High Level College Electives

[MyTurn2Raise]

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This year I finally choose a couple of electives that are good, and they are quite good. One is 190A Labor and Globalization, the other is 394E, Healthcare, Politics, Equality. They're both very intersting. Maybe I sound like a geek saying this but it's nice to have other people in the class that care about the material, that are smart and knowledgable on it (most know more than me). Mainly upperclassemen though a few freshmen.


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Prepare to be bombarded by big government, liberal bs

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Upper level courses tend to be graded much harder. Everything in your post is true for upper level courses for your major; people will (obviously) know more and maintain a greater interest in the material. Consequently, you need to work harder to stand out from the rest of the group. Anyways, I think you should take an upper level writing class.

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you should probably take a class that is a combination of easy and interesting. this is the most satisfying IMO

[ethan]

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Upper-level courses are graded on a different scale. If you get a C, that's terrible and you really have some explaining to do. At least in the UM aerospace program, the grades were pretty much A, A-, and B+ with the occasional A+. Anything below B+ looks really bad.

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I went to a school where this was decidedly not true. We took great pride in not having any grade inflation. Of course, this also meant that I had plenty of intelligent, hard-working classmates who didn't get into grad school. One of my professors got a call from Princeton (compsci) about a student whose references were fantastic but his GPA "just wasn't quite there". He had a 3.8, putting him easily in the top 5% of his class and top 2-3% for his major.

Clearly the obvious solution is just to give up and go to Stanford, where "failing a class" magically translates into a "B+" on your transcript. Or Duke, where (as I understand things) they recently had a graduating class with an avg GPA of an A-. God forbid a college decide to fail someone. Of course, then the parents will just end up suing.

(And before anyone insists this is sour grapes, I had no trouble getting into grad school and actually got a fairly prestigious fellowship. I just think grade-inflation is stupid.)

[M2d]

when taking electives, it's important to have a high girl:guy ration while avoiding potential feminazis. classes like women's studies look good, but are riddled with hidden landmines like lesbians and feminazis. sociology classes and education classes will often have the ratio you seek without as much static.

[Patrick del Poker Grande]

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Upper-level courses are graded on a different scale. If you get a C, that's terrible and you really have some explaining to do. At least in the UM aerospace program, the grades were pretty much A, A-, and B+ with the occasional A+. Anything below B+ looks really bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

I went to a school where this was decidedly not true. We took great pride in not having any grade inflation. Of course, this also meant that I had plenty of intelligent, hard-working classmates who didn't get into grad school. One of my professors got a call from Princeton (compsci) about a student whose references were fantastic but his GPA "just wasn't quite there". He had a 3.8, putting him easily in the top 5% of his class and top 2-3% for his major.

Clearly the obvious solution is just to give up and go to Stanford, where "failing a class" magically translates into a "B+" on your transcript. Or Duke, where (as I understand things) they recently had a graduating class with an avg GPA of an A-. God forbid a college decide to fail someone. Of course, then the parents will just end up suing.

(And before anyone insists this is sour grapes, I had no trouble getting into grad school and actually got a fairly prestigious fellowship. I just think grade-inflation is stupid.)

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Oops, I'm sorry. I'm talking about graduate courses, here. Of course the undergrad classes are graded on a standard scale. In my undergrad (at Michigan Tech), the story was actually opposite. The average was a somewhat low grade compared to most schools. I agree with you about grade inflation - it sucks. However, grad school is a completely different game than undergrad.

[edtost]

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One of my professors got a call from Princeton (compsci) about a student whose references were fantastic but his GPA "just wasn't quite there". He had a 3.8, putting him easily in the top 5% of his class and top 2-3% for his major.

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given that most courses at Princeton are curved around a B+, and the Compsci department historically gives out one of the lowest percentage of A's of all our departments, I find this very hard to believe.

[phil_ivey_fan]

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Upper-level courses are graded on a different scale. If you get a C, that's terrible and you really have some explaining to do. At least in the UM aerospace program, the grades were pretty much A, A-, and B+ with the occasional A+. Anything below B+ looks really bad.

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agreed. the higher and more focused you go, typically the only people who are there are the ones that want to be (there are the exceptions every once in a while). And its even more so like this in grad school. if you get a 'C' in a class, you likely will have to repeat it.

[theBruiser500]

Also the people get smarter and smarter. It's interesting to compare intelligences of different people from classes like physics for physics majors to freshmen english writing to labor 190A. Like I just went to get tutored in Spanish and met a cool person, and in the umass anti war club I joined the people there are extremely smart, versus the soccer I play where the people are nice (well at least half of them are most days) but maybe they are not as bright.