> The counter-example is trivial: suppose you have ten "Einsteins" in your class, but due to your dumb-ass stack ranked curve, you "cut" 4 of them. Knowing fro

> The counter-example is trivial: suppose you have ten "Einsteins" in your class, but due to your dumb-ass stack ranked curve, you "cut" 4 of them. Knowing from experience that 33% will fail is not the same thing as explicitly planning for 33% to fail. We don't have enough information to call this "stack ranking", IMO. One of the calculus professors at my undergrad institution was reportedly asked on the first day of Calc I class whether there would be a grading curve. He asked how many of the students were planning to be engineers. Roughly 3/4 of the hands went up. Then he said "I drive on bridges and fly in airplanes all the time. There will be no curve."