<p>@miltonfriedman. Grade deflation at Chicago has been overblown for many years now. Even in the dark ages of early 80s most of my friends who were “diligent” in their studies and yet have a social life were able to manage easily 3.5 - 3.7 as biology (premeds) and econ majors. These two majors were considered the toughest back then and probably still is. And, you are correct, many of the Chicago students are masochists when it comes to challenging themselves with tougher courses than they “need” to maintain a higher GPA. Something in the DNA of the typical Chicago student is to challenge themselves in very difficult math sequences or taking physical chemistry even as biology majors or taking advanced statistics when they don’t need to…and as far as I know the GPAs have been getting higher in recent years.</p>
<p>…the hardest thing to do is get straight As and graduate with 4.0. I only knew of one person my graduating year…but graduating with 3.5-3.7 GPA not so hard.</p>
<p>…“grade deflation” and “where fun goes to die” continues to be a popular outdated urban myth…I think we secretly still want to be Caltech in reputation.</p>