<p>Perhaps not the answers you were hoping for.</p>
<p>Princeton 46% A, 39% B, 7% C, 1.5% D and F, 7% P. </p>
<p>Eighty-five percent A’s and B’s, exactly the same as Berkeley. In other words, at the top, where everyone agrees that Berkeley students are on a par with those at Harvard and Princeton, the grade distributions are the same. </p>
<p>Your next question was about the low end of the distribution. Although this is not particularly relevant for medical school admissions, since C’s and D’s do not get you med school, here are the numbers.</p>
<p>Berkeley average GPA 3.25, Princeton 3.36. Now factor in the difference in entrance qualifications, and explain how Princeton grading is easier. Berkeley 25th percentile SAT V 570 M 620. Princeton 25th percentile SAT V 690 M 690. Note that a 690 M puts one at the 25th percentile at Princeton, and just below the 75th percentile (at 700) at Berkeley. At Berkeley 27% of students scored above 700 V, 45% were above 700M. Comparable figures at Princeton are 71 and 73. More to this point, at Berkeley 33% were below 600 on SAT V, 20% below 600 on Math. At Princeton the figures below 600 are 4% and 2%. Berkeley had 10% V and 5% M below 500. Princeton-none. </p>
<p>The Berkeley student body, and hence the grades, include a lot of people who could not get into Princeton. If grading standards were identical, one would hardly expect the same GPA from the two sets of students. </p>
<p>I don’t have data beyond “% A’s” for Harvard, but obviously its student body is even (slightly) more highly selected than Princeton’s. Wouldn’t you expect high grades from this crowd?</p>
<p>Do you have any evidence that the same student going to Berkeley would get lower grades there than at Princeton? Professional school admissions committees, as you point out, do not seem to believe this.</p>