@WFUparent1 I wasn’t making any of those statements. I was just curious. Maybe there’s a way to find the average GPA per major and that could tell a story. For us, I’ll probably talk to the kids from our high school who are there. Many, many kids are not prepared for college level work. (I’m not saying that your D is one of those. Just a general statement.) Are you willing to share your D’s major? I wonder how many kids in her major applied to PhD programs.
Based on the last couple of threads, it seems a certain parent harbors serious resentment with Wake. Sorry you didn’t enjoy your daughter’s experience there.
Yep.
Since I see someone has renewed this ad hominem response to my posts, I am circling back to clarify. There is no “serious resentment with Wake” involved in my comments. Our daughter’s educational fund paid the full tuition cash cost of her Wake education, so there was no financial burden to us. She left Wake with a great experience in her major, a great group of friends, a great boyfriend, and multiple job offers including a fantastic job at the top firm in the country in her field (which she obtained all by herself with no help from the OCPD). We have fond memories of Winston-Salem and are considering retiring there.
However, it is undeniable that Wake makes promises to prospective students/families in the areas of security, advising and career development that they don’t consistently deliver on. Furthermore, it is also true that the pre-professional climate at Wake is more competitive than at state schools, and Wake’s reputation is not a factor that will outweigh the GPA hit with med school admissions.
What I do resent is CC being used to try and deny these truths. Also, statements made in another discussion, that Wake “is as safe as a kangaroo’s pouch” are dangerously misleading and need to be called out for safety reasons.
If this is truly an open forum where families and students can discuss the pros and cons of various schools, all perspectives should be welcomed. However, it seems there’s a high tolerance for excessively positive commentary, combined with a tendency to attack those who offer a somewhat different perspective and then try to shut those commenters down when they stand their ground. Not sure why this would be happening in a forum that legitimately consisted 100% of parents and students.
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@WFUparent1 : I suspect that readers are able to distinguish puffery from honesty & concern. Your comments & insights are very much appreciated !
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@cltrising I was actually cruising through Wake threads for my younger daughter, but wanted to comment on this since my oldest daughter is at a T20 for undergraduate pre-med. At her university a “weed-out” class (at her school General Chemistry, Biology, Organic Chemistry, Biochemistry, and to a slightly lesser degree Physics) are normed so an average student receives a “C+ - C.” Most of the students attending this university have never received anything below an “A-” in high school, so as you can imagine the “average” person there is pretty accomplished. This has pros and cons, because if you are not going to get into medical school (which typically requires around a 3.7+ science GPA, a great MCAT score, and great medically related activities) the university does not want you applying to medical school. The big secret is that the “medical school admission’s acceptance rate” the undergraduate university reports (that everyone keeps telling you to look at) does NOT include students who were on the pre-med track but did not APPLY to medical schools and this is true at MOST universities! Thus, that statistic can be extremely misleading because if the university is unsure you will be successful getting into medical school they will strongly try to discourage you from applying to medical schools. This includes making the course grade reflective of what you would likely receive on the MCAT. Thus, while my oldest is busting her butt to earn the required grades to stay competitive (so far - she’s only a sophomore), if she was not going to be competitive for medical school admissions - and only 50% of students in the U.S. who apply to medical schools ARE successful - I actually think it’s in her best interest to know it sooner rather than later so she could change her direction early in her undergraduate college career. So yes, grade deflation can either be seen as a big problem for a pre-med student or as a kind of “reality check” on how hard it is to actually gain entry into medical school.
In addition, she is at a university with four hospitals on campus. Thus, she is working in a medical lab doing research, shadows doctors every semester, and has other opportunities to both explore if a medical career is something she REALLY wants to do (theoretical classes and working with real patients and real bodily fluids are very different) and to participate in extracurricular experiences which would be much more challenging to obtain if she went to our local state university, which does not have an affiliated hospital on campus. I’m not super familiar with Clemson or Wake Forest’s hospital situation as my one who applied to Wake is has an intended major of English Communications/Journalism, but you should also consider any access to doctors and if medical research is done at either of the schools you are considering. GOOD LUCK wherever you land!
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Now that my DD has completed her 1st semester, it did not appear for her that Wake practices grade deflation. She earned all A’s at her HS, and has done the same at WFU. She says the same cannot be said for many new friends that had all A’s in HS. They found their first semester very challenging and did not make the Dean’s List (3.4 GPA or better). I am comparing WFU level of work and grading to rigorous private HS. We shall see if this continues…
No this school does not practice grade deflation. The issue is that a lot of the students here perhaps experienced high school grade inflation. My daughter has earned straight A’s in a science major. She also said the science majors are the hardest at Wake. The business program is easy and those students have little work. She was worried about the grade deflation reputation however has a higher gpa here than in high school. It just isn’t true.
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Maybe not anymore but it absolutely DID practice grade deflation when I was a student (c/o 2006). It was at the professor level where you could have an 87% in your analytical biochem class but this could mean your professor is giving you an A or even a C (since grading on a “curve” is taken literally), it’s was especially common in the hard sciences.
The reason why it was still in practice is because Wake Forest medical school acceptance rate was still twice the national average. When they send your GPA to the medical schools they will also indicate what the average GPA is for the school and also what percentage of students qualified for the deans list. Also, most admissions directors are familiar with Wake’s reputation for being an outlier (because it’s unusual for an applicant to have a very high MCAT score but a “meh” GPA).
TLDR: Wake does practice grade deflation but for medical school the acceptance rate is still double that of average school (50% for students as of 2006). Wake Forest still has a bottom line because stats like high acceptance rates to medical school are critical for admissions.
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It does practice grade deflation but Wake Forest applicants are still accepted to medical school at twice the national average (for c/o 2006). What wake will do is include both the “average” GPA for the school and what percent of students make the deans list when they report your GPA to medical school admissions. The admissions departments of medical schools are aware that Wake deflates grades but just in case they still include this workaround.
It’s mentally stressful to have it be a concern because I was also extremely worried about this but I shouldn’t have been because anything that’s going to penalize you as an applicant is going to undermine Wake’s bottom line (both for admissions and for when they start asking for donations haha).
Source: I ended up deciding last minute against also attending medical school alongside my husband (also a wake student). I know I’m years late to respond to you personally so this answer is for similarly concerned students who will find this post. I wouldn’t expect anyone to just “trust me” on this so I’ll include my husbands USMLE step 1 score (he’s a board certified otolaryngologist in Florida). It’s not meant to be a flex it’s just to vouch that my opinion is informed and sincere. It won’t let me include this as a link so add “imgur dot com” to “/a/SjBAh41” if desired to see the score.
Also if anyone wants a little “pro tip” for Wake Forest regarding grades it’s that the earliest morning classes are going to be the ones that student athletes will be put in to free up their afternoons for practice. The class itself is just as difficult but you’re taking advantage of is that professors are significantly more likely to indicate what will be on exams and offer more pre-test review sessions so the advantage is in avoiding a professor that makes preparing for exams a frustrating experience.
As a fellow parent I can understand why someone asking to know your daughter’s SAT/ACT scores would to you imply a suspicion that she wasn’t “good enough” to cut it at Wake, but being accepted already indicates she was sufficiently exceptional
What knowing her SAT/ACT scores would do is allow someone to have an objective and quantitative reference point to gauge THEIR abilities to better predict how applicable their experience might be to hers.
I applied to wake after visiting the campus on a debate trip but mostly because my parents best friends son was applying early decision (and was of course a strong advocate for the school). We both got in and attended but he “suddenly” left at the end of freshman year (he had a horrible roommate