<p>I agree, but you really need to be a student here to see how the hard grading and median grades is really hurting undergraduates in all the colleges at cornell. Almost everyone here complains about the grading . . . we really should have been informed when we applied about the grading and median grading. my roommate who is premed says the grading is really hurting cornell premeds, no admit data has been put on the web site for the last 2 years, and the guess is that the admit rate is even lower than it used to be. If I do apply to law schools, I know this kind of grading at cornell is not going to help… that Journal article in the original post really bothers me because it shows the problem we have here.</p>
<p>I think there is little doubt that if Cornell kept all else equal and gave people higher grades for their work, admission rates for grad/med/law school would be higher. That does not mean Cornell should do that…</p>
<p>I find it odd that I see most of the people complaining about grade deflation going out on Thursdays while everyone else is doing homework, research, or work. Though Cornell, in my 3 semesters of experience, is a whole order of magnitude harder than high school, I still feel like I’m master of my own fate.</p>
<p>if you are 100% set on going to med school, attending a high-end college such as Cornell may not be the best move.</p>
<p>Going to an in-state school, which would likely to give you large scholarship money (if you were good enough to get into Cornell), and having much easier time racking up A’s, that’s the way to go. Same as law school. If you are, for some reason, 100% set on becoming a lawyer and don’t care about immediate post-college job placement, then by all means, go to the easiest state college that gives you the nicest, cushy scholarship money.</p>
<p>However, for many others, Cornell education is worth it. Better educational experience. Better/smarter students. Stronger alumni network. And, if you are interested in finance/ consulting type of career, Cornell gets strong recruitment from employers within those industries. Overall, high performing students at Cornell have access to jobs that most grads of lower-tier colleges don’t have access to.</p>
<p>Granted, I will say that the low-performing students at Cornell are the ones that may have been better served by attending some other institution, where they might have performed better. </p>
<p>Life is all about trade offs. Plan accordingly.</p>
<p>As am alum that graduated with nearly a 3.9, I am disgusted by some of the posters in this thread. Money is not the end all be all. I realized that in internships where I made plenty of money but discovered the job/environment itself sucked and would leave me miserable. You cannot put a price on happiness. </p>
<p>Saugus, your head is buried somewhere very deep in the confines of your ass. Yes, I am one of the “lowly” ILR majors you ****ed on, but I came to this conclusion long before reading your thoughts on my major. You seriously think IB is your only option even though you claim to despise the banking industry? You are a freshman; you have plenty of time to figure things out. I thought I knew what I wanted to do about 5 different times while at Cornell until I figured it all out about 3 months before I graduated. Consider thinking outside the box it seems like every business-ish major there paints themselves into (IB, law, consulting, etc). Personally, I decided working in an office countless hours per week would be the death of my soul. What the hell is one supposed to do with a ton of money if you have no time to spend it because you are always working?</p>
<p>After a ton of thought, I went far off the beaten path for a school like Cornell and am now an officer/student pilot in the Navy (non ROTC, so no scholarship swaying me into it). I knew nothing about the career prior to my own research. I have absolutely no regrets and after tax benefits I make more than I would have had I taken the silicon valley offer I had after interning there (factoring COLA it is actually a lot more, plus I am working toward a lucrative pension). While I am by no means saying you should go military officer (just throwing out what I do to give some perspective, as there are good or even great careers out there you will rarely hear anyone talk about at the university), I do think you should consider looking off the beaten path and figure out something you would actually like to do. For me I decided that was flying and it was the best decision I have ever made to this point (I am having a blast; how many IBer’s can truly say that?). I have no idea what would be ideal for you, but I would suggest some soul searching as it took me 5 or 6 years to figure out what I ACTUALLY wanted (going back to HS). Money is important, but there is much more to life and never let anyone else influence what YOU want to do.</p>
<p>Well put, NYULawyer. My D is at Cornell for the EXACT reasons you describe. Although she is challenged in the sense that she is not getting a 4.0, she is still doing quite well, she loves her major and her professors. </p>
<p>Students that believe that Cornell should be an absolute guarantee to med and top grad schools seem to be the most dissatisfied and hyper-fixated on grades. It is a relief to her to know that she does not have to micro-manage every single grade in every single class at Cornell for fear of med school rejection. </p>
<p>I know that whatever path my D is on, a Cornell degree will open doors for her.</p>
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I actually disagree with this. To be a successful lawyer network/connection is important, aside from going to top law school. UG network is generally the strongest. It is no different than finance. </p>
<p>hermanns - Great post. My nephew will be commissioned after graduating from JHU this year. His parents would have been happy to pay for college, but it is his calling.</p>
<p>Just to add to hermann’s post, I don’t think it’s essential to only pursue money. I think the people that end up being successfully motivated by money are those with a family to support where the ends make the means worthwhile. The latest is psychology research suggests for an individual, more money stops equaling more happiness at around $70k.</p>
<p>As I’ve said elsewhere, I have friends who got the great IB gig and are absolutely miserable. A $100k+ salary right out of college seems great, but if you don’t love what you’re doing, working 60-100 hours per week won’t make you happy/fulfilled. Some of my friends in IB are desperately trying to leave the industry (some already have). Don’t get me wrong, I have other friends who are happy at top banks as well, but you have to like the work for it to be palpable. The turnover rate in the IB field is astoundingly high. I have one friend who worked in banking for 2 years, and was so miserable he’s going back to school to do exercise physiology in order to become a trainer. My guess is he’ll be lucky in 10 years to earn what he made right out of undergrad. What I don’t get is people have these internships so should know what they’re getting into, because internships/networking for IB are much more important than GPA/coursework.</p>
<p>I find it ridiculous that this thread implies Cornell limits opportunities. Cornell opens more doors than 99.9% of colleges. Yes, if you compare Cornell to Harvard, Harvard DOES open a few more doors, but the difference isn’t worth noting because both institutions open more doors than anyone single person could ever hope to walk through. Also, there seems to be this idea that an average Cornell student should have the same opportunities as a top Harvard student. Guess what? Average Harvard graduates don’t have the same opportunities as top Harvard students. As for top Cornell vs. top Harvard (or any more highly ranked school)? The opportunities WILL BE SIMILAR if not exactly the same. An average Harvard student versus an average Cornell student will likewise have similar job prospects.</p>
<p>I agree that Cornell is what you make of it. Aside from the employment opportunities it opens up, there are plenty of other awesome things you can do while a student. If you want something different try study abroad. I did and absolutely had a blast. So much that I did it again. I spent all of senior year abroad (fall in Dublin and spring in Sydney…was summer/fall while I was there while Ithaca was buried in snow). That was following spending my junior spring credit interning in silicon valley (which then got extended into a summer internship as well) and getting paid very well in addition to the credits. ILR gave me an incredible amount of latitude (well there may have been some pestering and loophole work involved to get the exchange in my last semester as it is definitely discouraged) to make my college experience incredibly diverse.</p>
<p>Cornell is an amazing place with tons of opportunities. Do not be afraid to seize them. While I did miss some things about being on campus during that time, getting to see the world while in college was one of the best decisions I made during that time and really helped me find out who I was.</p>
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<p>The same can be said for most of high paying jobs. </p>
<p>High paying jobs are high paying, because either 1) the job in question is very stressful (I-banking, Biglaw, etc) OR 2) the job in question demands very specialized skill set (petroleum engineering) or extensive training, for which there is great demand (medicine)</p>
<p>There is no free lunch. That being said, life is all about trade offs. For some, their utility is maximized grinding out 100 hours a week, if they can break 300-400k by the time they are into late 20’s. For others, their utility is maximized elsewhere. It is a personal choice.</p>
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<p>Getting the first law firm job out of school is largely a function of where you attend law school and your law school grades. After that, where you end up years down the road depends on 1) quality of your work product, 2) quantity of your work product, 3) office politics skills, 4) rain making potential.</p>
<p>Nobody asked me where I went to college, when I interviewed for law firms.</p>
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It is not about getting the first job. It is about when you make partner, starting your own law firm or getting your next higher level job.</p>
<p>They stopped Median grades on transcripts</p>
<p>[Cornell</a> University Registrar: About Median Grades](<a href=“http://registrar.sas.cornell.edu/Student/mediangrades.html]Cornell”>http://registrar.sas.cornell.edu/Student/mediangrades.html)</p>
<p>I think you read it inocorrectly:
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<p>They stopped the “public” publishing of median grade reports because students were picking classes based on the classes with the highest median grade - the classes that were perceived to be the “easiest” to get an A in.</p>
<p>I still do not have a good answer as to why they are published on the transcripts. I don’t really see it as a benefit.</p>
<p>cormom, I do not believe there is a good answer. The original post in this thread kind of shows how the grading / median grading is bad for most all cornell students. Really wish they would take the median grades off transcripts…</p>
<p>The idea for median grades is that if you get a B in a class (which is probably true of most students in most classes), that normally doesn’t look like a “good” grade. However, if the median grade is also a B, then that shows you were on track with the rest of the students and that should be favorable at a school like Cornell with strict admissions. I think it also is designed to help students who get A’s because if you get an A, and the median grade is a B, you look like you excelled in that class. However, if you get an A in a class with a median grade of an A, whereas before you looked like you excelled, really now you’re “average.” </p>
<p>That paragraph is more or less the justification. I do not agree with it. I was happy I “missed out” on this when I was a student. </p>
<p>As for not publishing median grades, if there isn’t already, I’m sure it won’t be long before students put together their own “median grade reports” since that information is still available on their transcripts. As for students picking easy classes, that will always happen. I’m sure the median grade report makes that easier, and not publishing will make some difference, but I doubt it will be all that significant.</p>
<p>You guys are scaring me I applied ED and from SAT statistics most Cornell students are good so this grade deflation thingy is bugging me. Of course I want to go to a top grad school, everyone does.</p>
<p>If you have an idea of what you would want to do in grad school, and you are confident of your plans, you can definitely start your freshman year to make sure you stay on track for your goals. Remember, Cornell opens a lot more opportunities than your average university and more than most top universities. </p>
<p>If you want to do law school for example, your GPA is very important, so make sure you pick a major where it will be manageable to get a high GPA. If you want to do banking/MBA, make sure your pursue the appropriate internships. I think you get the idea.</p>
<p>I couldn’t read all the post, but to answer your question of why I am interested in Cornell, it is because of their animal science program.</p>
<p>And I like to wear winter clothing, ha ha :)</p>