This thread is archived. Watch out for this one, ladies and gents. Tread very carefully with this one. Students can find additional information in the Undergraduate Student Guide and Graduate & Professional Student Guide. This is probably one of the biggest weed-outs there is at BU. A free inside look at Boston University salary trends based on 3506 salaries wages for 1053 jobs at Boston University. “They tell more of the tale and allow students to point to an additional dimension of the grading data.”, But others aren’t so sure. Firstly, congratulations on the scholarship as BU is not only a great school but also quite an expensive one. 3. Study hard, give time to your pre-lab and post-lab, and do your best. However, in engineering, you can get just about any job you want if your GPA is over 3.5, and you can get many other good jobs as long as your GPA is above a 3.0. Although not all the schools listed below are in the city center (notably MIT and Harvard are in the neighboring city of Cambridge within Greater Boston), they are all part of the shared … Anne Shea, BU’s vice president for enrollment and student affairs, often hears these types of concerns, but, she says, they are exclusively from students receiving merit-based aid, about 10 percent of all freshmen. And BU’s grading commotion was even riffed on in the blog of an English professor at George Washington University who wrote a grade-deflation operetta. Successful … Brown might have the highest GPA on paper, but their No. CH 101/ CH102 – General Chemistry. While there’s debate about exactly how severe and widespread grade inflation is, the consensus seems to be that wherever it occurs, it has the potential to rob students of the motivation to excel and to dull the shine of extraordinary accomplishment. Thresholds for merit-based scholarships, such as the half-tuition University Scholarship and the full-tuition Trustee Scholarship, are higher — 3.2 and 3.5, respectively. Jul 24, … New comments cannot be posted and … “If you pay high tuition to go to a top private school, do you deserve a good grade?” Henderson asks. One Silber Way, Boston, MA 02215. University to Offer Students Credit/No Credit Option for Spring 2020 Classes, Terrier Athletes Set BU Record With 3.56 GPA for Spring Semester, The BU Class of 2023: The Numbers Tell the Story. BU’s Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Policy. It’s desirable, yet time-consuming and almost entirely impossible. He is there on a merit scholarship but risks losing it, because he is .11 away from the GPA he needs.”. Good luck to you! Students must maintain a 2.3 to keep University grants for need-based aid. Harvard campus workers came out of the dining halls, security stations, and custodial offices to rally in the yard Thursday, asking university President Lawrence Bacow to save their livelihoods by … At 3.68, the average GPA of Stanford students is high, hovering around a solid A-. This article was originally published in BU Today on September 14, 2006. “As the parent of a very bright man,” writes one signer of the online petition protesting BU’s grading policies, “I am very, very disappointed after his first year at BU. The university is nonsectarian but maintains its historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. For example, after the embarrassing revelation that in 2001 more than 90 percent of its graduates earned Latin honors, Harvard capped the number of honors graduates at 50 percent and pledged to bring grades under control. In response, Wells’ committee proposed two University-wide actions. Biden’s Top Four Priorities, Explained by Leading BU Experts, History Made as BU Gives First COVID-19 Vaccines, Honoring Martin Luther King, Jr. (GRS’55, Hon.’59) amid Tumult in America, BU’s Jessica Stern on Why January 6 Attack on Capitol Was an Act of Terrorism, BU to Begin Giving COVID-19 Vaccines Friday, Patriot League Announces Plans for a Spring Unlike Any Other, CAS Alum Creates a Different Species of Podcast. All courses are academically rigorous, however, and students must meet certain requirements to earn a certificate from Boston University. Furthermore, because the trend has been more pronounced in humanities classes, it is surmised that grade inflation might be driving students away from studying sciences, where grading has remained relatively strict. Campbell says that contextual transcripts were discussed again at this summer’s Council of Deans meeting, but that concerns remain. You won’t just find out about what parts of the brain are responsible for certain processes, you’ll learn exactly what neurotransmitters and proteins are released, etc. Similar to the introductory courses, this class is still a weed-out, but now you get to add in NMR too. Those bigger organic molecules will look pretty impressive when you draw them out right and you’ll feel really proud of yourself when you master the benzene ring, getting to that point will be quite the journey. Instead of studying for my Chemistry final that I have on Friday, I did a little digging to see which colleges and universities gave the hardest finals. Everyone at some point will likely feel their own degree is the hardest out there. “If students come here and aren’t challenged, then I think we’re cheating them.”. If they do, that’s the case of a crash and burn.”. Remembering Former BU President Jon Westling, BU Takes Another Step to Advance Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, President Biden’s Inaugural Address Gave America Reassurance and Hope, Change Arrives in Washington: What It Could Mean for Higher Ed, POV: Creating a Healthier America—The Challenges and Opportunities for the Biden Administration, This Presidential Inauguration Will Be Unlike Any Other, but It Isn’t the Only Exceptional One, BU Community Writes Joe Biden’s Inaugural Address, Sujin Pak Appointed New Dean of BU’s School of Theology. Assembling data for the review, Linda Wells, current dean of the College of General Studies, found two disturbing trends, which she outlined in a 1998 memo to Dennis Berkey, who was then the provost. But four years later, the percentage of Harvard undergraduate grades in the A range was exactly the same: 48.7 percent. Chris Berdik The second trend she noted in her memo was a grading disparity between colleges and between different sections of large classes. An online FAQ page includes excerpts of responses received from graduate school admissions deans and fellowship officers whom Princeton informed of the grading standards. Weed-out happens in almost all colleges and it is particularly worst for pre-meds since a med school worthy GPA is 3.7 these days which means A- average. At least one prominent university, however, has recently enacted a very public grade deflation policy. So, what did all those distributions of data and grading discussions accomplish? “These are only guidelines based on historical performance of students,” says Arnold. But How Good Are They? From the initial pressures of studying and meeting exam grades to the potential minefield that is choosing the right school, it can be a truly daunting experience. One possible solution has been discussed among BU’s deans for several years — a contextual transcript that both reports a student’s grades and provides information such as the median grade in each class. This is what I came up with. It also has the 23rd lowest acceptance rate among accredited law … “We say we’re upholding standards and challenging students and giving them a first-rate experience in the classroom. save. This grading system is used at Boston University (BU) Letter Grade: Honor Points: A: 4: A-3.7: B+: 3.3: B: 3: B-2.7: C+: 2.3: C: 2: C-1.7: D: 1: F: 0: Information Source: Boston University (BU) - Grades & GPA. “If BU wants to restore grade integrity, fine,” says Liz Spellman (CAS’07), a history and classical civilization major. BU Acceptance Rate: 18.5%. Last year, 11 percent of merit-based scholarships were not renewed because students were not making “satisfactory academic progress.” However, students with any predetermined financial need who lose a merit-based scholarship will have that need covered by the University so long as they achieve a 2.3, something 91 percent of BU sophomores were able to do in 2005. This class will require all of the effort you can give, so plan wisely if this class is in your future. 93% Upvoted . However, all courses are academically rigorous, and students must meet certain requirements to earn a certificate from Boston University. share. In fact, the GPAs of BU undergrads and the percentage of As and Bs have both risen over the last two decades. First, there was the high percentage of A to B+ grades in certain classes, such as the CAS Core Curriculum classes (73 percent) and foreign languages (often 70 to 80 percent). A closer look reveals that claims by students like Kornfeld are not pure fantasy. As a result, the syllabi of all CAS classes are reviewed every year, and, he says, “we tell departments to keep an eye on the courses that they offer to make sure that they’re current and challenging.” Naturally, such raising of the bar is a drag on GPAs. You're going to need more than a perfect SAT score and a 4.0 for these elite universities. The grades B and D are given when a student has met all the requirements for the grade below (E or C) and a majority of the … Second, BU began distributing data to deans and department chairs showing the grading by each professor along with the grades that professor’s students received in their other courses. The professor genuinely enjoys it. What I Can Contribute To BU: College Admission Essay Sample. www.bu.edu. Salaries posted anonymously by Boston University … Letter Grade: Explanation (honor points are not applicable for these grades) AU: Audit, no credit CR: Credit, course acceptable for degree ... Boston University uses the honor point system in which each letter grade has a numerical value. It’s never quite certain how the professor manages to get all of the information into lecture, but it happens and you end up studying half of a notebook for one midterm. Also, because I really didn’t want to study at all, I decided to make it a list of 100. Steer clear, unless you have to take it, in which case… have fun? Here are 10 of the Hardest Classes at Boston University. CollegeVine’s Top 10 Hardest Majors . “They can go up and down depending on the performance of students in any particular class.” He adds that professors are not required to follow any particular grade distribution. Most agree with Wells, who has doubts about how important GPAs are to prospective employers. Great expectations: when everybody’s above average. And it’s not just the inflation of grades at other universities that affects how BU students perceive their GPAs. Turnitin Feedback Studio is often utilized more for its plagiarism detection and Google Assignments has only recently been activated for use at Boston University. Then there is the question of what people are buying in higher education. However, several did say that GPAs are important for graduate school admissions, and that BU should do a better job of making its rigorous grading standards known. 2. Grades, Grading, & CEUs. The university now has more than 4,000 faculty members and nearly 34,000 … The top grades go to the people who excel and get very high percentages and the pass grades are given to anyone who manages to achieve the minimum grade … The professors design the course so that anyone … But both faculty and administrators dismiss these stories as individual professors being too timid to stand up for their own standards. Siôn Phillpott. Luckily, it can be pretty interesting, but the sheer amount of work can be overwhelming. The 3-hour labs involve actual semester-long research projects which will keep you there the whole time. From digital logic to memory systems to processor design, this class will throw a lot at you and expect you to give it all your time and energy. Whether it’s the lecture, discussion, lab, or pre-lab, you’ll learn everything from balancing equations to mass spectrometry to Hess’s law and it’ll make your head spin. I found that grade inflation, while waning beginning in the mid-1970s, resurfaced in the mid-1980s. These Are the Hardest Colleges to Get Into Ranked. My open-mindedness, good sense of humor and diverse talents give me much to contribute to Boston University. “We certainly could do more in terms of taking a principled stand that we distinguish between excellent, good, and subpar performance,” says Campbell. Auditing is not an option with CPE courses. In order to find out the facts, we interviewed students, faculty, and University administrators and reviewed spreadsheets of average grades and grading distributions at BU, covering many years, schools, and departments. Chris Berdik can be reached at cberdik@bu.edu. It is composed of 16 schools and colleges. A bigger worry than financial-aid cutoffs among many students, and also among some faculty and administrators, is how BU’s uninflated grades are interpreted by graduate school admissions officers, fellowship selection committees, and potential employers. “The number of schools that use them seems to be dwindling,” he says. And one of the biggest changes in that context at many universities has been rampant grade inflation. By Lindsay Silberman. Of course, all of those things might factor into which school makes it “the hardest to get get grades”. Profile, Pioneering Research from Boston University, © Boston University. Here, you get the fundamentals of the ENTIRE NERVOUS SYSTEM. But before you attribute your less than perfect grades to your … As a result, says Henderson, students and their parents expect this top-tier performance to continue into college. Or Ban Trump? The BU admissions statistics are as follows: Total Applicants: 61,006. Nevertheless, a straight B average like BU’s is lower than that of many other selective universities, where grade inflation has gone relatively unchecked. First, I am an open-minded person. NE 203 – Principles of Neuroscience with Lab. “These are top students,” says Shea. All of the body systems. The bulk of Wells’ review focused on CAS, the largest college on campus, which enrolls more than 40 percent of BU undergraduates and provides liberal arts courses for most of the rest. When taking classes here, beware of chemistry, biology, and math. Archived. “It’s extraordinarily rare for somebody to come into the University and fail to achieve the bare minimum required for need-based aid. Why should he get a B– at BU?”. This class is supposed to stress the interpretation, analysis, and evaluation of published financial statements, but it’ll also seriously stress you out. The university has implemented a policy of grade deflation, where most, if not all, classes curve or award grades so the average course grade lies in the C to C+ range, and only sometimes in the C+ to B- range. 1839 — 33,355 Students. Average Rank in High School: Top 7%. Stanford University. BU charges “top dollar for tuition for a good education,” he says. Here Are The 16 Colleges And Universities Where It’s The Hardest To Get An “A” jla0192 | Nov 15, 2013 11:45 am | Nov 30, 2020 11:49 am. 1902-365 Bloor St East, Toronto, ON M4W 3L4, 3. Patricia McAnany, a CAS professor of archaeology for nearly 20 years, says she grades by judging students against an absolute scale of excellence in class discussions, written assignments, presentations, and exams. “An employer may never even ask for your transcript,” she says. 24 comments. Fast At-Home COVID-19 Tests Are Coming. Grades A, C and E all have different requirements and the requirements for A are, naturally, the hardest to reach. The average GPA in 2003 was 3.01, down from 3.1 in 1998, but up from the average a decade earlier, which hovered around 2.84. Maybe I’m not intellectually rigorous enough,’” he explains. A recent study found that where you attend university will impact your overall Grade Point Average, but not by much. Certain percentages of … Grade Requirements. That being said, when you take a look at things from a strictly statistical view, we can take a look at which degrees are mathematically the toughest. We used a combination of lowest average GPA, highest number of hours spent studying, and lowest return on investment to determine which majors are the hardest to pursue. Yeah, it’s a lot. Middle 50% ACT Score: 32-35 (Source: BU admissions website and BU Today) “Fairness in grading is something students should care about tremendously,” he says. So what sparked all the commotion, the editorials, the petition, and the libretto? ; coeducational; founded 1839, chartered 1869, first baccalaureate granted 1871. For CAS freshmen, those scores jumped from 1119 to 1315 over those same years (a mid 1990s SAT recentering accounts for a portion of these increases). Indeed, while plenty of other universities face charges of grade inflation — professors flooding student transcripts with flabby As — BU is encountering claims of “grade deflation,” a belief that the University mandates a certain median grade in classes or a predetermined curve of grade distributions. He was a brilliant student, at the top of his high school class. The professors design the course so that anyone thinking of going to medical school after getting their bachelor’s will rethink their life decision. Contact your school or institution for an exact determination. Indeed, according to Campbell, every undergraduate college at BU follows the CAS model of providing grading data but allowing departments and professors to determine their own grading standards, with one exception — the School of Management maintains target GPAs, adjusted annually, that vary between lower and upper division courses (where grades tend to be higher). It’s almost completely understanding and application and the questions tend to be purposely confusing. In CAS, between 1994 and 1998, the average GPA climbed from 2.84 to 3.1, and the percentage of A grades went from 29 percent to nearly 36 percent. In the 2005–2006 academic year, 62 percent of all BU undergraduates received a 3.0 or better, and 47 percent scored above 3.2, the highest percentages in seven years. Each grade is given the following “honor points” value: Grade: A: A-B+: B: B-C+: C: C-D: F: Honor Points: 4.0: 3.7 : 3.3: 3.0: 2.7: 2.3: 2.0: … 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. “They’re just weenies,” says Snyder. For instance, in one large introductory psychology class, 82 percent of one section earned A grades while another could manage only 15 percent. Or, as Kornfeld, the SHA student, puts it, “Nobody wants to feel mediocre.” And here’s where the grading issue leaves the relatively solid ground of statistics and takes a philosophical turn. “And they’re up against students from equally prestigious schools who have higher GPAs due to grade inflation.” While many universities don’t disclose average GPAs, here’s a recent sampling for comparison: Emory 3.3, Dartmouth 3.3, Notre Dame 3.4, Harvard 3.4. Students at public universities have an average GPA of 3.1 while those attending private universities have a 3.3. It's a really big school and it's easy to get lost in some of the initial large lecture courses. Consider yourself warned. Does BU deserve to be known as the hardest grading college? “They want to know if you have a degree, and then they want to know what kind of work you can do.”. Boston University's Center for Professional Education offers only non-credit, non-degree programs. “[These grades] indicate either that the standards aren’t high enough in the courses, or As are being given for less than outstanding work,” concluded Wells. But, taking all the progr… With the simple AND multiple linear regression, weighted and generalized least squares, polynomials and factors, and so much more, this class is bound to give you at the very least a bit of a headache. But Henderson stresses that in subsequent years only data were sent, as they continue to be every spring. 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