Pre-Med and Management Consulting at Princeton

[TigerInCambridge]

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@stemit

For example, my D just completed her first year of engineering. In EVERY science/math/computer class (physics, chem, Calc, COS), the classes were packed with students who had achieved 5s on the AP exams, yet we’re taking intro classes. (There are plenty of good reasons to not use the AP results to “test out” of a intro class; but many students were so far beyond what was taught in the intro classes, they were simply “protecting” their GPA.)</p>

<p>Specifically, intro COS was packed with seriously experienced programmers competing with students who knew how to turn on a computer and not much else. The curve would have two peaks - each peak representing prior experience with the subject matter. Guess which peak got the 35% prize? Same was true with the other intro science/math classes.

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<p>This deserves some context, because it was not the culture I saw at Princeton. I was a CS major at Princeton who had taken AP Computer Science in HS who then took COS 126 (the intro CS class). The biggest reason I did this was not to protect my GPA but because intro courses at Princeton typically go way above and beyond high school AP classes in breadth and rigor.</p>

<p>COS 126 covers more any HS computer science curriculum does, and if you want to be a CS major, it’d be foolish (even if manageable) to skip this class. The same was true of intro math and physics classes: for every one person in the class who’s trying to protect his GPA, there are ten others who’re there because these are legitimately difficult classes.</p>

<p>“Grade deflation” or whatever is, IMO, an easy scapegoat when you’re used to being the smartest person in the room for the last 17 years of your life and now see B’s and C’s on your transcript, but the biggest reason people get their butts kicked at Princeton is not because of grade deflation or grade protection but rather because they’re at Princeton. </p>