<p>Someone mentioned that while BC was harder to get into, and was ranked higher, BU had a more rigorous academic program.</p>
<p>Is that true?</p>
<p>In what department are we talking about? If we are comparing engineering, then BU got us beat since we don’t have an engineering school. Difficulty mostly depend on the department you are in and the standard sets by the department. The Political Science department at BC is brutal with its grade deflation, but some other departments (which I won’t mention) are laughably easy.</p>
<p>BU does have a reputation of grade deflation–a reputation that many students and administrators are trying to debunk. One article even notes that BU overall GPA has been increasing over the past decade. (I’ll try to find that article and BC overall GPA to compare it with.) I don’t think it BU is harder overall; people who transfered from BU to BC don’t seem to be laughing at BC workload, which is decent but not overwhelming.</p>
<p>I’m referring to the departments they both have.</p>
<p>I think this is very true - many people have mentioned the light workload at BC</p>
<p>Light workload compared to that of BU or that of other universities in general?</p>
<p>Like I promised on the other post, here is what I found:</p>
<p>Boston College
"MEDIAN GPA BY CLASS: Murphy stated that over the last decade the median “GPA for all undergraduates went up and that for every year the spring median GPA was higher than the fall median GPA. He added that, by the spring of 2003, half of all seniors received a GPA higher than 3.5 for courses taken in that semester…Michael Connolly commented that this might result from students in two semester long courses usually receiving higher grades for the second semester. Dean Quinn noted that, in the case of seniors who might be taking only courses in their major and doing a senior thesis, we would expect them to be doing their best work and receiving their highest grades.”</p>
<p>“AVERAGE GPA BY CLASS: Murphy stated that from 1993 to 2003 the average GPA for all undergraduates had gone up though more slowly than the median. He added that he thought the median a more useful indicator than the average.”</p>
<p>SURVEY OF OTHER SCHOOLS.</p>
<p>Murphy stated that the subcommittee had received 10 responses to a questionnaire concerning the issue of grade inflation sent to the member schools of the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities. He summarized the responses as follows:</p>
<pre><code>* All responding schools showed GPA increases, though in varying amounts, and reported there was some concern on their campus over the issue.
- A few schools reported having formed committees to assess the issue and listed suggested measures such as �narrative� grading, reporting course averages alongside a student�s grades on transcripts, and reporting information on grading patterns to departments and individual faculty.
*** Several schools noted the rise in their GPAs was accompanied by rising SAT scores.**
*** Some schools attributed the rise to the pressure for higher grades by students applying to professional schools.** - Four schools noted that some questions concerning expected grades were included on student course evaluations.
</code></pre>
<p>[College</a> of Arts and Sciences](<a href=“http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/meta-elements/html/epc_feb_18_04.htm]College”>http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/meta-elements/html/epc_feb_18_04.htm)</p>
<p>At another meeting later on that year:
“He added that the rise in figures like the median GPA followed almost exactly the rise in quality of the undergraduates over the past decade and a half. �Joe Quinn stated that the problem was not really inflation but compression resulting in the loss of the ability to make distinctions among students.”
[College</a> of Arts and Sciences](<a href=“http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/meta-elements/html/epc_oct_14_04.htm]College”>http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/meta-elements/html/epc_oct_14_04.htm)</p>
<p>What’s BU is saying
“the bottom line: there is no Boston University policy requiring a certain median grade or grade distribution. In fact, the GPAs of BU undergrads and the percentage of As and Bs have both risen over the last two decades. Currently, the average GPA of a BU undergraduate is 3.04, with about 81 percent of all grades earned in either the A or B range.”
[Grade</a> Deflation or Not? | BU Today](<a href=“http://www.bu.edu/today/node/1962]Grade”>http://www.bu.edu/today/node/1962)</p>
<p>From other schools:
“Stories about easy As began to surface in the early 1990s: the average GPA at Stanford climbed from 3.04 in 1968 to 3.44 in 1992; between 1984 and 1999 the percentage of A and A– grades at Georgetown jumped from 28 percent to 46 percent; and a study of 34 colleges by a Duke professor revealed that between 1992 and 2002 the average GPA at private colleges went from 3.11 to 3.26.”
[ibid]</p>
<p>Reddune, the article states that the average GPA of a BU undergraduate is 3.04, but it doesn’t say anything about the average GPA of BC undergraduate, though it can be deduced it is lower than 3.5. It’s still a good article. Thanks :D</p>
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<p>Let me try to rephrase this question in a form that a simple mind such as mine can understand. You walk into a mosque and ask “I have decided to dedicate myself to god, should I go Christian or Muslim”. You are not exactly going to get an unbiased opinion. On the other hand, if you ask open-ended non-leading questions in both forums, the LJ group, etc, you may just get the answers you need. :D</p>
<p>"it doesn’t say anything about the average GPA of BC undergraduate, "</p>
<p>I noticed that too, but I couldn’t find a document that clearly states what BC’s current average GPA is. I guess it’s a pretty close kept secret.</p>
<p>Boston College has some departments with really low standards. If you major in english, comunications, theology, or psychology you won’t have to do too much work to get by. On the other hand, if you’re going to be a chemistry major prepare to spend many Friday nights studying. Overall this school has a lighter workload and less competition then universities of a similar ranking. I’d imagine that as a whole BU is more academically challenging than BC.</p>
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<p>And employers and graduate schools respect BC students even though they went to a school that has a workload that’s not quite up to par with its ranking?</p>
<p>Actually, they do.</p>
<p>How academically challenging the school is depends in part on the talent level of the students, don’t you think? Smarter kids means teachers can go deeper, faster, etc…seems to me you would almost always want a school with the most talented students so that you can be challenged and pushed to do better than you would otherwise.</p>
<p>4mygurl, I agree with you on that, but are you inferring that BC does have these talented students, and that is why they are completing their work earlier?</p>
<p>One of my biggest concerns is academics, and I might be in the minority, but I want the most challenging classes possible. Do many BC students want the same thing? If so, do they get it in Honors classes, seminars, etc. early on/</p>
<p>I can speak from personal experience. I went to BC and my fiance went to BU (we both graduated last May). Overall, my work was more challenging and my professors were more engaging. BU has many talented kids, but the quality of the average student is higher at BC making class discussions and peer learning am more interesting experience. Just for references, we were both Phi Beta Kappa, Summa Cum Laude, blah, blah, blah. He was a physics/bio major and is currently in medical school, I was history/secondary education and I am currently in a doctoral program in history.</p>
<p>How good is BC’s history department? I am thinking of majoring in history. How does the history department compare to the English and Philosophy departments? Thanks.</p>
<p>The history department is good. It is much more academically rigorous than philosophy or English, both in terms of expectations and requirements. There are some incredible professors (I only had one bad experience) and some really interesting courses. I recommend courses by Lyerly, Reinburg, Gelfand, and Seraphim, but be prepared to be challenged.</p>
<p>Dido on Gelfand and his dry humor. </p>
<p>Philosophy has very basic requirement so it is incredibly easy to get a Philosophy major. That doesn’t mean it’s easy. BC’s specialty is European Continental. We have a lot of European philosophers working at BC. Some of the best teachers include Rumble and Tacelli; best lecturers include Kearney and Kreeft. Overall, both departments have a lot to offer in term of classes and routes you want to take. Next year there will be a new major called Islamic Study, so BC is definitely improving its humanities stock.</p>