Grade Disclosure

Wisconsin allows us to disclose our grades to prospective employers. We have a couple of companies that require specific GPA's, but the vast majority don't care. There are more important aspects to your application than your GPA.

There was news in BusinessWeek today that Harvard Business School has just changed their rules to allow grade disclosure. Students aren't happy about it. They say that it will discourage cooperation amongst students in favor of competition. Imagines that. Competition in a business school, whatever next. The one thing I don't get about the article is this section.

HBS students are graded on a scale of one to three. They receive a one for being in the top 15% to 20% of the class, a two for being in the middle 70%, and a three for being in the bottom 10%. Fear of falling into that lower 10% is one reason why some students suggest the rule change could discourage people from signing up for classes containing difficult subject matter.

I'm not sure how that would be the case. If your grade is determined on a bell curve, it shouldn't matter how difficult the subject is. 15-20% will get a 1 and 10% will get a 3 whatever happens. Surely what it will really do is to discourage people from signing up for classes full of very smart people. Although you'd think that would be all of them at Harvard.

3 Down, 2 To Go

Marketing down. 5 split-essay style questions.

• Segmentation and Targeting
• Pricing
• Channel Decisions
• New Product Development
• Promotions

I think I did OK. Nothing special though. With an arbitrary 25% class participation grade though your grade could be made to be whatever the lecturer wants it to be.

2 Down, 3 To Go

Accounting is finished. The exam was pretty much what I expected, but I knew more than I thought. There's an outside chance of an AB, but I'm still expecting a B. No chance of dropping below that into the no man's land that is BC or C.

1 Down, 4 To Go

Finished with Marketing Research now. I think I have an AB. It's difficult to tell though as the lecturer is a really high grader and 20% of the grade is on class participation.

Accounting finishes in about... 90 minutes. The final exam is at 9:30. I'm pretty set for a B in that class I think, but we'll see.

The Marketing final is on Friday, I'd have to screw that up not to get an A. Finance is on Monday, and then our Data Analysis presentation and report is on Tuesday. B and AB in those classes I think.