Yale student wants to know parents’ thoughts on college grades

Parents Forum
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<p>^ I disagree, Hunt. Through professional and family connections, I know several law school deans, including some at top 20 law schools. Except at Yale and Stanford where they claim to be above such things, they all say the same thing: they can’t afford NOT to let their admissions process be driven by the US News rankings, because everyone else is. Which means their principal concern in admissions is protecting or improving their median LSAT score (=12.5% of their US News ranking) and their median undergrad GPA (= 10% of their USNews ranking). They don’t really even care about the 25th and 75th percentiles; for law schools, US News uses the entering class median (50th percentile). One or two points above their median LSAT and a fraction of a point (on a 4.0 scale) above their median GPA, and you help them; your chances of admission are then strong. One or two points below their median LSAT and a fraction of a point below their median GPA and you hurt them; your chances of admission are then slim-to-none. If you’re above the median in LSAT but below the median in GPA (or vice versa), it’s a trickier call.</p>

<p>Bottom line, though, since what’s being measured here is entering class medians, not averages, it really doesn’t matter how far above or how far below the median you are; it’s just a matter of counting how many bodies are to the left of the line, and how many to the right. So someone who’s just a point or two above their current LSAT median helps them just as much as someone who’s 10 points above the median. And someone who’s just a shade below their current GPA median hurts them–whether that GPA is from Princeton, Harvard, or Bemidji State.</p>

<p>Back in the day when US News wasn’t in the driver’s seat on this, law schools could afford to treat different undergraduate institutions’ GPAs differently. Now they can’t, and if you talk to them, they’ll tell you they don’t. The one place it could make a difference is if they’re comparing two applicants who are both above their median in LSATs but below their median in GPAs; then factors like how far below the median the GPA is, and what school it’s from, might make some marginal difference. But in a lot of cases, the 3.7 GPA from Princeton will be a negative factor in law school admissions, even if it’s the equivalent of a 3.8 at Harvard and a 4.5 at Bemidji State. Because to US News, it’s just another 3.7, putting downward pressure on the school’s GPA median and therefore its all-important US News ranking. </p>

<p>The law dean who told me he couldn’t get his own daughter admitted with a 3.7 from an Ivy also told me that they know they’re not necessarily admitting the strongest students, and they hate it, but they feel trapped; if they ignore the US News ranking methodology, their US News ranking will drop, the alums and students will be up in arms, contributions may suffer, the next round of applicants may be less interested because they’ll perceive the school to be a “weaker” school and on a downward trajectory, etc. ad infinitum. So they feel they have no choice. His advice: if your kid wants to get into a top 20 law school, she should get the highest grades she possible can as an undergrad, even if it means taking easier classes or attending an easier school. There are no bonus points for attending an Ivy. That, and start studying for the LSAT now.</p>

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<p>Of course, that can be true at any University…</p>

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<p>I agree with bluebayou’s comments that the comments I’ve made could apply at any university. I think you will find undergrads in seminar courses in varying numbers, though, at different Ivies; and you will also find grad students of varying strengths in different departments.</p>

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<p>Interestingly, though, the GPA’s required at Yale to graduate summa cum laude and *magna cum laude<a href=“which%20are%20determined%20based%20on%20GPA%20being%20in%20the%20top%205%%20and%20the%20next%2010%%20of%20the%20class,%20respectively”>/I</a> don’t appear to be that much higher – maybe a few 100ths of a point – than they were when I graduated 35 years ago. So maybe the median GPA is higher but there are still not that many kids with GPA’s above 3.85 or so – which I happen to remember was the cutoff for Phi Beta Kappa (top 10%) the year I graduated. (At Chicago, they don’t have Latin honors, and I don’t think GPA figures have been officially published for years, although my son tells me – based on what, I’m not sure – that he thinks the average is around 3.3.</p>

<p>In terms of requesting transcripts, I know of lawyers who graduated 20+ years ago who are required before being laterally hired by law firms to provide their law school transcripts. Seems absurd to me.</p>

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<p>Perhaps, your Firm doesn’t want to hire someone who wants to be a politician and use the good name of the Firm as a point of refernce.</p>

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<p>My company has a minimum grade cutoff for college grads. Be below the cutoff and it gets round filed by HR and I never see it. The cutoff is typically 3.0, sometimes higher depending on the number of resumes for a position. I’ve seen it go as high as 3.4. Doesn’t matter what school it is when it is being reviewed by HR. </p>

<p>We always ask for transcripts for applicants until they’ve been out of school for about 5 years, then it is you work track record (and I do check you references and ask my friends in the industry. Amazing how your reputation gets around rather quickly). I always look at the grades in specific course that are directly applicable to the job being offered. Some credit is given to what school one attended but it is hard to make a blanket statement with all the grade inflation at the top end schools. I have found that some college hires with slightly lower GPAs from good but not top tier schools are actually more knowledgable and harder workers (kind of reverse of the top school GPA can be lower theory). </p>

<p>The main advantage of a top tier school is the available internships, project work, etc that these schools can offer to many more of their students. If you didn’t take advantage of them, you missed a great opportunity.</p>

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This is crazy, in my opinion. Why would anybody take this approach?</p>

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<p>HR screeners aren’t specialists and don’t know the details of the job outside of keywords in resumes. If you have a lot of resumes to go through, then you have to reject a lot of resumes and one fast way for a non-expert is just to toss out those with lower GPAs. GPAs aren’t a protected subclass. You could also toss resumes based on the last digit of their phone number or how tall or skinny they are but the GPA may be reasonable because it may have some actual correlation with how well they did in school.</p>

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<p>If employers are really setting arbitrary GPA cutoffs, regardless of what school the applicant comes from, it’s quixotic to ask schools not to engage in grade inflation.</p>

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<p>My company is very grade conscious but we aren’t morons. A 3.2 GPA in engineering from Cornell is not the same thing as a 3.2 from Villanova in Sociology or a 3.2 from Drexel in Sports Management. We ask for transcripts and we read them, and our recruiting teams are very familiar with the course work and rigor of a lot of classes at our core schools. Sometimes if an otherwise strong candidate has something funky on the transcript- or the grades seem out of whack, we will call career services who can usually explain. (We can tell when a professor at Wharton is on sabbatical when all of a sudden the grades in a notoriously difficult class get a lot better for every student who submits a resume that year!)</p>

<p>But this doesn’t mean we want robotrons with all A’s. We routinely toss “perfect” resumes and transcripts if they demonstrate a student who spent four years trying to get all A’s at the expense of getting an education. B’s and a judicious C or two or three often mean a student who is pushing him or herself out of the comfort zone, struggling a bit, trying to master something hard- which frankly mirrors the work world better than a string of easy A’s.</p>

<p>So yes, grades matter, but your education matters more. We know the gut courses – don’t fill up with those.</p>

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<p>How would you differentiate the graduate who simply worked hard and succeeded in getting all A’s AND an education from one who got all A’s at “the expense of getting an education?”</p>

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<p>You could take a look at the number of graduate courses on the transcript.</p>

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<p>A student with a 4.0 average in Economics will have a wide range of classes in econ- getting an A in econometrics is different than an A in “buyer behavior” or a “soft”, economics related discipline. A few “soft” classes are fine but some kids seem pathologically averse to anything challenging. Similarly- the non-econ classes can demonstrate a wide range of interests, and a kid willing to step outside his or her comfort zone- or can show a string of “Rocks for Jocks” type classes where if you show up on time and sit for the final you’re pretty much assured a B- do anything more, and you’ll get an A.</p>

<p>There are colleges where the brutal classes are in music theory, art history, comparative literature. So I’m not suggesting that every class a kid takes has to be in math, science or social science. But a kid who walks into college with a string of AP credits (those show up on the college transcript) who then re-takes all the same classes Freshman year, gets A’s in all of them, really should be chomping at the bit to take harder courses.</p>

<p>Not every kid needs to take graduate courses to challenge themselves.</p>

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<p>I got my second degree in nursing. At my university, all nursing students took exactly the same required classes once they got into the nursing school. The pre-requisites were identical as well, so the only variation would be in a very few electives.</p>

<p>I ended up with a 4.0 GPA in my nursing degree. I’ve never been accused of doing that “at the expense of getting an education.” I guess in a professional track like nursing where there is no significant variation in the requirements for graduation, it’s quite a bit different than the situations described above.</p>

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<h1>53.“But this doesn’t mean we want robotrons with all A’s. We routinely toss “perfect” resumes and transcripts if they demonstrate a student who spent four years trying to get all A’s at the expense of getting an education. B’s and a judicious C or two or three often mean a student who is pushing him or herself out of the comfort zone, struggling a bit, trying to master something hard- which frankly mirrors the work world better than a string of easy A’s.”</h1>

<p>But what happens when you got a smart kid with excellent time management skills?
I know, its very rare, and they will find their niche.</p>

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<p>LongPrime- we conduct “holistic reviews” of new grads who apply to us. Bad grades will keep you out. Great grades won’t get you in. There are some characteristics of a 22 year old kid that make them a better bet for a new employee than others- kids who work hard to achieve- we like that. Kids who challenge themselves- we like that. Kids who balance academics with work, volunteer, EC’s- we like that. A few B’s or C’s won’t kill you if there is evidence of lots of other good stuff on your resume. All A’s- in the absence of anything else- may or may not get you an interview depending on what else is there. Going to college with the objective of maximizing your grade point average is probably not the winning ticket anywhere in corporate America. Most employers like to see evidence of non-classroom excellence in addition to the transcript.</p>

<p>NR- I have never hired nurses so can’t speak to the curriculum. </p>

<p>OK? Not trying to play gotcha here.</p>

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<p>If you go to Grad. school, college GPA is the most significant. In fact, for Med. School GPA is much more significant than the name of UG. Job wise, it is different from company to company. I was asked my GPA after 30+ years of experience. I told them truth: I did not remember, but I remember graduating Magna Cim Laude. I got the job, but definitely not because of Magna. I got it because my experience matched what they were looking for. However, I could not have low GPA anyway, because my college was paid by several of my employers. To get tuition covered by employer, one needs to maintain certain college GPA.
Why pay and spend time onr low GPA anyway? Why not get the highest possible to increase your chances? It always looks good and it will stay with you for the rest of your life. On the other hand, nobody paid any attention that I have all my degrees from the local college, not Yale /Elite.</p>

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<p>bclintonk,</p>

<p>Okay,use your data. There are still a grand total of seven law schools with median GPAs at or above a 3.8.You said that 3.8 was a “cut off.” Now it seems that 3.8 is only a “cut off” for people who get LSAT scores below the median. In plain English, that means that 3.8 is NOT a “cut off” at all. And the only people affected by your fake “cut off” are applicants to seven law schools who have below median LSATs at those law schools. </p>

<p>Sure, I agree, if you have a GPA below the median AND a LSAT below the median, you’re unlikely to be admitted. You might still get into a top law school if both numbers are only a little below the median. The problem with your anecdote is that we do not know the young woman’s LSAT score. And, at most law schools, the LSAT is more important than GPA. She could have a 4.0 and she still wouldn’t get in with a 158 LSAT.</p>

<p>A 3.7 from an Ivy in and of itself is NOT going to keep you out of any LS with the possible exception of YHS. Your first post clearly sent the message that it would and that is just not the case. </p>

<p>The system I explained is not one I am advocating–it is what exists. The admissions folks know where your GPA puts you among applicants from your college. Everyone has to submit/his her transcript to LSDAS. The GPAs are recalculated using the LSDAS format. The LSs get the data. </p>

<p>So, Joe Schmoe applies to X law school from a small LAC which X law school knows little about. The LSDAS report will have information which tells X law school where Joe’s GPA puts him among the other LS applicants from his college.( Law schools do not know or care what the OVERALL median GPA is for the college.) Law schools will also know what the median LSAT score is for Joe’s LAC.</p>

<p>It’s a very simple system. The LSAT is scored on a 120-180 basis. Drop the 1. Divide by 20. That “should be” the aggregate median gpa. So, if the median LSAT were 180, the median GPA “should be” 4.0. If the median LSAT is 150, the median GPA “should be” a 2.5. </p>

<p>Bottom line: the way LSs ACTUALLY measure grade inflation, the Ivies are no more grade inflated than most colleges. Last time I checked, Yale had a 165+ median LSAT.That means it “should have” a median GPA of 3.25+. Even if it has one of 3.6-and I don’t think it does given the cut off for cum laude which is the top 30% of the class-- that doesn’t make it as grade-inflated as a big state U with a median GPA of 3.2 and a median LSAT of 150. </p>

<p>Obviously, that profile does NOT belong to UMichigan–and I’m not claiming it does. But yes, UMichigan’s median LSAT is below H’s and Y’s and therefore, LSs think that LS applicants from UMich “should” have a median GPA below that of H and Y. </p>

<p>Except for Brown–which allows students to take classes S/NC (Brown’s version of P/F)–all the Ivies, to the best of my knowledge have grading scales with pluses and minuses. At both Harvard and Yale, there are a lot of students in the humanities and social sciences who have A- averages in their majors and B+ averages outside them. If you split your classes evenly between major and non-major courses–which doesn’t really happen that often, but make my math easy–that would make the median GPA about 3.45. I suspect that’s probably about what it really is. </p>

<p>Personally, given the caliber of the students, I don’t think that’s all that grade-inflated. YMMV.</p>

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<p>thx Blossom, #56.
Some need to hear and read it.</p>