80% Yale Grades A & A-

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This isn't 1980 anymore. Most smart and talented kids go into STEM majors - mechanical engineering, computer science, neuroscience, biochemistry, applied mathematics, earth science, nanotechnology. Or a harder social science like economics. Most of these majors have introductory courses that are graded on a curve. No one in these majors is graduating with a 3.7.

Harvard, Yale, and Brown are soft schools. And they have been for a long time. The hardest thing about these schools is getting in. None of them excel in STEM fields, certainly not at the undergrad level. When it comes to brain power, I'm pretty confident the students at Purdue and Georgia Tech blow away the film studies majors at Yale.

Oh give it a frickin' rest. I went into Biochem as a female in the 80s, from a STEM family. I am not so impressed by all the STEM worship, having worked with so many that have ZERO communication skills, no EQ and can't write.

I also have two sons that do EQUALLY as well in math/science and English/history/humanities. One was asked to bump up to Calc early--and guess what? he has a complete and total love of history/international relations/policy, etc. He took a few college courses in it over college summers--all while scoring 5s in every single Science and math AP exam, As in all those classes and near perfect math on SAT and 36 in ACT Sci/Math.

The smartest kids excel in ALL subjects and go where they have a passion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, when they're letting in morons like Jared Kushner, what do you expect?

Actually, they’re not. Kushner went to Harvard.

Let’s try this again: Extremely bright, extremely motivated, extremely achievement-oriented students choose a top school.
They are given tasks and assignments. If all of them do what they are asked to do, then all of them get As — as they should.

It really doesn’t make sense to continually post threads questioning why students who were picked because they are excellent students earning top grades continue to be excellent students earning top grades while they are in college. Education doesn’t require artificially creating a zero sum game. Education requires mastery.

This. They got straight As in high school. Why would you expect them to be getting Bs and Cs in college?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This. They got straight As in high school. Why would you expect them to be getting Bs and Cs in college?

Well, everyone who is a starting quarterback in HS is a good athlete but 95% of them will not make the college football roster. College should be the same way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let’s try this again: Extremely bright, extremely motivated, extremely achievement-oriented students choose a top school.
They are given tasks and assignments. If all of them do what they are asked to do, then all of them get As — as they should.

It really doesn’t make sense to continually post threads questioning why students who were picked because they are excellent students earning top grades continue to be excellent students earning top grades while they are in college. Education doesn’t require artificially creating a zero sum game. Education requires mastery.

If everyone is getting a 3.7 GPA or higher, it will make the vetting process by employers much harder.

This is NOT how it works in the real world. In my software engineering group of twenty, two people will get a rating of 4 (exceptional), three people will get a rating of 3 (outstanding), ten people will get a rating of two (successful), and five people will get a rating of 1 (below average). Why can't they do the same in college? Where I work, they will pick a recent grad with a 2.5 GPA but with AWS certification(s) over a grad with 4.0 GPA but no AWS certification(s).

Employers see the rampant grade inflation at colleges. It is why most administer their own tests to candidates these days. Weeds out those that were coddled from those that mastered the skills the employer is looking for in a candidate. Not surprising for employers in the private sector where profits matter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This example of the real world seems artificially constructed. ”There are always exactly 5 people who deserve 1s, no matter who is working here at any given time.”

What if — just a thought experiment here — you hired 20 4s from previous years? A all-stars team as it were. Would you still give 5 1s?

DP. The answer is yes. They are compared among each others. The goal is to get the very best SWE and these guys get paid a lot of money. Think of it like the recent College Football Playoff where there are at least six teams that are qualified but only four teams were selected. You don't get a participation trophy.

But that’s a one-day game. Where the goal is a literal trophy. We are talking here about employment, in an industry/world where recruitment and employee turnover are one of the most substantive cost centers, and where every new cohort brings new risk. I suppose the “there are always five 1s” approach might be a way to hit short-term goals (not even sure about that, as it could be a disincentive to hard work for some). But it hardly seems like the long-term play.

Yeah, sounds like a plan conceived by an engineer. Hopefully just wishful thinking and not actually implemented. Either way, it makes the case for keeping engineers carefully siloed away on their allotted task, and away from decision making.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let’s try this again: Extremely bright, extremely motivated, extremely achievement-oriented students choose a top school.
They are given tasks and assignments. If all of them do what they are asked to do, then all of them get As — as they should.

It really doesn’t make sense to continually post threads questioning why students who were picked because they are excellent students earning top grades continue to be excellent students earning top grades while they are in college. Education doesn’t require artificially creating a zero sum game. Education requires mastery.

If everyone is getting a 3.7 GPA or higher, it will make the vetting process by employers much harder.

This is NOT how it works in the real world. In my software engineering group of twenty, two people will get a rating of 4 (exceptional), three people will get a rating of 3 (outstanding), ten people will get a rating of two (successful), and five people will get a rating of 1 (below average). Why can't they do the same in college? Where I work, they will pick a recent grad with a 2.5 GPA but with AWS certification(s) over a grad with 4.0 GPA but no AWS certification(s).

No. College grading isn't the same as workplace evaluations, and different companies have different methodologies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This. They got straight As in high school. Why would you expect them to be getting Bs and Cs in college?

Well, everyone who is a starting quarterback in HS is a good athlete but 95% of them will not make the college football roster. College should be the same way.

+ You're one of the most selective and elite colleges and the country, and you can't offer coursework that challenges your students a bit such that less than 80% of them get the top grade?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This. They got straight As in high school. Why would you expect them to be getting Bs and Cs in college?

Well, everyone who is a starting quarterback in HS is a good athlete but 95% of them will not make the college football roster. College should be the same way.

95% of great students don't get into Yale. Yale knows that grad schools and employers care about GPAs and they aren't about to hamstring their own students. People have said the hardest part is getting in for decades now and it's still true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This. They got straight As in high school. Why would you expect them to be getting Bs and Cs in college?

Well, everyone who is a starting quarterback in HS is a good athlete but 95% of them will not make the college football roster. College should be the same way.

95% of great students don't get into Yale. Yale knows that grad schools and employers care about GPAs and they aren't about to hamstring their own students. People have said the hardest part is getting in for decades now and it's still true.

If these students are so excellent, they should be able to handle coursework that challenges *them.* Not just coursework that would be challenging to an average hs graduate, but something that actually raises the bar a bit instead of giving out a participation trophy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, when they're letting in morons like Jared Kushner, what do you expect?

Actually, they’re not. Kushner went to Harvard.

Let’s try this again: Extremely bright, extremely motivated, extremely achievement-oriented students choose a top school.
They are given tasks and assignments. If all of them do what they are asked to do, then all of them get As — as they should.

It really doesn’t make sense to continually post threads questioning why students who were picked because they are excellent students earning top grades continue to be excellent students earning top grades while they are in college. Education doesn’t require artificially creating a zero sum game. Education requires mastery.

I couldn't agree more. There has been discussion here in the past about the book "Excellent Sheep," decrying the pre-professionalization of high school students, and how the kinds of kids that get into Yale are high achievers mindlessly programmed to complete every task and clear every hurdle to their teachers' satisfaction. If you're the kind of high school student that got the 4.9 GPA and 1550+ SAT while taking every AP course known to man, why in the world wouldn't you continue to complete every assignment to your teachers' satisfaction once you're in college (when you don't have to do 3 sports, run a student publication and create a non-profit organization like you did in high school to get into Yale in the first place)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This isn't 1980 anymore. Most smart and talented kids go into STEM majors - mechanical engineering, computer science, neuroscience, biochemistry, applied mathematics, earth science, nanotechnology. Or a harder social science like economics. Most of these majors have introductory courses that are graded on a curve. No one in these majors is graduating with a 3.7.

Harvard, Yale, and Brown are soft schools. And they have been for a long time. The hardest thing about these schools is getting in. None of them excel in STEM fields, certainly not at the undergrad level. When it comes to brain power, I'm pretty confident the students at Purdue and Georgia Tech blow away the film studies majors at Yale.

Oh give it a frickin' rest. I went into Biochem as a female in the 80s, from a STEM family. I am not so impressed by all the STEM worship, having worked with so many that have ZERO communication skills, no EQ and can't write.

I also have two sons that do EQUALLY as well in math/science and English/history/humanities. One was asked to bump up to Calc early--and guess what? he has a complete and total love of history/international relations/policy, etc. He took a few college courses in it over college summers--all while scoring 5s in every single Science and math AP exam, As in all those classes and near perfect math on SAT and 36 in ACT Sci/Math.

The smartest kids excel in ALL subjects and go where they have a passion.

I have a similar kid (through HS at least) and I, too, don’t get the stem worship. My kid is only a first year, but he loves and is challenged by his college poli sci and IR classes, and finds his linear algebra class easy and boring. I don’t care whether he majors in math or political science, and don’t view one major easier or harder than the other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
CS and Engineering is the new Ivy

CS and Engineering hand out Cs though. Weed out classes are real!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This. They got straight As in high school. Why would you expect them to be getting Bs and Cs in college?

Well, everyone who is a starting quarterback in HS is a good athlete but 95% of them will not make the college football roster. College should be the same way.

95% of great students don't get into Yale. Yale knows that grad schools and employers care about GPAs and they aren't about to hamstring their own students. People have said the hardest part is getting in for decades now and it's still true.

Employers do NOT care about GPAs, at least in SWE. They care more about AWS/Azure/Cybersecurity certifications than a degree from Yale.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
CS and Engineering is the new Ivy

CS and Engineering hand out Cs though. Weed out classes are real!

Primary reasons for weed-out courses (in no particular order and often a combination of several reasons):

1) STEM professors are more focused on research and are not awarded for the quality of their teaching.
2) Need to limit the number of majors in the department due to resources such as classroom/lab space, faculty, etc.
3) STEM professors sometimes make entry-level classes more difficult, i.e., teaching at a graduate level.
4) Early elimination of students who will eventually fail and, therefore, less likely to graduate on time (by six years) or drop out.
5) Need for students to master the material before moving to upper-division courses.

-- STEM dept chair

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This. They got straight As in high school. Why would you expect them to be getting Bs and Cs in college?

Well, everyone who is a starting quarterback in HS is a good athlete but 95% of them will not make the college football roster. College should be the same way.

95% of great students don't get into Yale. Yale knows that grad schools and employers care about GPAs and they aren't about to hamstring their own students. People have said the hardest part is getting in for decades now and it's still true.

If these students are so excellent, they should be able to handle coursework that challenges *them.* Not just coursework that would be challenging to an average hs graduate, but something that actually raises the bar a bit instead of giving out a participation trophy.

How do you know they aren't? Have you seen Yale coursework and work product that indicates that it isn't challenging and that the grades aren't earned? Why does it surprise you that the best students in high school are still great students in college?