For many years, students at elite business schools have prohibited themselves from disclosing their grades to recruiters. Of the top ten full-time MBA programs in Bloomberg Businessweek’s 2010 ranking, seven have or had some form of grade nondisclosure. These aren’t the dictates of some secrecy-obsessed dean; these are self-imposed bans. At those schools and many others, the class has voted to implement a policy, and it’s up individual students to honor it. Most do, and recruiters, while they’re not big fans, generally go along.
The idea behind these policies was that by freeing students from the tyranny of grades they would encourage students to take more challenging courses and play nice with each other, fostering an environment of cooperation in what might otherwise be a cutthroat competition for grades and jobs.
Turns out that’s a load of hooey, at least according to a new study by the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Daniel Gottlieb and Kent Smetters, two professors at Wharton, where grade nondisclosure has long been a point of contention between students and faculty, report that the “levels of curriculum effort” found in student surveys conducted in the wake of nondisclosure policies show the policies didn’t help, and may have even hurt….
Find out more at http://www.businessweek.com/bschools/blogs/mba_admissions/archives/2011/10/should_top_b-schools_disclose_grades.html
No comments:
Post a Comment