Flame Free Confession III: Even More Flame Free (Part 2)

I will leave this here

George Kennedy wins Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

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What in the fuck does this even mean?
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*meanwhile, in California*

It means the lazy students get the same score as hard working students in the name of ā€œequityā€

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I confess that I would unironically adopt this kind of system if I ever become a prof.

From my perspective, there’s no reason I should make my class difficult considering that I’d most likely be teaching gen eds, grad students and or MBAs.

The students who care of the materials can come of office hours and talk about research

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Then in the name of Socialism, I too shall, aim for the lowest passing score :+1:

You wouldn’t be making it difficult; it’s the same class regardless of scoring method. The real difference is who excels in it and who doesn’t.

Some of us have lives that need tending to - outside the institution. Our grades can still reflect this without having to suck our professors’ ass.

Thanks for the easy 4.0GPA though

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Why are we acting like pass/fail classes are something new? Or am I missing something?

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This is the first class I’ve had in my ~110 credits completed that doesn’t have a letter grade.

I thought the hippy-dippy feel-good grading was supposed to stay out of the STEM field.

that’s the idea. I shouldn’t be the one placing stress from grades. The ones who are interested will learn.
but for the engineering major taking econ 101 as a gen ed, it frankly isn’t important. Having a good grade matters more than learning how to shift supply and demand. For the econ majors, most of them already know this info

If i were to be teaching a phd class, ANYTHING that adds non- research related stress should be minimised and tbh, a lot of the profs who teach phd classes already adopt the philosophy of the grading structure above.

If I were teaching MBAs or someone like you, there’s NO reason for me to add stress. make it as easy as possible to pass so you guys can get on with more important things.

THe quality of teaching is the same. THose who learn are the ones who are motivated to/need to

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I understand.
For gen ed classes that are unrelated to STEM can be pass/fail without my criticism.

But the ones that are directly pertinent to my degree path should be A-F graded. What other criteria would they even consider when perusing Masters/PhD applicants, outside of GPA?

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For me, the worst part of school IS the grading. I hate it.

I might be the exception, but I spent 6-10hrs a week attempting to do the problem sets of a phd class I was auditing last semester and spent over 20 hours working on assignments that I really didn’t need to do in another class a year ago

having easy classes with lenient profs has allowed me to prioritise the material I was interested in and do much more research

research experience

GPA and scores on qualifying exams are quite a poor predictors of research ability

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also agree, but most graduate+ programs have specific GPA requirements, no?

^I could be wrong here as I’m not close enough to worry about it, but this is my understanding.

I hate cloudy cold weather, all it does is make me wanna sleep and do nothing.

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not explicitly, but it can matter and does depend on the programme.

hard sciences (physics, bio, engineering etc) tend to be more lax about UG GPA

social sciences (econ, psych, sociology) are a bit stricter. They generally want 3.7+. With economics, it’s getting increasingly difficult to get in straight out of UG. Most ppl now need to do 1-2 years of full time research assistantship or work at the Fed

Business school are in the middle, 3.5+ but work experience or masters are HIGHLY recommended. Of the programmes I’m looking into, none have taken anyone straight out of UG in the past 4 years or so. The exception is Marketing, which is more permissive to going straight out

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Ahh okay.

I had a different impression from my friends, but maybe it’s a case of 3.8 instead of 4.0

Also, does it matter based on school?

I can get away with a lower GPA and test scores bc of my letter writers and bc my school is know for being particularly rigourous. Idk how it works in hard sciences

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No. I’m exaggerating

Most of my friends going into hard sciences have between 3 and 3.6. There’s one really OP guy with a 3.9

That’s much lower than what the Econ programmes expect. Competitive applicants have 3.8+ with A in real analysis, econometrics, proof based linear algebra and 1-2 advanced statistics courses. The really strong ones have A in 1-3 Econ grad classes

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For STEM PhD programs, high-quality research experience and letters of recommendation trump undergraduate GPA. That is not to say that the latter is not a factor. But if GPA were really that important, then 1. I would not be in my current program, and 2. many students who are unprepared to conduct high-quality research would matriculate into such programs.

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I dunno. This convo is way above my level of education BUT…

There was this douchey wanna be manufacturing engineering kid at a place I worked that just used to cry at the Dean and threaten to pull his student loan money until his grade was changed.

And that was supposedly a pretty decent university.

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My advisors are encouraging me to applying to a social decision neuroscience programme. there’s a very slim chance that UG app experience repeats itself and I actually end up there.

THe programme is interesting and I’m interested in this, but it feels so strange to think that I could actually be doing it

My wife bought an ā€œorthopedic mattressā€ with some kind of topper and I’ve been waking up with pain at my mid back area so bad I can’t even turn sideways.

I confess I really have zero idea why. It makes no sense. The pain goes away in a couple of hours.

I don’t get ANY pain sleeping on my recliner nor the sofa and this mattress doesn’t feel much different from others. The top is supposed to be some kind of latex and foam combination. Underneath it is just normal pocketed spring mattress that’s like 7 out of 10 in terms of firmness. I turned it around since only one side has the latex/foam topper and it’s almost the same.

Anyone knows what the hell’s the problem lol?