I must disagree with the rose colored view of the Ivy Leagues always requiring hard work (it has long been about connections and making excuses for old money an

I must disagree with the rose colored view of the Ivy Leagues always requiring hard work (it has long been about connections and making excuses for old money and supersonic goal posts for any upstarts who threaten their demographics by making it an actual meritocracy) But it is true that there are real incentive issues. GPA as a metric especially in High School is problematic in that it encourages students going with what they are already good at instead of where they may have room to grow and explore. I could see a case for keeping GPA "internal only" but that puts more emphasis on standardized tests which are already a teach to test black hole.