t be celebrating when it seems like the instructor pitched it too easy. That actually suggests that the professor doesn’t give a damn about you and made the course easy to keep undergraduates out of their hair (office hours, etc) and don’t have time for you or worse: a low opinion of students’ abilities or will to work. They are usually not simply being kind when they water down courses. A teacher who cares will challenge the students and is willing to invest time in helping them rise to those challenges. When you take courses, take note of these patterns and be a cynic. Don’t follow the crowd in thinking: “This course is easy because the teacher is just so nice and caring”…that usually isn’t what it is though that faculty may present it to you that way.
