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This isn't surprising. The important selection filter is entirely in getting into Harvard. It's an excellent signal for some critical amount of intelligence, co

This isn't surprising. The important selection filter is entirely in getting into Harvard. It's an excellent signal for some critical amount of intelligence, conscientiousness, and conformity, where each one can be traded off for some of the others - but only up to a point. What would be really interesting is if the same effects happen at top universities in the East Asian countries. I would be fascinated to know why the divergence if we found that only 20% of students at, say, Seoul National University got top marks in their classes.

Jensson 3y ago
Normally the classes have harder tests at more prestigious schools, ensuring that most people doesn't reach an A. I've worked with people from Harvard, they weren't smart enough to consistently get A's in hard classes, so it seems to me like Harvard doesn't grade as harshly or have easier classes than most other prestigious universities. I understand why they do it, they want their students to not have problems due to low grades, but that also means that a Harvard degree isn't as useful as a sorting mechanism because I can't tell the difference between top students and the rest.
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  > I understand why they do it, they want their students to not have problems due to low grades, but that also means that a Harvard degree isn't as useful as a sorting mechanism because I can't tell the difference between top students and the rest. They got into Harvard and were subsequently successful there. Do you really benefit from knowing which of two Harvard grads got a few extra questions right in a handful of exams?
  - Jensson 3y ago
    > Do you really benefit from knowing which of two Harvard grads got a few extra questions right in a handful of exams? It isn't just "a few extra questions", when professors makes tests harder they add more interesting questions that requires you to think further rather than just plug-n-chug. The difference between a 4.0 student and a 3.0 student at lets say Caltech is enormous, so yeah I care.
    - ceejayoz 3y ago
      If you wanna make questions challenge students to think harder, by all means do so. If you do, and an entire classroom of kids manages to answer them correctly, "I guess I have to still give some of you Bs and Cs" isn't a great response.
      - Jensson 3y ago
        But that is how it works at other prestigious universities, basically every professor thinks that students doesn't learn stuff well enough and would want to test even more thorough understanding than they already do. It isn't about grading on a curve, it is about giving a good test for the students. It isn't like students at any institution understands the material as well as the professor even when they get the highest grade in that class, but that is the goal. The better the students the closer you can get, Harvard just refuses to test that properly, or if they do test it they don't record that grade. Edit: What I meant is that they typically don't grade on a curve, so it works as the poster I replied to wanted it to work. Realized "that is how it works at X" could be taken as I mean they should grade on a curve.
    - beambot 3y ago
      Why would you want "interesting problems that require you to think further" to be on exams?! That should be the entire point of lectures, office-hours, group problem solving, etc...
      - Jensson 3y ago
        Because they test if students understand the material well enough to apply it to nonstandard problems. A person who can solve nonstandard problems is much more valuable than a person who can just solve standard problems.
        beambot 3y ago
        Curious. I always assumed the primary purpose of an exam was to demonstrate proficiency, not mastery -- especially for undergraduate coursework. If you want mastery, you look at other work product: Projects, research, letters of recommendation, etc. Pedantry and intellectual hazing seem endemic in academia -- from the perspective of someone who spent entirely too many years in the sector (all the way through postdoc).
  - laverya 3y ago
    > They got into Harvard Harvard admits quite a few people who would normally not qualify as the cream of the crop. Above average, even good - but the worst Harvard admit is probably on par with the smartest kid at the local community college. They might bring other things to campus! But that doesn't mean you want them handling your legal defense or managing your money. > and were subsequently successful there. If 80% of the grades at Harvard are As, this just means you're not in the bottom 20%. I would also generally assume that this 80% is not uniform - some classes or even majors will give out higher percentages of As than others.
dguest 3y ago
There is also a strong selection for students who will fight to be the best, especially in ways that are easily quantified. Students like this aren't always shy about demanding a formulaic way to get an A. You can try to fight it, grade on a curve, etc, but there's only so much time in a day and in the end it's much easier to come up with a formula that they can follow, and to let them follow it.
gnicholas 3y ago
> It's an excellent signal for some critical amount of intelligence, conscientiousness, and conformity, where each one can be traded off for some of the others - but only up to a point. No amount of conformity and intelligence can explain 80% A's if there is a curve that mandates otherwise. This grading distribution can only occur if the faculty permit it to, both at an individual level and at a policy level.
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  > No amount of conformity and intelligence can explain 80% A's if there is a curve that mandates otherwise. A curve requiring an entire class of people who all got 90% of the questions right on an exam to have a particular distribution of As, Bs, Cs, Ds, and Fs would be insane. Curves are supposed to account for "this test is quite difficult and has an expected range of passing scores that doesn't quite fit in the ten point scale" scenarios. If you can get into Harvard, you're supposed to be an A student.
  - c-linkage 3y ago
    Then why bother giving grades at all? EDIT: The parent comment makes it sound like admittance to Harvard is prima facia proof that students are already excellent. If that is the case, then why grade students in Harvard? Students at Harvard should be trusted to learn everything they need to learn. EDIT2: Given that 80% of grades at Harvard are 'A', it seems like Harvard administration agrees that grading is not needed.
    - ceejayoz 3y ago
      Because it indicates "this student has a good grasp of subject X". If everyone at Harvard exits with a good grasp of Calculus, that's useful information. If only half of people from BU graduate with a good grasp of Calculus, that's also good information. BU and Harvard don't need to have the same proportions of A students for it to be a useful data point.
      - 3y ago
noslenwerdna 3y ago
It's also a good selector for having parents who got into Harvard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legacy_preferences https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legacy_preferences
aseo 3y ago
Just from the top of my head, SKY (SNU, Korea, Yonsei) have pretty significant grade inflation -- probably not as bad as Harvard -- and a cursory Google search supports that. Back to US schools, I'd like to see some analysis on the correlation between the proportion of # of GE courses for a program and that program's grade inflation levels. Also, compare public vs private schools' grade inflation. Schools in general have a strong incentive to send their students to internships and post-grad programs at prestigious IB firms, consulting firms, law schools, grad schools, and etc; and I wouldn't be surprised if private schools tend to have more lenient policies in relation to grade inflation to boost that goal. (edit: grammar)
- hiAndrewQuinn 3y ago
  Thank you!
CobrastanJorji 3y ago
Citation Needed. I don't think anyone has ever thought "ooo, a Harvard grad, they must be really conscientious." They do, accurately, see a white Harvard grad and think "50/50 chance on whether they're brilliant or they come from money."
rvba 3y ago
The selection filter is having rich and connected parents + not being a complete moron. On a side note the bigger joke are the scholarships for sports - you dont even need to be able to read if they put you on the football team.
lozenge 3y ago
"The important selection filter is entirely in getting into Harvard." You are confusing cause and effect there. By giving everybody high grades, they are reducing the ability to tell Harvard graduates apart, thus increasing the desirability of getting into Harvard and decreasing the need to put in effort after being accepted.

Jensson 3y ago

Normally the classes have harder tests at more prestigious schools, ensuring that most people doesn't reach an A. I've worked with people from Harvard, they weren't smart enough to consistently get A's in hard classes, so it seems to me like Harvard doesn't grade as harshly or have easier classes than most other prestigious universities. I understand why they do it, they want their students to not have problems due to low grades, but that also means that a Harvard degree isn't as useful as a sorting mechanism because I can't tell the difference between top students and the rest.

ceejayoz 3y ago
> I understand why they do it, they want their students to not have problems due to low grades, but that also means that a Harvard degree isn't as useful as a sorting mechanism because I can't tell the difference between top students and the rest. They got into Harvard and were subsequently successful there. Do you really benefit from knowing which of two Harvard grads got a few extra questions right in a handful of exams?
- Jensson 3y ago
  > Do you really benefit from knowing which of two Harvard grads got a few extra questions right in a handful of exams? It isn't just "a few extra questions", when professors makes tests harder they add more interesting questions that requires you to think further rather than just plug-n-chug. The difference between a 4.0 student and a 3.0 student at lets say Caltech is enormous, so yeah I care.
  - ceejayoz 3y ago
    If you wanna make questions challenge students to think harder, by all means do so. If you do, and an entire classroom of kids manages to answer them correctly, "I guess I have to still give some of you Bs and Cs" isn't a great response.
    - Jensson 3y ago
      But that is how it works at other prestigious universities, basically every professor thinks that students doesn't learn stuff well enough and would want to test even more thorough understanding than they already do. It isn't about grading on a curve, it is about giving a good test for the students. It isn't like students at any institution understands the material as well as the professor even when they get the highest grade in that class, but that is the goal. The better the students the closer you can get, Harvard just refuses to test that properly, or if they do test it they don't record that grade. Edit: What I meant is that they typically don't grade on a curve, so it works as the poster I replied to wanted it to work. Realized "that is how it works at X" could be taken as I mean they should grade on a curve.
  - beambot 3y ago
    Why would you want "interesting problems that require you to think further" to be on exams?! That should be the entire point of lectures, office-hours, group problem solving, etc...
    - Jensson 3y ago
      Because they test if students understand the material well enough to apply it to nonstandard problems. A person who can solve nonstandard problems is much more valuable than a person who can just solve standard problems.
      - beambot 3y ago
        Curious. I always assumed the primary purpose of an exam was to demonstrate proficiency, not mastery -- especially for undergraduate coursework. If you want mastery, you look at other work product: Projects, research, letters of recommendation, etc. Pedantry and intellectual hazing seem endemic in academia -- from the perspective of someone who spent entirely too many years in the sector (all the way through postdoc).
- laverya 3y ago
  > They got into Harvard Harvard admits quite a few people who would normally not qualify as the cream of the crop. Above average, even good - but the worst Harvard admit is probably on par with the smartest kid at the local community college. They might bring other things to campus! But that doesn't mean you want them handling your legal defense or managing your money. > and were subsequently successful there. If 80% of the grades at Harvard are As, this just means you're not in the bottom 20%. I would also generally assume that this 80% is not uniform - some classes or even majors will give out higher percentages of As than others.

dguest 3y ago

There is also a strong selection for students who will fight to be the best, especially in ways that are easily quantified. Students like this aren't always shy about demanding a formulaic way to get an A. You can try to fight it, grade on a curve, etc, but there's only so much time in a day and in the end it's much easier to come up with a formula that they can follow, and to let them follow it.

gnicholas 3y ago

> It's an excellent signal for some critical amount of intelligence, conscientiousness, and conformity, where each one can be traded off for some of the others - but only up to a point. No amount of conformity and intelligence can explain 80% A's if there is a curve that mandates otherwise. This grading distribution can only occur if the faculty permit it to, both at an individual level and at a policy level.

ceejayoz 3y ago
> No amount of conformity and intelligence can explain 80% A's if there is a curve that mandates otherwise. A curve requiring an entire class of people who all got 90% of the questions right on an exam to have a particular distribution of As, Bs, Cs, Ds, and Fs would be insane. Curves are supposed to account for "this test is quite difficult and has an expected range of passing scores that doesn't quite fit in the ten point scale" scenarios. If you can get into Harvard, you're supposed to be an A student.
- c-linkage 3y ago
  Then why bother giving grades at all? EDIT: The parent comment makes it sound like admittance to Harvard is prima facia proof that students are already excellent. If that is the case, then why grade students in Harvard? Students at Harvard should be trusted to learn everything they need to learn. EDIT2: Given that 80% of grades at Harvard are 'A', it seems like Harvard administration agrees that grading is not needed.
  - ceejayoz 3y ago
    Because it indicates "this student has a good grasp of subject X". If everyone at Harvard exits with a good grasp of Calculus, that's useful information. If only half of people from BU graduate with a good grasp of Calculus, that's also good information. BU and Harvard don't need to have the same proportions of A students for it to be a useful data point.
    - 3y ago

noslenwerdna 3y ago

It's also a good selector for having parents who got into Harvard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legacy_preferences https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legacy_preferences

aseo 3y ago

Just from the top of my head, SKY (SNU, Korea, Yonsei) have pretty significant grade inflation -- probably not as bad as Harvard -- and a cursory Google search supports that. Back to US schools, I'd like to see some analysis on the correlation between the proportion of # of GE courses for a program and that program's grade inflation levels. Also, compare public vs private schools' grade inflation. Schools in general have a strong incentive to send their students to internships and post-grad programs at prestigious IB firms, consulting firms, law schools, grad schools, and etc; and I wouldn't be surprised if private schools tend to have more lenient policies in relation to grade inflation to boost that goal. (edit: grammar)

hiAndrewQuinn 3y ago
Thank you!

CobrastanJorji 3y ago

Citation Needed. I don't think anyone has ever thought "ooo, a Harvard grad, they must be really conscientious." They do, accurately, see a white Harvard grad and think "50/50 chance on whether they're brilliant or they come from money."

rvba 3y ago

The selection filter is having rich and connected parents + not being a complete moron. On a side note the bigger joke are the scholarships for sports - you dont even need to be able to read if they put you on the football team.

lozenge 3y ago

"The important selection filter is entirely in getting into Harvard." You are confusing cause and effect there. By giving everybody high grades, they are reducing the ability to tell Harvard graduates apart, thus increasing the desirability of getting into Harvard and decreasing the need to put in effort after being accepted.