Seoul National University students are "brighter" than Harvard students.

Phokus

Lifer
Nov 20, 1999
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Originally posted by: Passions
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200504/200504270009.html


BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWAHAHAHAHAHHAA.

WHAT. A. JOKE.

SNU is considered Korea's Harvard, but this is ludicrious.

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVARRRRRD is the finest and most refined learning institution in the WORLD, where little children all over the world can only dream of attending. PERIOD!

I've met harvard students as well as oxford/cambridge students. Oxford/Cambridge students are smarter.
 

Phokus

Lifer
Nov 20, 1999
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Originally posted by: mercanucaribe
Didn't you read the article? She says SNU sucks.


This is probably why passions couldn't get into harvard ;)
 

thelanx

Diamond Member
Jul 3, 2000
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Awesome, a completely arbitrary opinion presented by one person with no evidence whatsoever and potentially full of bias. It must be true!!! :confused:
 
Feb 10, 2000
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I tend to think any of several high-tier public universities (e.g., Michigan, Texas, Berkeley, Wisconsin) probably offer educations that are of a similar caliber to Ivy League schools, minus the grade inflation. IMO the big thing with Ivy League schools (as with universities in Japan) is getting in; once you're there, it's not particularly taxing.

I'll also observe that public schools are generally free of the kind of cronyism that gets marginal students into high-end private schools (by way of illustration, President Bush, a "C" student at Yale undergrad, even under a grade-inflated system, was turned down by UT law school prior to enrolling at Harvard Business School).

I do think, however, that it's silly to refer to Harvard as "third rate," when it's clearly one of the world's most respected schools; the diploma alone confers tremendous benefits in terms of employability. My father went to Harvard 43 years ago, and it's amazing how people still genuflect to his alma mater when he deals with them in business and politics.
 

Phokus

Lifer
Nov 20, 1999
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Originally posted by: DonVito
I tend to think any of several high-tier public universities (e.g., Michigan, Texas, Berkeley, Wisconsin) probably offer educations that are of a similar caliber to Ivy League schools, minus the grade inflation. IMO the big thing with Ivy League schools (as with universities in Japan) is getting in; once you're there, it's not particularly taxing.

I'll also observe that public schools are generally free of the kind of cronyism that gets marginal students into high-end private schools (by way of illustration, President Bush, a "C" student at Yale undergrad, even under a grade-inflated system, was turned down by UT law school prior to enrolling at Harvard Business School).

That's not really true, places like cornell and yale are VERY competetive. I had a friend from cornell who said that you could score a 91 on a test, but end up with a C because the classes were so competetive, all the grades were curved down.

However, harvard is an exception, like i said above, harvard is a third rate school (all hype), half the students get A's.
 

thelanx

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Jul 3, 2000
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Originally posted by: Phokus
And personally, i consider harvard to be third rate... they've had a grade inflation scandal for decades:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1133702

Everyone that i've talked to that's gone to harvard has confirmed this. There's aboslutely no competition there.

Dude get your facts straight, that article is from 2001, and it says grades have risen over the past 10 years, not over decades. Plus, they've taken many steps to reduce grade inflation since 2000, and nowadays grade inflation isn't nearly as much of a problem. You have no idea how hard ppl work there for their grades, the level of performance expected there is quite high, especially for the math and sciences. Sure they might get slightly higher grades than the average college student, but that's because as a whole they perform at a higher level than students at your local community college and/or state party school.
 

Phokus

Lifer
Nov 20, 1999
22,994
779
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Originally posted by: thelanx
Originally posted by: Phokus
And personally, i consider harvard to be third rate... they've had a grade inflation scandal for decades:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1133702

Everyone that i've talked to that's gone to harvard has confirmed this. There's aboslutely no competition there.

Dude get your facts straight, that article is from 2001, and it says grades have risen over the past 10 years, not over decades. Plus, they've taken many steps to reduce grade inflation since 2000, and nowadays grade inflation isn't nearly as much of a problem. You have no idea how hard ppl work there for their grades, the level of performance expected there is quite high, especially for the math and sciences. Sure they might get slightly higher grades than the average college student, but that's because as a whole they perform at a higher level than students at your local community college and/or state party school.

The grade inflation was instituted at harvard (and many other schools) ever since the late 60's and 70's in order to help harvard students avoid the draft, IIRC. The other schools stopped this policy of grade inflation after the vietnam war was over, but for some odd reason, harvard continued it.
 

thelanx

Diamond Member
Jul 3, 2000
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Originally posted by: Phokus
Originally posted by: thelanx
Originally posted by: Phokus
And personally, i consider harvard to be third rate... they've had a grade inflation scandal for decades:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1133702

Everyone that i've talked to that's gone to harvard has confirmed this. There's aboslutely no competition there.

Dude get your facts straight, that article is from 2001, and it says grades have risen over the past 10 years, not over decades. Plus, they've taken many steps to reduce grade inflation since 2000, and nowadays grade inflation isn't nearly as much of a problem. You have no idea how hard ppl work there for their grades, the level of performance expected there is quite high, especially for the math and sciences. Sure they might get slightly higher grades than the average college student, but that's because as a whole they perform at a higher level than students at your local community college and/or state party school.

The grade inflation was instituted at harvard (and many other schools) ever since the late 60's and 70's in order to help harvard students avoid the draft, IIRC. The other schools stopped this policy of grade inflation after the vietnam war was over, but for some odd reason, harvard continued it.

Like I said, that may be been true in 2000, but not anymore. Besides by your logic, if Harvard was a third rate school how come it is still turning out so many successful people and is so respected? Obviously the level of education, regardless of whether grading is inflated or not (since this is a point of debate), is very high.
 

Phokus

Lifer
Nov 20, 1999
22,994
779
126
Originally posted by: thelanx
Originally posted by: Phokus
Originally posted by: thelanx
Originally posted by: Phokus
And personally, i consider harvard to be third rate... they've had a grade inflation scandal for decades:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1133702

Everyone that i've talked to that's gone to harvard has confirmed this. There's aboslutely no competition there.

Dude get your facts straight, that article is from 2001, and it says grades have risen over the past 10 years, not over decades. Plus, they've taken many steps to reduce grade inflation since 2000, and nowadays grade inflation isn't nearly as much of a problem. You have no idea how hard ppl work there for their grades, the level of performance expected there is quite high, especially for the math and sciences. Sure they might get slightly higher grades than the average college student, but that's because as a whole they perform at a higher level than students at your local community college and/or state party school.

The grade inflation was instituted at harvard (and many other schools) ever since the late 60's and 70's in order to help harvard students avoid the draft, IIRC. The other schools stopped this policy of grade inflation after the vietnam war was over, but for some odd reason, harvard continued it.

Like I said, that may be been true in 2000, but not anymore. Besides by your logic, if Harvard was a third rate school how come it is still turning out so many successful people and is so respected? Obviously the level of education, regardless of whether grading is inflated or not (since this is a point of debate), is very high.

Read this article:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/2002/02/08/edtwof2.htm (this is from 2002)

Really smart students probably deserve really high grades. Moreover, tough graders could alienate their students. Plus, tough grading makes a student less likely to get into graduate school, which could make Harvard look bad in college rankings.

...


The report sifts through several possible causes for the inflated grades. Among them:

A holdover practice from the 1960s, when professors knew that F's triggered a draft notice and a trip to Vietnam.

An influx of more students, including some minorities, who are less prepared for college work. Grading leniency is believed to encourage their continued academic participation and promote self-esteem.

Evaluation systems in which students grade professors, thereby providing an incentive for teachers to go easy on their future evaluators.

An explosion in the number of overburdened adjunct professors who lack the time to evaluate each student more accurately.

The authors of the report cast doubt on several of those explanations, including the influx of minorities. They barely touch on an obvious explanation offered by several professors: Families paying more than $30,000 a year for a college education expect something more for their money than a report card full of gentleman's Cs.

More important than the reasons for inflated grades is the impact they have.

When all students receive high marks, graduate schools and business recruiters simply start ignoring the grades. That leads the graduate schools to rely more on entrance tests. It prompts corporate recruiters to depend on a "good old boy/girl" network in an effort to unearth the difference between who looks good on paper and who is actually good.

Put to disadvantage in that system are students who traditionally don't test as well or lack connections. In many cases, those are the poor and minority students who are the first in their families to graduate from college. No matter how hard they work, their A's look ordinary.

I think that explains why there are so many successful people who get out of harvard.
 

bigj3347

Senior member
Sep 19, 2004
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Frankly, I don't really care which university is better. However, I am getting tired of all this national pride coming from these Koreans. Don't get me wrong, I think its great being proud of your country and your roots but I think Korea has taken it too far. Death threats to American Olympic athletes becasue a Korean was disqualified? Anti-US demonstrations after all the US has done to keep them from communist rule? Absolute adoration for their major league ballplayers even though they absolutely blow? Byung Hyun Kim immediately comes to mind, followed by Chan Ho Park. Kim's got like an 100+ something ERA for the Rockies this year as a reliever and Koreans I know still refuse to say that he just simply sucks. I think Korea's got a serious inferiority complex and constantly needs to say its better than America in whatever just so it can feel better about itself.
 

tami

Lifer
Nov 14, 2004
11,588
3
81
Originally posted by: Passions
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWAHAHAHAHAHHAA.

WHAT. A. JOKE.

SNU is considered Korea's Harvard, but this is ludicrious.

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVARRRRRD is the finest and most refined learning institution in the WORLD, where little children all over the world can only dream of attending. PERIOD!

are you angry?
 

Passions

Diamond Member
Feb 17, 2000
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0
Originally posted by: tami
Originally posted by: Passions
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWAHAHAHAHAHHAA.

WHAT. A. JOKE.

SNU is considered Korea's Harvard, but this is ludicrious.

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVARRRRRD is the finest and most refined learning institution in the WORLD, where little children all over the world can only dream of attending. PERIOD!

are you angry?

no. are you?
 

BigJ

Lifer
Nov 18, 2001
21,330
1
81
Originally posted by: Attrox
Originally posted by: halik
Originally posted by: J0hnny
America > *.*

you mean

america > *

theres are no countries that have . (periods) in their name...

J0hnny just got pwned!

Maybe he was making a reference to Asians, with the * portraying the stereotypical squinty eyes?
 

konakona

Diamond Member
May 6, 2004
6,285
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Originally posted by: bigj3347
Frankly, I don't really care which university is better. However, I am getting tired of all this national pride coming from these Koreans. Don't get me wrong, I think its great being proud of your country and your roots but I think Korea has taken it too far. Death threats to American Olympic athletes becasue a Korean was disqualified? Anti-US demonstrations after all the US has done to keep them from communist rule? Absolute adoration for their major league ballplayers even though they absolutely blow? Byung Hyun Kim immediately comes to mind, followed by Chan Ho Park. Kim's got like an 100+ something ERA for the Rockies this year as a reliever and Koreans I know still refuse to say that he just simply sucks. I think Korea's got a serious inferiority complex and constantly needs to say its better than America in whatever just so it can feel better about itself.

there are many koreans who still appreciate what US has done to deter the communist expansion; however younger post-war generation cant really relate to that as much it seems. history proves time and again it is always completely insiginificant events that ignite a gruesome war or catastrophic clashe between nations/people/etc. wihtout having much knowledge of what the relation between US and Korea has been in past decades, i can see how you are quick to jump to the conclusion that those people were overreacting about the sporting events. US has admittedely supported a dictatorship that massacred on its own people (not really a surprise, must be a part of us foreign policy all over the world), and there have been countless accounts of atrocities commited by US troops that go unpunished. also, there are some military pacts - clearly obsolte but still in effect - such as korea (south) cannot develop any missiles with range greater 200km. as democracy settled down in rapidly growing korea, koreans started yearning for more sovereignty with less US influence (or interference, you could say), which is only natural if you think about it.

as for baseball, no matter how bad your numbers are, just staying in the league is a feat of its own when MLB is considered to be cream of the crop.

SNU sux, but the students there are extremely well qualified, if academic aptitude is the only measuring stick. throughout their high schoool days, they would literally spend 4-5 hours per day on non-academic activities including eating, sleeping and whatnot.