Anonymous
02/19/2026 15:57
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I don't think of Princeton as having a grind reputation.
STEM is a grind at Princeton
Princeton is at an academic crossroad. They want to admit more FGLI (it's now the #1 institutional priority as they have more money than god and legacy preference is gradually diminishing), but FGLI often have lower preparedness and were admitted TO. TO ends at P this year so it will be interesting
Couldn’t Princeton just lower the academic expectations for FGLI admits, but keep everything the same for the rest of the students?
Ha! Trust me, it is not just FGLI kids who struggle. Many, many kids from top privates, top magnets, legacy kids, etc. have a hard time at Princeton, especially first year. You deal with it, go into easier majors, get academic support, deal with the grade deflation and hope grad schools will give you the Princeton pass when evaluating you against a Harvard gentleman's B.
Or schools can admit the right students to begin with.
You’re assuming it’s really simple to admit the “right” students in the first place. I’m guessing you mean using stats like SAT. The problem is, some kids will grind for years to get their score up. Let’s say we’re talking about a really rigorous college with a higher SAT bar. If it requires years of studying to get a 1550+ for one student, and a few weeks of studying for another student, how is a college supposed to tell these two apart? And how is that first student going to keep up with the second student once in college and under pressure to keep up in the same classes under similar time constraints?
I never mentioned the SAT—that’s your assumption. If some people enjoy studying endlessly or tiger parents have no clue what competence means, that’s their decision. Identifying the right fit is schools' responsibility if they request such a high tuition. If other merit-based institutions—many of them globally ranked—can successfully select the right candidates, why can’t we? If University of Cambridge can nurture talent like Demis Hassabis, why aren’t we able to do the same?
Anonymous
02/19/2026 15:50
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I don't think of Princeton as having a grind reputation.
STEM is a grind at Princeton
Princeton is at an academic crossroad. They want to admit more FGLI (it's now the #1 institutional priority as they have more money than god and legacy preference is gradually diminishing), but FGLI often have lower preparedness and were admitted TO. TO ends at P this year so it will be interesting
Couldn’t Princeton just lower the academic expectations for FGLI admits, but keep everything the same for the rest of the students?
Ha! Trust me, it is not just FGLI kids who struggle. Many, many kids from top privates, top magnets, legacy kids, etc. have a hard time at Princeton, especially first year. You deal with it, go into easier majors, get academic support, deal with the grade deflation and hope grad schools will give you the Princeton pass when evaluating you against a Harvard gentleman's B.
Or schools can admit the right students to begin with.
You’re assuming it’s really simple to admit the “right” students in the first place. I’m guessing you mean using stats like SAT. The problem is, some kids will grind for years to get their score up. Let’s say we’re talking about a really rigorous college with a higher SAT bar. If it requires years of studying to get a 1550+ for one student, and a few weeks of studying for another student, how is a college supposed to tell these two apart? And how is that first student going to keep up with the second student once in college and under pressure to keep up in the same classes under similar time constraints?
Anonymous
02/19/2026 15:38
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I don't think of Princeton as having a grind reputation.
STEM is a grind at Princeton
Princeton is at an academic crossroad. They want to admit more FGLI (it's now the #1 institutional priority as they have more money than god and legacy preference is gradually diminishing), but FGLI often have lower preparedness and were admitted TO. TO ends at P this year so it will be interesting
Couldn’t Princeton just lower the academic expectations for FGLI admits, but keep everything the same for the rest of the students?
Ha! Trust me, it is not just FGLI kids who struggle. Many, many kids from top privates, top magnets, legacy kids, etc. have a hard time at Princeton, especially first year. You deal with it, go into easier majors, get academic support, deal with the grade deflation and hope grad schools will give you the Princeton pass when evaluating you against a Harvard gentleman's B.
Or schools can admit the right students to begin with.
Anonymous
02/19/2026 15:33
Subject: Re:Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
My DD is an engineering major at JHU. She is also an athlete, in a sorority, doing research, working part time at the school and still seems to have plenty of time to hang out with friends. Maybe some kids are grinding, but her and her friends seem to be having a great college experience
Anonymous
02/19/2026 15:32
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I don't think of Princeton as having a grind reputation.
STEM is a grind at Princeton
Princeton is at an academic crossroad. They want to admit more FGLI (it's now the #1 institutional priority as they have more money than god and legacy preference is gradually diminishing), but FGLI often have lower preparedness and were admitted TO. TO ends at P this year so it will be interesting
Couldn’t Princeton just lower the academic expectations for FGLI admits, but keep everything the same for the rest of the students?
Not possible. That would be very unfair if one student got an A for a fraction of the work or mastery as another student. Everyone would want the easier, higher grade, because grades matter for internships, med school, recruitment, etc. Also, if you marked students as needing easier work, how would that feel to a FGLI student who was extremely capable?
Anonymous
02/19/2026 15:25
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
These places are difficult, but aren’t unmanageable unless you are underprepared or not up to the challenge at that level. Naturally, different people work at different speeds, and some students will grind and grind and still not get high marks. This has always been the case, and this is why it’s so stressful to be in the bottom quarter or even bottom half of the class. Better to be the proverbial big fish in small pond. Grade inflation is happening everywhere due to lower preparedness of incoming students, so these schools are definitely not as difficult as they once were. I can confirm this about JHU, Princeton and Cornell from various student reports. However they are still difficult and stressful for many.
Anonymous
02/19/2026 15:12
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I don't think of Princeton as having a grind reputation.
STEM is a grind at Princeton
Princeton is at an academic crossroad. They want to admit more FGLI (it's now the #1 institutional priority as they have more money than god and legacy preference is gradually diminishing), but FGLI often have lower preparedness and were admitted TO. TO ends at P this year so it will be interesting
Couldn’t Princeton just lower the academic expectations for FGLI admits, but keep everything the same for the rest of the students?
Ha! Trust me, it is not just FGLI kids who struggle. Many, many kids from top privates, top magnets, legacy kids, etc. have a hard time at Princeton, especially first year. You deal with it, go into easier majors, get academic support, deal with the grade deflation and hope grad schools will give you the Princeton pass when evaluating you against a Harvard gentleman's B.
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:56
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I don't think of Princeton as having a grind reputation.
STEM is a grind at Princeton
Princeton is at an academic crossroad. They want to admit more FGLI (it's now the #1 institutional priority as they have more money than god and legacy preference is gradually diminishing), but FGLI often have lower preparedness and were admitted TO. TO ends at P this year so it will be interesting
Couldn’t Princeton just lower the academic expectations for FGLI admits, but keep everything the same for the rest of the students?
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:45
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:No body wants/needs mindless grinding.
Or you can go to a trade school instead.
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:37
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Why can't students study and get evaluated "properly"? Why is it called "grind"? It is called learning and evaluating.
Not everyone deserves a trophy. Studying or get out of the school to do something more meaningful to your life.
Deflationary curves and rampant to now professional cheating at the top killing the curve can make it very demoralizing. If schools dealt with that dynamic then it would be different.
The issue is academics have different priorities. Grades mean nearly nothing in graduate admissions- you just need to pass around a 3.5-3.7 minimum and after it’s all about recommendations and your publication/research history. Jobs used to not care about grades but they’ve turned a leaf where they want colleges to do their job in discriminating who is and is not their version of competent.
Yike. Thought STEM professions are all skills based. Why would employers check grades?
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:31
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Why can't students study and get evaluated "properly"? Why is it called "grind"? It is called learning and evaluating.
Not everyone deserves a trophy. Studying or get out of the school to do something more meaningful to your life.
Maybe grades shouldn’t be where we place our trophies in the first place?
Then where?
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:18
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
No body wants/needs mindless grinding.
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:17
Subject: Re:Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
DS at UChicago, studying Econ and Applied Math. He says that coming from a top/feeder private with grade deflation, it is similar in difficulty, if not a bit easier (some classes). I think UChicago has done a good job working against the "fun goes to die" stereotype while still maintaining a standard of rigor. Obviously its not the school for everyone but they've done well.
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:14
Subject: Re:Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Confused by all the vitriol about a reasonable question. Wanting to avoid super-grind college culture is not the same thing as trying to cheat your way to easy As without learning anything.
1. College is not solely about learning subject content, especially for the many students who do not wind up using their major in their ultimate job. College should also expose you to new perspectives, students from around the country and the world, etc. You are shortchanging yourself if you spend 12 hours a day in the library. Might as well do an online degree.
2. As an academic, I find that mindless grinding can be counterproductive. Scholarship (or advanced undergraduate work writing a research paper with an original thesis, or solving a problem in the lab) is not making widgets. Sometimes a walk or a little time away is where you get the best ideas. When I hear that some students are spending 12 hours a day studying and all weekend in the library, I do not assume that they are producing the best work or learning the most.
I want my DC to work hard in college and to learn a lot. But I would not encourage DC to go to a school that has a super-grind culture or where a very difficult curve creates a zero sum competitive culture. I don’t think it is unreasonable for a prospective student to wonder whether the historical reputations of the listed schools are still accurate.
Agree with everything this PP said
Anonymous
02/19/2026 14:11
Subject: Hopkins, Princeton, Cornell, Carnegie mellon...are the "grind" reputation real or outdated?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I don't think of Princeton as having a grind reputation.
STEM is a grind at Princeton
Princeton is at an academic crossroad. They want to admit more FGLI (it's now the #1 institutional priority as they have more money than god and legacy preference is gradually diminishing), but FGLI often have lower preparedness and were admitted TO. TO ends at P this year so it will be interesting
There are many FGLI who are not less prepared at all- many in fact are very academically privileged. The type of FGLI student at Princeton is a boarding school/magnet school/top private school student, not some kid in inner city Chicago- though there are maybe a few.