Videographic: Grade inflation at Ivy League universities
All shall have prizes: An animated infographic showing grade inflation at Ivy League universities. All shall have prizes. Grade inflation at Ivy League universities. Sixty-five years ago the average grade at Harvard was around a C. Today it’s about an A. The same holds true at Yale. And at Dartmouth. Across America’s Ivy League, the data is patchy but the trend is unmissible. Grade point averages have risen -- steeply at first, and then gently. Certainly student quality has improved: the Ivies are no longer gentlemen’s clubs for rich dunderheads. But standards also seem to have loosened. Today, Brownies have it easiest, while Princetonians have to work a bit harder. Though the schools do not disclose the information, they have not contested it either. Maybe the so-called “excellent sheep” have lackadaisical shepherds. For more video content from The Economist visit our website: econ.st/1vJDt98
