is it hard to graduate from berkeley?

sakky · January 16, 2009, 3:24pm

Yep, that’s the problem. I don’t see why experimentation is bad - if anything, it is good. People should be allowed to try out different majors without fear of damaging their futures. What exactly is wrong with that? Why exactly is experimentation a bad thing anyway?

I think you’re hitting at one of the hearts of the problem - student overconfidence combined with a lack of information. Let’s face it. Most incoming freshmen don’t know what engineering is all about. They’ve never had the opportunity to try it. I don’t know about any of you guys, but my high school certainly didn’t offer any engineering courses. People don’t really know what they’re signing up for. Furthermore, overconfidence has been well documented within the academic literature.

That is why you need procedures to protect people from their own hubris. I fail to see what is so bad about letting people try something out, finding out that they’re not good, and then allowing them to move onto something else.

I’ll give you an example. I read about a girl who decided she wanted to try to become an actress after high school rather than going to college. She moved to Los Angeles, tried her hand for awhile, but her career didn’t go anywhere, and she ended up with menial jobs such as working as a tour guide for Universal Studios. So she decided to pack it in and go to Berkeley, where she did very well, and then went to Harvard Law. Nobody cares that she’s a “failed actress”. She tried out a career, it didn’t work out, so she moved on with her life.

Oh, by the way, her name is Jennifer Granholm, and she’s the current Governor of Michigan.

The point is, if somebody like Granholm can try and fail at acting and moving on with her life with no repercussions (as she still got into Harvard Law), then what exactly is so wrong with people trying and failing at engineering and being allowed to move on with their lives? What’s the difference? The only difference I can see is that an engineering career involves school coursework whereas an acting career involves moving to Hollywood and trying to obtain roles, but I hardly see why that’s such an important distinction. After all, if acting was actually taught in school, then perhaps Granholm would have racked up a string of F’s. But since it wasn’t taught in school, her failed acting career didn’t hurt her.

sakky · January 16, 2009, 3:30pm

I understand, and I am illustrating just how ludicrous that logic really is.

But hey, those who subscribe to that logic are left to explain why is it that schools like Harvard and Stanford - notorious for easy grading - are also precisely the schools that seem to win so many Rhodes. Or nab so many top grad school spots.

Note, I am not even comparing these schools on a per-capita basis. After all, Berkeley has several times the number of undergrads that Stanford or Harvard does. Yet Berkeley (sadly) gets crushed by these schools for the Rhodes on even an absolute numbers basis. After all, you would think that the top 6700 undergrads at Berkeley would be comparable to the student bodies of Stanford or Harvard (which also have about 6700 undergrads). Yet even under that comparison, Berkeley is (sadly) routed.

mathboy98 · January 16, 2009, 3:44pm

The Berkeley engineering college, while filled with quite a few insanely qualified people, and while boasting amazing departments, really is run very strangely. Such an inflexible one.

NO technical course may be taken on a Passed-NotPassed basis. That includes if someone’s majoring in EECS, and is taking a physics course out of interest. I mean, it seems to pride itself on making a good GPA as hard to obtain as possible, without a good reason given. This seems to very much be in line with the poor incentive provided to take risks. Someone who takes 3 classes, really standard EECS curriculum, is going to be fine. What if someone wants to take Quantum or Analytic Mechanics for fun? Really competitive classes with some very hardcore physics majors. Well, too bad, have to take it for a letter grade, and if your GPA goes down, so be it.

sakky · January 16, 2009, 3:57pm

The logic also breaks down even more spectacularly after you consider the sheer difficulty of the material that Berkeley engineering courses for you to learn.

Heck, I’ll give an example from my own past. I once got a 30% on an engineering exam…and celebrated. Why? Because the mean was a 25, and with the tight S.D., my 30 ended up being an A-. I freely admit that I hadn’t a single clue about what was going on during the exam. But that didn’t matter. What mattered is that I knew more than the average student, who knew even less.

Furthermore, the top score of the exam was something like a 60. In other words, even the best student still got nearly half of the exam wrong. Think about that. What real-world engineering company is going to try to implement a project that is so complex and convoluted that the average engineer will make errors 75% of the time, and even your very best engineers in the company will still commit errors almost half of the time? Come on, no company is actually going to run such a project. {Ok, maybe Microsoft did that with Vista, but I digress…}

Look, the truth is, real-world engineering projects are designed with numerous built-in redundancies and checkpoints and are organized in a manner in which each individual engineer actually understands how to do the task that he is assigned to complete (or else that engineer won’t be assigned to that task) and where mistakes are rare. That’s how you can build engineering projects that have “six 9’s” (or 99.9999%) reliability and mistakes You don’t run a project where even your very best engineers are making mistakes almost half the time. But that’s precisely what happens within engineering courses. That’s where the analogy falls down.

mathboy98 · January 16, 2009, 4:08pm

“after you consider the sheer difficulty of the material that Berkeley engineering courses for you to learn.”

I also made one point earlier, which is that I don’t always think the material is what’s at fault – often it’s just plainly that the prof. (due to departmental restrictions) has to make the grades bad. In other words, make up despicable ways of lowering the average, completely take students off guard in tests. This, to my experience, not only is unnecessary torture, but also doesn’t even really help someone learn the material.

As was stated, people are getting over half the problems wrong at certain times, and for instance if one takes the 30 (as opposed to 25) on the exam, who is to claim the 30 has a better clue what’s happening? Who is to claim a 35 even does necessarily? When the problems were so abstruse and odd, it seems like depending on what problem struck whichever guy’s fancy, that guy would come out on top somehow.

I’m always much more in favor of teaching advanced material than of just grading students particularly hard on less advanced material. Advanced with a limit of course.

dill_scout · January 16, 2009, 8:55pm

I do think that the grading is a bit hard at Berkeley, but I can see why professors grade the way they do. A lot of classes already have really advanced material that also have a hard curve all because the professor finds its fitting for the sake of academic integrity or something like that. I feel like maybe there should be a department wide GPA average standard set that professors should aim for.

Mathboy:

I’m thinking of maybe going to grad school for math. I’m not so sure though because before I came to Berkeley I had wanted to be a doctor for years. I just realized this year that I love more abstract math and doing proofs. At the same time, I am rather fond of my current major, BioE, though I don’t love it quite as much as my love for math right now. I’m also not so sure how I’d do in a math major; in high school, i was above average in my classes without trying too hard. At the same time, because I did not work very hard in my math classes throughout high school, I do not think I have as solid a math foundation as I would like. Do you think switching to a math major would be worth it?

mathboy98 · January 16, 2009, 9:38pm

Dill_scout – the prospect of switching to a math major isn’t going to ruin your life, but remember that as a Bio-E major, you’re likely going to have some degree of job security in the future. Perhaps PM me, and tell me a little more about yourself + what exactly leads you to believe you like abstract math.

I truly don’t want to give an opinion before I feel I have enough info to say one way or the other. See, I’ll give you my profile. My family comes from a background of engineers. I was going to be an EECS major for a whole year (frosh year), but I actually switched. However, one could make the case that I never, ever was really meant to be an engineering major - no signs pointed to it, and I was just doing it because it’s something I could handle, which would have a somewhat solid job prospect ahead. I am resigned, now, to pursuing pure math, with the intent of going the academic route, going to grad school, etc.

Now let me say, if you just want to major in math, fine. If you, however, want to go to grad school and make math the basis for your career, that’s a huge step, and honestly you’d likely have to give up BioE. Is it worth it to give that up? I can tell you I DID NOT like EECS, I just was doing it for the sake of it. So it wasn’t as hard of a step for me to change gears entirely.

Grad school will only be a grueling process if you don’t like the idea of it, and bear in mind math grows more and more abstract as you go. I know at least one guy who was fairly advanced coming into Berkeley, took some math, but eventually decided it wasn’t what he thought it’d be like! I on the other hand, reaching a similar stage, concluded that I could see what he didn’t like, and that what he didn’t like, I rather like.

Anyway, this is a terribly composed post, but it at least should hint that I think switching entirely out of BioE is a serious decision, and would like more info before I advise either way. I do believe I can probably give you good feedback given some info on why you think you like math, what your background is, etc.

mathboy98 · January 16, 2009, 9:45pm

Let me put it this way…if you genuinely still like BioE, you may find that the highest stages of abstract math aren’t for you, but that you do like the intermediate stages, kind of like that friend I mentioned.

In this case, continuing Bio-E and double majoring in math is a good idea, and just taking the classes you like. If you’re getting rid of Bio-E entirely, I’d want to know firstly what advantage you perceive to this.

I can tell you, though, that if grad school in math is your aim, LIKELY you’ll be much less satisfied with where you end up if you continue Bio-E. Math Ph.D. candidates tend to have done quite an incredible bit before grad school to develop their applications, and it is extremely tough without time.

I know a brilliant grad student (third year at Berkeley) in math, who majored in EECS, math, and economics at MIT. Perhaps you even know who I’m talking about. I had a 1 hour long chat with him when I was considering my predicament while being an engineer. He basically told me that he was told “Double majors don’t make it to math grad school.” Though, he did say that’s an exaggeration; but apparently, the guy was the type to take ridiculously overpacked schedules in MIT, and told me he still entered Berkeley weak in certain math subjects.

So you see what I mean. If you like math, no issues, but if you want to make grad school + possibly more your goal, you may need to discuss things in greater depth, do some more self-reflection, etc.

sakky · January 17, 2009, 7:47pm

Newmassdad, you can continue in your “wonderland of sophomoric argument” (whatever the heck that is). I think I have embarrassed you in every single debate we have ever had, to the point that I am frankly amazed that you still have the gumption to try at all. I would advise you to work harder on your logical reasoning and debating skills, or you will continue to have the same problems.

Is that right? Exactly how many do you know, pal? I’m going to guess about zero.

sakky · January 17, 2009, 7:53pm

Since you insist on bringing up the aspect of salary - which I find utterly irrelevant when it comes to the issue of grading (for after all, why exactly should salary affect grading anyway?) - fine, then let’s play it your way, Tax Bear.

Consider the majors of American Studies and physics. I think there is little dispute that physics is a more harshly graded major than is American Studies; heck, I suspect even most students who are currently majoring in American Studies would concede this point. Put another way, would anybody here like to argue that American Studies grades harder than physics? I didn’t think so.

Yet the fact is, American Studies students actually garner a higher starting salary than do physics students. That’s right - higher. In other words, the physics students get harsher grading and lower salaries than do the A.S. students.

[Career</a> Center - What Can I Do With a Major In…?](<a href=“http://career.berkeley.edu/Major/AmerStud.stm]Career”>http://career.berkeley.edu/Major/AmerStud.stm)
[Career</a> Center - What Can I Do With a Major In…?](<a href=“http://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Physics.stm]Career”>http://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Physics.stm)

So Tax Bear, perhaps you’d like to tell us all again about the correlation of risk and reward? How does that go again?

I don’t think anybody should hold their breath waiting for Tax Bear’s response.

mathboy98 · January 17, 2009, 7:59pm

“Yet the fact is, American Studies students actually garner a higher starting salary than do physics students. That’s right - higher. In other words, the physics students get harsher grading and lower salaries than do the A.S. students.”

Incredible, but I guess in a strange way (understanding how our world works) logical.

mathboy98 · January 17, 2009, 8:07pm

Also in all honesty, physics isn’t even the only example…I could EASILY give up the kind of pure math I’m doing, and pass by with decent grades in engineering. I could also do economics or something. Lots of ways I could make more money with much less academic reaching.

Guess what, the main attraction to doing pure physics or math is academia. For which one needs top grades anyway, and even with good grades, there’s a great chance one will not make it. The people who’d even attempt this road are a self-selected lot, not your standard engineer looking to make money…encouraging these to try their luck at the beginning is not a bad idea.

Oh, and to the claim that people who fail deserve it…well that’s the whole thing, EVEN if we concede the Tax Bear point. Technically, this just means that more will attempt to be smart and stay away from things like physics. Good idea? I think not.

asdjkl · January 17, 2009, 11:24pm

As a Berkeley engineer who is trying to apply to medical school I must say that I follow Sakky and Mathboy’s sentiments.

<ol>
<li>To get a subpar grade (Below a B-) in Humanities, Poli-Sci, etc. you basically would have blown off the class. However, getting below a B- in many engineering courses requires a lot of work and commitment. My two forays into humanities resulted in easy A’s, but when I put in over twice the work for EE40 I only got a B-. </li>
<li>Consider your generic humanities course and your generic engineering course. Based on grade distributions, a student ranked at say 1/2 std. dev. above the mean would probably get a B+ in the engineering course and an A- in the humanities course since the humanities courses generally give out higher grades. So basically, a humanities premed competes with students who were on average worse in high school for a proportion of A’s while the opposite is true for the engineer. In our hypothetical case above the engineer ends up with a 3.3 while the humanities student ends up with a 3.7. Big difference. </li>
<li>Finally, consider my case: I have a 3.6 BCPM GPA and a 3.5 overall GPA. My BCPM GPA was brought down by Physics 7B and Math 54–two notorious engineering lower-divs. In addition, my overall GPA was brought down by engineering courses. In effect, Chem 3A/3B, Bio 1A/1B, and a coupleMCB upper-divs brought up my GPA.
All else being constant, I am at a clear disadvantage to my peers in “softer” majors who would have probably gotten a 3.8 cum. 3.7 BCPM even though we may have same MCAT, same ECs, yadda yadda. </li>
</ol>

Based on these 3 examples, it is clear that Berkeley engineering has disadvantageous grading policies for premeds. I would still do engineering, however, because I think its an exciting program that instills a strong work ethic in its students.

mathboy98 · January 17, 2009, 11:53pm

I am actually somewhat bewildered why admissions for med school and law school are done how they are. Maybe I should ask on the law/med fora.

sakky · January 18, 2009, 4:19pm

One reason is that the med and law schools are themselves judged by the GPA’s of the students they admit - by ranking systems that measure “selectivity” based on GPA - without regard for how difficult it may be to obtain those GPA’s.

mathboy98 · January 18, 2009, 4:33pm

“One reason is that the med and law schools are themselves judged by the GPA’s of the students they admit - by ranking systems that measure “selectivity” based on GPA - without regard for how difficult it may be to obtain those GPA’s.”

When you say they “are judged,” who in particular judges them?

I mean geez, honestly I have to be an IDIOT to apply with a hard to earn major to law school then don’t I? Unless I’m just a whiz at the major…that’s really really sad.

sakky · January 18, 2009, 6:31pm

The rankings, and so by extension, prospective students. For example, one reason why Berkeley’s law school is so highly ranked according to USNews, relative to its peers, is that the law school places such a high emphasis on GPA in its admissions process. In fact, Berkeley’s law school’s incoming student GPA is surpassed only by the Holy Trinity of YLS, HLS, and SLS. If they did not place such a strong emphasis on GPA, the school’s ranking would be lower and hence fewer top students would want to apply or want to go.

The problem, again, is when USNews calculates its “selectivity” rating, it just looks at the incoming student GPA. It doesn’t know and doesn’t care that different schools and different majors use different grading schemes. All it sees is the GPA.

Actually, you have to be an idiot to choose that hard-to-earn major in the first place, if you are thinking about going to a law school. Either that or you just have to be highly confident - perhaps overconfident - in your own abilities. It’s like trying to run a footrace while strapping a weight plate on your back. Yeah, you might win the race anyway if you’re really strong, but surely we can all agree that you’re placing yourself at a significant disadvantage.

A fairer way would be to normalize everybody’s grades. That is, your GPA would be recalculated in relation to a theoretical student who took the same exact courses you did and got the median grade in each course. What that would mean is that if you got a B in a course where the median grade was a C, then that would be an excellent grade and your “corrected” GPA would be boosted. On the other hand, if you got a B in a course where the median grade was an A-, then you were clearly one of the worst students in the class and so your corrected GPA would be reduced.

I believe Dartmouth prints transcripts where the median grade of each course is printed next to the grade you received for that course. Hence, anybody who reviews your transcript would be able to quickly determine whether you really were an above-average or below-average student in the courses that you took. Unfortunately, they don’t then take the next step to normalize the overall GPA. But at least they do provide information about just how easily graded your courses are. Either way would be a clear improvement over what Berkeley does now, which is nothing at all.

mathboy98 · January 18, 2009, 6:48pm

“But at least they do provide information about just how easily graded your courses are. Either way would be a clear improvement over what Berkeley does now, which is nothing at all.”

Yeah, I guess I consistently advise people to come to Berkeley only if they want to take advantage of its amazing faculty + departments. Not if they want to go to law school or med school…just go somewhere else, and save yourself an ulcer [or rejection].

sakky · January 18, 2009, 8:02pm

Or follow the strategy that Tax Bear’s logic would entail: simply choose the easiest classes in the easiest major, including classes about topics that you already know. You won’t learn much, you won’t really develop your intellectual capabilities, in short, you won’t really grow as a functioning adult at all. But who cares, right? After all, you’ll get high grades and that’s all that matters, isn’t it?

mathboy98 · January 18, 2009, 8:04pm

YEah though, if I were to go for an easier major, I’d prefer to apply to some Ivy’s or something…an easy major from an Ivy might have a bigger “name” to it than one from Berkeley.

is it hard to graduate from berkeley?

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