Harvard U: Inflating Your Grades Since The FIRST Bush Administration

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

grade inflation3

Working on today’s show, and the astonishing “Everybody Gets A Cupcake” mentality in which the most common college grade today is an “A”—I ran across this article on grade inflation at America’s most pompous institute of self-important learning:

This is Harvard’s dirty, little secret: Since the Vietnam era, rampant grade inflation has made its top prize for students — graduating with honors – - virtually meaningless.

Last June, a record 91 percent of Harvard students graduated summa, magna, or cum laude, far more than at Yale (51 percent), Princeton (44 percent) and other elite universities, a Globe study has found.

While the world regards these students as the best of the best of America’s 13 million undergraduates, Harvard honors has actually become the laughingstock of the Ivy League. The other Ivies see Harvard as the Lake Wobegon [sic] of higher education, where all the students, being above average, can take honors for granted.

It takes just a B-minus average in the major subject to earn cum laude — no sweat at a school where 51 percent of the grades last year were A’s and A- minuses.

What makes this story special? Check the dateline: “Sunday, October 14, 2001”

And you wonder why college degrees cost more than ever, and are worth less than ever.

Then again, Harvard HAD to lower their standards. How else to explain “Professor” Elizabeth Warren?

Oh and don’t hold your breath waiting for Obama’s grades to be posted any time soon. Try telling your college graduates that they don’t need to tell their prospective employers what their grades were…. or perhaps prefacing that comment with….I can’t remember college because of the drug-induced stupor. I bet that will distinguish them from the other job applicants.