<p>I heard they grade down, meaning that you must get in the high 90s to get an A and stuff. A friend told me that they make it harder to get good grades to make it a more competitive school, is this true?</p>
<p>see grade deflation threads.
Every professor’s grading system is different. If you want a gpa breakdown, [Boston</a> University - Office of the University Registrar - Grades and Transcripts - Explanation of Grades](<a href=“http://www.bu.edu/reg/grades/explanationgrades.html]Boston”>http://www.bu.edu/reg/grades/explanationgrades.html)</p>
<p>I’m curious: where do kids hear this from? </p>
<p>BTW, it’s funny but a number of schools have this “accusation” thrown at them. Who starts it? Why is GW accused of having grade deflation but not Lehigh? The gpa’s at those schools are, I understand, very similar. BU’s gpa’s are normal for colleges, certainly not on the low side, so where does this come from? </p>
<p>I also wonder about the weird logic - and I’m asking, not accusing, R324u. Why would a school lower grades to create more competition? You raise standards to make the school better, meaning more competitive in the market with other schools, but a school gains nothing by making an A harder to get with the same standards. </p>
<p>Maybe it’s a holdover from 30-40 years ago when BU transitioned from more of a commuter school to a solid university. To do that, you do have to raise standards and that means people need to work harder and I suppose some might then say they were marked down. But I really don’t know where it comes from. Is it because some kids go to BU thinking they can drink every night and then are burnt when they get C’s? BU used to have a party-hard reputation, but then so did a lot of schools.</p>
<p>Double post. Sorry.</p>
<p>I wonder the same thing, Lergnom. If I have experienced grade deflation, I’d never know it. I feel like the grades I get are the ones I deserve in most cases. There are always some exceptions, but I feel like that’s less a case of grade deflation than it is subjective essay grading (grrr). To be honest, I know there have been classes where I’d feel a little strange getting an A compared to some of my peers who made the class their top priority and were legitimately prepared every day, had very insightful comments etc etc. And on the flip side, when I do have a class I care about very deeply and work very hard in, I can feel like my A meant something.</p>
<p>Do you think it’s an effect of BU being a safety school for some people? Clearly it’s a great institution, but a fair amount of students who come here are HYP rejects and expect BU to be cake. I don’t know that my friends expect to drink every night and still shine academically, but a lot of students do expect A’s no matter what. So that first B is shell shock. I dunno…if I get a B, I think “I should probably get my act together,” not “I WAS ROBBED.” When everyone who comes to a school was probably a star in their high school, you’re going to have to work harder to outshine all the others. It isn’t grade deflation, it’s just a different playing field.</p>
<p>i personally just had a professor today that said he’s going to be generous and drop our lowest exam. he then told us (and he’s been a professor here for years) that if his students averaged an 80 or an 85, BU would push him, and congratulate him, to lower the average to a 75. i’ve had very few classes in my 4 years where grades were deflated, but what some professors do is put everyone on a bell curve, which i have experienced. so if the class average is an 85, instead of a b that will be a b-, and if you had a 94 average in the class you’re shocked to see that your final grade is an a-. it’s not outrageous, but when students are thinking about their gpa’s and grad schools, one grade really does count, especially if its a drop from an a- (3.7) to a b+ (3.3). so basically if the entire class does well, BU thinks the professor is too easy and is giving away a’s, so the professors have to cover their a**es. now again though, having 4 classes per semester for 8 semesters, i’ve experienced maybe 4 classes where my grade was deflated. some of those professors said at the beginning of the semester that he “doesn’t want to hear people crying to him that they deserved an a- and got a b+ because it really isn’t a big deal.” but when you’re like me, and you killed yourself for that a- and know you earned it based on your average, getting a b+ can really feel awful. </p>
<p>however, this shouldn’t freak people out about grade deflation. it’s very few professors and its the ones who put you on a bell curve (which can help if the average is a 50! lol) when the average is high.</p>
<p>Each department actually sets its own grading policies.</p>
<p>Yeah…I think the quote of the century was from that Bostonia article…Dean Snyder calling professors who blamed BU for making them deflate grades “weenies” for not standing up for their own policies. haha</p>
<p>As I understand it - and this is how I gather it works at most schools - each department reviews how each of its classes is graded. First, remember a tenured professor can pretty much do what he or she wants in grades and departments don’t have much leverage. The only real leverage is any bonus that might be allocated to that professor but those aren’t big dollars if they’re even available.</p>
<p>If a professor is grading everyone high, there are two issues: is the class too easy or is the grading too easy? Pedagogically speaking, if the material is too easy, the class should be made more difficult because otherwise you’re not teaching. At some schools, this has become ridiculous - as in unreally hard problem sets in certain MIT departments. But generally, the goal is to raise the level of the material, not reduce the grades. A department is responsible for its curriculum and for the classes within that course of study. They review the syllabus, within certain limits of freedom. They want to be considered a good academic department.</p>
<p>Think of it this way: a department has nothing to gain by marking students lower for easy or middling hard course work. That would merely make the department unattractive to students - as in, why take their classes because you’ll get a lousy grade and not learn much? The goal is to improve education and that means you make better classes which require more of the students. That attracts students interested in learning. A department benefits from being considered good.</p>
<p>So maybe some of the silly grade deflation talk is because BU tries to improve its courses over time.</p>