<p>
</p>
<p>Mean GPA for natural science courses is around a 3.13</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/odoc/faculty/grading/faq/#comp00004c791b9f000001c882077c[/url]”>http://www.princeton.edu/odoc/faculty/grading/faq/#comp00004c791b9f000001c882077c</a></p>
<p>Although grade deflation has had no effect on science GPAs.</p>
<p>^Based on this link, it seems like grade deflation has had little, if any, impact on post graduation opportunities.</p>
<p>Grade deflation is a total non-issue. Work in your classes and get good sleep and you will almost certainly do well.</p>
<p>If you are drastically affected by grade deflation, it likely wouldn’t matter anyway.</p>
<p>Note that your statistic is the mean GPA in all science courses, not among science majors. Princeton, like everywhere, has tougher curves in intro classes, so I would expect (estimating roughly here) that the 3.1 mean science GPA is much more likely the result of a breakdown like this:
Average GPA in intro-level science courses, which are typically enormous - 2.8
Average GPA in upper-level science courses, which are notably smaller - 3.3
Thus an average science major would probably have a science GPA closer to 3.3 (since science majors tend to do better in intro science classes than non-majors), and the overall GPA is probably near the same number. This 3.3 number sounds more reasonable, seeing as it’s approximately the Princeton median GPA.</p>
<p>Thanks for the link. Yes, I see that it refers to the gpa for a group of courses and not for those who concentrate in any of the natural sciences. Those majoring in one of them would tend to have a higher overall gpa for the reason FightTheTide cited and because, of course, they would be taking plenty of non-science courses to fulfill distribution requirements. But if Underachiever wants to point to specifically the science gpa considered by med schools, then I would agree that a 3.1 may not cut it at a lot of places. However, I have heard repeatedly that grade distributions are not so different from other schools in this area, and comparing gpa with MCAT scores goes a long way in telling schools about the degree of grade inflation when comparing transcripts.</p>
<p>I feel the topic of this thread converges with the current Princeton vs Yale thread, it would be nice if they were merged.</p>
<p>
So are you asserting that med school admissions offices are stupid, or ignorant, or both?</p>
<p>Just because some people worry about grade deflation does not mean that they had a really easy academic life at HS, and that they expect to cruise through their time at Princeton with 3.8-4.0 GPAs.</p>
<p>This is a legitimate concern for some people, especially those that come from families that are not very well off. Most of these people care about getting good jobs as much as, if not more than, getting a good education. btw, someone who gets into Princeton is usually qualified enough to get into other top institutions. Why should he choose Princeton and not say Stanford, or Harvard, where grading is a little easier? You cant honestly say that Princeton is miles ahead of them. Maybe it is better, but not by a great extent.</p>
<p>The website whose link has been given says that Princeton students are doing well in the job market, that employers take note of the “real grades” at Princeton, that they get a copy of Grading at Princeton. But I don’t know how much one can trust this. You cant possible imagine Princeton to say “our grads are not doing as well in the job market as their peers because we screwed their grades up”</p>
<p>Look. I might be wrong. It is possible. I am just a high school student, an international one at that. I just wanted to know.</p>
<p>"The website whose link has been given says that Princeton students are doing well in the job market… "</p>
<p>Huh? What link? Where?</p>
<p>[Princeton</a> University - Career Services - Online Publication](<a href=“http://ocsweb.princeton.edu/pro-flip/Main.php?MagID=1&MagNo=1]Princeton”>http://ocsweb.princeton.edu/pro-flip/Main.php?MagID=1&MagNo=1)</p>
<p>Here’s one that shows that fewer than one-third of Princeton graduates have full-time employment at graduation time.</p>
<p>^This report says that only %23.8 per cent are still seeking employment at the time of graduation (and %1.6 are seeking grad school placement). The rest have jobs, year-long internships, are attending grad school, going into the military or have voluntary alternative plans.</p>
<p>Considering the job market and the length of time it takes these days to land a satisfactory first job, I’d bet that that percentage is pretty low compared to other schools.</p>
<p>According to the statistics here ([FAQ</a> -*Office of the Dean of the College](<a href=“Grading at Princeton | Office of the Dean of the College”>Grading at Princeton | Office of the Dean of the College)), the percentage of graduating seniors still seeking work as of graduation has changed by less than 1% from 2004 (economic changes probably explain most of the variation in this statistic from 2004 to 2010), med school admissions rate had changed by less than 1%, and law school acceptance rates at 18 schools (it doesn’t specify which) has increased by 7.6% since the policy was enacted in 2004. While this contains no data regarding starting salary, I really don’t find the changes due to the new grading policy very troubling. I have not seen any statistics from peer schools to which these can be compared.</p>
<p>randombetch, I thought you were pre-med?</p>
<p>Changed my mind :). I’d say a large % of those who end up going to Wall St. were not pre-finance to begin with.</p>
<p>Lucky for me it’s so easy to switch over if you go to Princeton and have a strong GPA.</p>
<p>Folks, I really have to tell you that it is not the gpa per se that determines post-grad opportunities, or lack thereof. For example, when it comes to internships, the hard luck of it all is that two things tend to determine internships (or 3):</p>
<p>(1) timing. This is most of it: who is offering an internship in your field at the time you’re availble for it. It’s not the same year by year, summer by summer, etc. Nor is the competition identical, for that field and region, year by year, summer by summer.</p>
<p>(2) luck. This is not unrelated to #1, but can include as well have “an inside track” on an opportunity due to a unique availability this year/this summer, and the opportunity having slipped notice of others who are equally or better qualified than yourself. You might get “tipped off” to an opportunity via a former prof, an advisor, a former or current employer, a relative/friend in a company who is not competing with you for such a position but has heard of it before the position becomes public.</p>
<p>(3) niche. This can also combine with (1) and (2), in that an opening may occur for a time-limited internship that happens to coincide with a specialty of yours, such as a concentration in an area, such as facility with a particular foreign language, such as a project that overlaps with or expands on some laboratory work you’ve done as an undergrad.</p>
<p>Anyone who wants more details is welcome to PM me.</p>
<p>So, if we decide anecdotal evidence is useful, maybe fewer people from Princeton to go medical school because they realize IT IS SO EASY TO GO TO WALL STREET AND MAKE MILLIONS:). If you go to Princeton that is:).</p>