How good were you at college?

I started out thinking that grades weren't everything, but then when I got my first A+'s I realized that really learning material dead was a terrific thing educationally. I was also greatly swayed by the fact that this could earn me scholarships. These scholarships ended up paying for me the whole way -- I couldn't get an entrance scholarship because I never went to highschool.<p>I could choose my classes so that the material would be generally useful, by moving into a combined honors, or interdisciplinary degree. I tried really hard, and eventually people started coming to me for tutoring. I taught a few classes, professors asked if I wanted to work with them, and eventually I graduated with the university medal.<p>One thing that I never gave up on was the idea that you can turn anything from an 'assignment' into a really educational experience by going above and beyond. In math assignments, prove auxiliary theorems, and the general case. Always do the bonus problems. For projects, release on Sourceforge. Write essays to please an online audience. For new projects that would be better in a different language, learn the new language. Learn everything from first principles, and when something looks wrong, bring it up. Do all the readings, and read the original works. Program in programming contests. Program for fun. Program as reflex. Don't ask permission to do research. Live in Libraries. Play games with smart people. Give talks. Teach. Publish. Learn.<p>University, for many people, seemed to involve a lot of rote learning, but I seem to have avoided that substantially. I loved my years in college.

I had an A average -- I could have had an A+ average, but I was too busy {publishing research papers, calculating the quadrillionth bit of Pi, writing the Putnam, playing violin in symphony orchestras} and knew that with the rest of my academic record, nobody would care if I had an A average or an A+ average.<p>I was right -- in the 7 years since I graduated it has been everything I did <i>in addition to taking classes</i> which has gotten me places, not my grades in the courses themselves. Every year, at every college in the world, there's someone who graduates with the highest GPA. If you want to make yourself stand out more than that -- to make the point that you are not just the best of your year, but the best of the decade -- you need something other than just GPA.

I got kicked out halfway through my Sophomore year for being on Academic Probation too long, and it's the best thing that ever happened to me. I wish it had happened sooner.<p>I have some kind of allergy to pointless busy work and institutional bullshit.<p>Anyway, I don't understand the point of the question... :)

I got 4.2 on a 5-point scale at MIT. I graduated in 1990.<p>Know what's interesting? You're the first person to ask me that, as far as I can recall.

Grades do not matter. Accomplishments matter. If you have no other accomplishments, grades will be the default accomplishment that you will be judged against for comparison. So really, you are in complete control of whether or not grades will matter. Of course this means applying yourself.<p>Likewise, your future degree has an expiration date. I would estimate about a year from walking. Your degree will start to smell if you have no accomplishments to back it up. Each year past graduation, the education section of your resume should be bumped farther down the page. Eventually, it should become a matter of whether or not you have room to include your education at all. Your education should become a trivia fact. A small talk subject before discussing what you have done.<p>PS: I am of the opinion that anyone completing a four-year degree with a 4.0 grade point average did not get their money's worth out of college.

I went to a state school with the mindset that:<p>1) It'd be cheaper<p>2) It's still a solid education that will get me a job<p>3) I would have time to party and work on my own projects, rather than be at the whim of a professor's latest epic dull assignment<p>The result? 3.7 GPA and have run a successful entertainment blog, have two Facebook apps with 550,000 users, and hopefully announcing my web startup in the next month.<p>Also have a job locked in at a top engineering company, should I choose to work for them.<p>Certainly not saying there weren't stressful times, just much less of them and far more time to enjoy what you really like to do.

I got pretty good grades but got really unlucky. In my 3 years at Duke(graduated early with triple major ECE, CS, Econ) I got all A+'s and one A. The A was in Mandarin 312 and it was because I got sick during finals week in my study abroad program in Beijing. So even if you do get good grades you might get sick like I did and it could totally ruin your transcript and making finding a job harder.So don't worry too much about grades--sometimes no matter how hard you try things beyond your control will decide the final outcome. Even with my A I ended up fine and was still able to get a Rhodes and a Fulbright. <p>And as long as you know how to manage your time you can get good grades and do fun things. My favorite part of college was not getting good grades--the best part was being student class president and winning the ACM-ICPC. I also enjoyed having the time to start a company that ended up getting acquired by Google. So make sure you measure your life, like you said, not by how good your grades are(I would be miserable if that's the case) but by the whole balance of your life.<p>

While doing my masters at CMU in robotics, the ideal grades, as proclaimed by the professors, were straight B-.<p>It meant you were actually doing your important your, your research, while still passing.<p>Research is what will get you into grad school. A big project is what could spinoff into a company, or at least teach you how to build big/real systems.

Not very. Marks anywhere from 40% to 85%. I started when I was fifteen and failed out in my fourth (last) year.<p>Went back part-time about 5 years later, and failed a compilers course after I decided to forgo the group, write the compiler myself, but got sidetracked leading bots in assault mode on Unreal Tournament.<p>I really learned how to study about 2 years ago. Sigh.<p>Spending too much time playing games was a major contributing factor. OTOH I now work in game-development.<p>I occasionally think about going back so I can some day get a post-grad degree, but don't relish being some profs biatch.<p>I have a university library-card, read theses and research papers, and generally do whatever I damn well want, while getting paid and hatching product ideas.

First college? Systems Analysis. I dropped out after one year because it seemed like total crap. I had a C average.<p> Second college? Business Administration. I dopped out after one year because I was getting a divorce. I had a 4.0 average.<p> I felt awful about lacking a college degree -- until managing my first PhD. He was an idiot. The second and third were worse. Really smart guys with an awful attitude.<p> Ever since then -- I keep asking myself what the point would be to go back? College was fun. I learned to play games by arbitrary rules some jerk set up. I would much rather learn all the time than play games.

I consistently got As in the most interesting classes: compilers, databases, abstract algebra, independent study, senior project. My overall GPA was only about a 3.4, though. And my GPA totally tanked in the final semester when I started persuing Y Combinator.

People who are programmers might not have as much respect for or interest in college, because C.S. tends to be a little watered down as far as standards go. If you want high standards, go into physics or math.<p>Probably confirming this general prejudice, I programmed a lot in high school, and I never thought grades had anything to do with intelligence or ability or willingness to work, because all the smart people I knew had bad grades. It annoyed me when people with good grades got into good colleges for not doing interesting things, so in undergrad I decided that I'd get perfect grades. I did that, majoring in math and physics, and switched back to C.S. for grad school. My adviser told me grades don't matter in grad school, so I've now gone back to ignoring grades.<p>I'm in grad school at the moment. I'm sure I have a lot of learning to do, as far as what different groups of people think of all this grading information. I mostly just look at it as a proof that I'm willing to teach myself, learn, and occasionally work, so it seems frustratingly tedious to me, as I already know the answers to these questions. Since perhaps middle school, with the exception of graduate school, I've disliked much of school because I don't like being taught, as compared with being given enough freedom to teach myself (gently guided exploration is my preference).<p>Grad school is fun if it's your cup of tea.<p>Despite having extremely limited information on the subject of how grades change job prospects, I think people worry too much about grades. If you get the perfect white collar job after getting perfect grades then chances are you will still be unhappy unless it is a good fit for you. A college degree is the access card to the academic and corporate systems, so it's an important constraint, and nothing to casually dismiss or yawn at. And grades are part of that. But rational, informed decisions can be made to not go to college, or to not get good grades, depending on one's interests. For example, the corporate side of the world doesn't interest me at all, and I have the nagging feeling that in undergrad I really should've been exploring what I wanted to do with my life more instead of spending four years trying to get good grades.<p>The bottom line is that I'm not convinced that careers and that ordering them the way that everyone tells me to will necessarily give me happiness. When in doubt, ignore everyone else and listen to oneself, but first maximize your information by reading lots of good books on the subject of grades and careers, and also be rational and don't overly discount the worth of your future time; realize that grades are a part of the union card for corporate America and the academic world.

One of my CS professors said something along the lines of A students generally go forward and get masters and phds, B students go out and build the stuff that changes the world

I got a lot worse at college after I learned a D- was a passing grade in Pitt's School of Engineering.

As other people have mentioned, doing well in college is more about learning a lot and doing research than getting good grades. With this in mind, I think doing well in college can be important for a couple of reasons:<p>1) You should try to learn as much as you can. <p>2) Grad school. If you decide you want to go to grad school, it's important to have good grades and more importantly research experience.<p>3) Employment. Grades / research experience may not matter for a startup, but I think it does help with getting your foot in the door with big tech companies like Microsoft, Google, etc.<p>Only 1) matters as far as start ups are concerned, but it's good to keep options open. Your interests may change (I'm only 23, and my interests have changed a few times already).

I was pretty bad at college and high school. But I did get the highest grade in the class in one class, it was where there was direct competition between everyone else for the grades. So I thought, in law school every class is a competition for grades. So I went. My grades were really good!<p>Do the grades matter? Not really, but it is always nice to go out on top. So what I am saying is that I recommend, for you, to do the last year or the last semester really well and get all A's. Then for the rest of your life you can say that you finished school on top.

Er, why do you care?<p>Make sure you do lots of extra-curricular work that you enjoy, and that's difficult. If your grades aren't great, you can show off projects to get jobs. If you want to make your own job, grow it out of your projects.<p>I failed out of school, and I'm an inconsistent employee at best, but I only know a couple of people who work harder than I do, and they're all business owners.

Answer for this question is different based on location. If you are in US then degree is not that important as there are many people in US at higher post - based on knowledge rather than degree but if you are in country like India then degree matters because you won't even get chance for interview without good degree..

I'm not doing well in college at the moment. The assignments are just too boring (Perl database-connected survey, ncurses/conio wrapper library in C &#38; C++, business analysis crap with UML diagrams and Rational Rose (yuck)).<p>I looked at the curriculum (<a href="http://warp.senecac.on.ca/bsd/courses.aspx" rel="nofollow">http://warp.senecac.on.ca/bsd/courses.aspx</a>) for my program today and it looks like the majority of courses are business oriented. One major project + an internship do not sound very appealing.<p>I'm not sure what else to do though :(

A in music, all over the place in Csci. Grades depended largely on how much attention I gave to the class, and how much miscellaneous administrative bull I had to deal with

What's the scale on the grades you people are giving? From F to A, 0 to 4, I guess?<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_grading_in_North_America" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_grading_in_North_Ameri...</a><p>I had an average of 4.3 (on a scale from 1 to 5). I worked somewhat hard on the interesting courses and did quite well. I got my Masters degree "with distinction", as I also got a 5 for my thesis.

Actually I had a pretty bland uni life :D I spent most of my times in the CS labs learning things I was curious about but never had the common-sense to find a cofounder to start something with. Point of the story? Do a startup while in Uni. It is the best place to find co-founders! Plus you have very minimal costs (especially staying with your folks!)

3.4/4.0 at Brandeis university. I learned pretty early on that you take courses that both sound interesting and are taught by professors you like. If you find both then you enjoy doing the work as well as enjoy going to class. Once those two are taken care of you needn't worry too much about grades as they'll take care of themselves.

Georgia's HOPE scholarship requires that you keep a 3.0 GPA in order to receive free tuition.<p>My final GPA was 3.1. It is not a coincidence.

My freshman year sucked ass grade-wise. But I also had the most fun that year.<p>Sophomore year started off depressingly. Then my start-up took off and it was lots of fun. Funnily my grades improved a great deal between freshman year and sophomore year(even with the start-up).<p>That's how far I got before taking off. Hopefully I won't have to return anytime soon.

I sucked. My overall average was a 3.0, but that was made up of a lot of As, a lot of Cs, 2 Fs, and relatively few Bs. My terrible physics grades were counterbalanced by excellent CS grades (I only got less than an A on one CS course).

I went to all lectures, all tutorials and did everything as expected. Big deal.

3.5GPA<p>May sound cocky, but did not put forth a whole lot of effort in my classes. I put in enough to get a B (or an A if the class was interesting or easy) but 90% of my time (and learning) was spent working on my own projects.

Currently in my 2nd year with a B average. Content. I'd rather spend time working on projects than studying that much more.

flunked out.

3.8 GPA with 1 semester to go.

I had to stay in town but tried to go to the best university around. Studied three subjects, computer sci, math and economics, so I can learn as much as I can in terms of sciences and business ... it took me 5 years to finish it with the jobs I had ... for the first two years my grades varied I had good ones and bad ones (mostly Bs) ... but for the next three years I mostly got As specially on courses that mattered the most to me.<p>I also did an internship at a biotech company in Germany, worked with SAP for my university, got hired by one of my professors and helped him to write a book on astronomy, did a project with another professor on Six Sigma, and another project with a different professor on databases, worked at a gaming company (mostly R&#38;D) and did a few other projects on the side.<p>Thats mostly what I did during school ... but then graduated and decided to start my own company, which I did, and learned maybe more than ever ... and am now working on another project ....<p>so I am also not too clear about your question ... but what you want to do after college is also important, meaning if you want to do masters then you <i>must</i> try to get good grades, if you want to get a job then it depends on what kind of a job ... <p>but as a general rule I would say try to do your best ... if you don't do too well at the beginning try to pick it up and do better later on, people will notice that, they like to see you improve, specially during your senior years ... the better you do the more options you leave open for yourself. <p>I think undergrad mostly fills you up with the basics, so you can go and specialize on whatever you like after. But the most important thing you can take away from school is getting disciplined, and learning how to look for information and learn more when you need to. Getting good grades also means you have actually learned something from college. The worst is to go to college and get bad grades and the excuse being "my courses are boring," or something along those lines. Your marks might not be that important to everyone, but what you did with your life within those years would matter a lot to anyone that might be interested in you. <p>I don't mind when I hear people drop out and end up doing something, even if they don't make it big. At least they realized they don't want to waste their time with school and they have other ways of doing it.<p>Bottom line, having good grades <i>will never</i> hurt you no matter what you want to do. But if you don't have good grades then you must have other stuff to make up for it, or to replace it and sometimes you need to give a valid reason of why you don't have the grades.<p>Just remember that nothing is the final answer, and there is not one way that you can do it. Get creative and come up with other ways that can prove yourself.

You guys already know that high school doesn't matter, right?<p>College doesn't matter, either. You will discover this eventually.<p>Sure, it might seem important if trying to impress an <i>employer</i> right out of school, but that's still like waiting to be rewarded by Daddy -- much like the Christian religion, in which Celestial Dad is going to punish or reward you after you're <i>dead</i> -- there is no self-determination, only supplication. Everything depends on <i>pleasing</i>, or obeying, some other more powerful entity.<p>Take off the shackles and decide for yourself. Grades make zero difference for start-ups -- it's like Captain Jack Sparrow said, "The only rules that really matter are these: what a man can do, and what a man can't do."

If you have won a medal in the math or computer Olympiads in high school, then that would probably be more important than anything you do later as an undergrad in terms of grades.