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Title: Obama's Years at Columbia Are a Mystery - He Graduated Without Honors
Source: [None]
URL Source: http://www.nysun.com/new-york/obama ... -columbia-are-a-mystery/85015/
Published: Sep 8, 2008
Author: ROSS GOLDBERG,
Post Date: 2008-09-08 21:26:36 by Jethro Tull
Keywords: None
Views: 1508
Comments: 93

Obama's Years at Columbia Are a Mystery

He Graduated Without Honors

By ROSS GOLDBERG, Special to the Sun | September 2, 2008

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Senator Obama's life story, from his humble roots, to his rise to Harvard Law School, to his passion as a community organizer in Chicago, has been at the center of his presidential campaign. But one chapter of the tale remains a blank — his education at Columbia College, a place he rarely speaks about and where few people seem to remember him.

Contributing to the mystery is the fact that nobody knows just how well Mr. Obama, unlike Senator McCain and most other major candidates for the past two elections, performed as a student.

The Obama campaign has refused to release his college transcript, despite an academic career that led him to Harvard Law School and, later, to a lecturing position at the University of Chicago. The shroud surrounding his experience at Columbia contrasts with that of other major party nominees since 2000, all whom have eventually released information about their college performance or seen it leaked to the public.

For better or worse, voters have taken an interest in candidates' grades since 1999, when the New Yorker published President Bush's transcript at Yale and disclosed that he was a C student. Mr. Bush had never portrayed himself as a brain, but many were surprised to learn the next year that his opponent, Vice President Gore, did not do much better at Harvard despite his intellectual image. When Senator Kerry's transcript surfaced, reporters found that he actually had a slightly lower average at Yale than Mr. Bush did.

Some political observers cite such disclosures as proof that candidates' intelligence cannot be judged solely by their political careers or the schools they attended. Grades provide a rare measure of intellect that is immune to political spin, proponents say.

"We like to pretend IQ doesn't matter, but it really does with a lot of jobs, including the presidency," a professor at Smith College who studies the effects of human intelligence on the economy, James Miller, said. "We can't trust the information that candidates give us, so it's important to look for objective data that they can't falsify or distort."

Mr. Miller acknowledged that Mr. Obama displayed academic achievement at Harvard, where he graduated magna cum laude and led the Harvard Law Review. Still, Mr. Miller said, he would like to see information about how Mr. Obama performed in various subjects at Columbia.

That view is not shared by other election observers, including some who have themselves indulged the public's interest in candidates' academic records. One of them is Geoffrey Kabaservice, a political historian who in 2000 published Senator Bradley's relatively low score of 485 on the verbal SAT. Mr. Bradley, a Rhodes Scholar who was a star basketball player at Princeton, was running for the Democratic presidential nomination.

"It's awfully hard to correlate anything, really, about a person on the basis of their grades," Mr. Kabaservice said, explaining that he published Mr. Bradley's score to highlight limitations in intelligence testing. He said he doubted that candidates' grades have affected the outcome of any recent presidential elections.

"For people who didn't like George W. Bush, for example, the grade aspect only confirmed what they thought about him," Mr. Kabaservice said. "And for everybody else, it made him more of a regular guy."

The Obama campaign declined to comment for this article and did not offer an explanation for why his transcript has not been released. But observers speculated that one reason might be the racially charged nature of the election. Mr. Obama has acknowledged benefiting from affirmative action in the past, and details about his academic performance might open him up to critics eager to accuse him, probably unfairly, of receiving a free ride, Mr. Kabaservice said.

"Anyone who is a minority and who's come up partially through the meritocracy — getting into good colleges, and subsequently good law schools — is going to come under suspicion that there was some kind of affirmative action boost," he said. "I suspect this is an area of discomfort for Obama."

In contrast with the rest of Mr. Obama's life story, little is known about his college experience. He attended Occidental College in Los Angeles for two years before transferring to Columbia in 1981. The move receives only a mention in Mr. Obama's 1995 memoir, "Dreams from My Father," which instead devotes that chapter to his impressions of race and class struggles in New York.

An article in a Columbia University publication, Columbia College Today, reported that Mr. Obama has portrayed Columbia as a period of buckling down following a troubled adolescence. He did not socialize much, he has said, instead spending a lot of time in the library, "like a monk." He has also stated that he was involved to some extent with the Black Students Organization.

Federal law limits the information that Columbia can release about Mr. Obama's time there. A spokesman for the university, Brian Connolly, confirmed that Mr. Obama spent two years at Columbia College and graduated in 1983 with a major in political science. He did not receive honors, Mr. Connolly said, though specific information on his grades is sealed. A program from the 1983 graduation ceremony lists him as a graduate.

More is known about Mr. McCain's experience at the United States Naval Academy, where he was a self-described troublemaker and graduated in the bottom 1% of his class. The McCain campaign has declined to release his transcript, saying that his performance at the academy can only be viewed in the context of his larger military career.

"His record stands on its own," a McCain spokesman, Peter Feldman, said. "His time spent in college was part of the transformative years that made him who he was."

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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 85.

#1. To: Jethro Tull (#0)

Okay, let's compare 'Obama graduated without honors' with 'McCain graduated at the very bottom of his class'.

But the headline is 'Obama did not graduate at the top of his class?' How stupid is that?

a vast rightwing conspirator  posted on  2008-09-08   21:43:50 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#3. To: a vast rightwing conspirator (#1)

It's not about class rank, it's about more unanswered questions.

Jethro Tull  posted on  2008-09-08   21:58:02 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#5. To: Jethro Tull (#3)

All you need to know is this?

Obama displayed academic achievement at Harvard, where he graduated magna cum laude and led the Harvard Law Review. That puts him in the top 10% of his law class at one of the top 2 law schools in the U.S.

My UGPA was 3.83 (Computer Science/minors in math, economics polysci -yes it took me 5 years to get thru all the hours) and I scored at the 90% percentile on the LSAT. I applied to Harvard as my "dream school" and I wasn't even considered. I did get accepted to the Univ of Mich, AZ State U, Texas but was denied by Harvard, Stanford and Berkeley.

Since I was already married and had 2 children at that time and you were not allowed to work while attending L.S. I opted to go the Masters route.

bush_is_a_moonie  posted on  2008-09-08   22:06:24 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#34. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#5)

Obama displayed academic achievement at Harvard, where he graduated magna cum laude and led the Harvard Law Review. That puts him in the top 10% of his law class at one of the top 2 law schools in the U.S.

No, it doesn't.

Magna Cum Laude at Harvard means a 3.3 to 3.5 GPA if you take the thesis option. If you take the non-thesis option, you don't get honors no matter what.

Summa Cum Laude at Harvard means a 3.5+ GPA.

That is all honors at Harvard mean. Period.

mirage  posted on  2008-09-08   23:31:45 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#38. To: mirage (#34)

Harvard Law School recognizes the achievement of attaining and maintaining high grades through graduation honors. 10% of class graduates magna cum laude with a GPA slightly above an A-minus (roughly the equivalent of a 3.72) or higher; the next 30% graduates cum laude with a GPA between a B+ and an A-minus (roughly the equivalent of a 3.55 or higher)

bush_is_a_moonie  posted on  2008-09-08   23:49:02 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#57. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#38)

Harvard Law School recognizes the achievement of attaining and maintaining high grades through graduation honors.

Yes, but the 3.3 is per one of the profs there for Magna Cum Laude.

mirage  posted on  2008-09-09   9:48:35 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#59. To: mirage (#57)

Yes, but the 3.3

My god.

angle  posted on  2008-09-09   9:49:40 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#62. To: angle (#59)

Sorry....I know the place too well. Four generations of Harvard grads and professors here.

mirage  posted on  2008-09-09   9:51:42 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#66. To: mirage (#62)

What I posted came directly from the Harvard Law School. Now do I believe what they post on their law school site or you? I think you know who I believe.

bush_is_a_moonie  posted on  2008-09-09   10:02:37 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#73. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#66)

What I posted came directly from the Harvard Law School. Now do I believe what they post on their law school site or you? I think you know who I believe.

I believe what I know for a number of reasons.

1) In the 1980s and up until the late 1990s, many schools at Harvard didn't even give grades.
2) Harvard changed their honors system within the last three years.
3) When did you get your data and when did Obama graduate so which system did he graduate under? Do you even know?

I await your response to #3.

mirage  posted on  2008-09-09   20:45:44 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#75. To: mirage (#73)

Don't waste my time. It is obvious you know very little about Harvard or you applied there and was rejected.

bush_is_a_moonie  posted on  2008-09-09   20:57:42 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#82. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#75)

It is obvious you know very little about Harvard

Its obvious you don't know much about anything but claim an outdated internet reference is how Harvard has always done things.

Do some real research. Learn something about the place.

In 1966, 22% of Harvard undergraduate students earned A's. By 1996, that figure rose to 46%. That same year, 82% of Harvard seniors graduated with honors.

So much for what you THINK you know. Eight of ten graduate with honors? Golly gee, so much for "top ranked" and that's just the undergrads!

What about Columbia or other places?

In a study for the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, former Harvard Dean Henry Rosovosky found that in 1950 about 15 percent of Harvard students got a B+ or better. Today, it's nearly 70 percent. Last year 50 percent of the grades at Harvard were either A or A-, up from 22 percent in 1966, and 91 percent of seniors graduated with honors. Eighty percent of the grades at the University of Illinois are A's and B's, and 50 percent of Columbia students are on the Dean's List.

WOW! 50 percent are on the Dean's list? Talk about Grade Inflation!

Care to explain this?

mirage  posted on  2008-09-09   22:10:20 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#83. To: mirage (#82)

What does undergrad GPA have to do with their law school GPA?

bush_is_a_moonie  posted on  2008-09-09   22:11:48 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#85. To: bush_is_a_moonie (#83)

What does undergrad GPA have to do with their law school GPA?

Those are just a couple of articles I pulled up googling "harvard grade inflation" but the grade inflation, by 2000, had infected Harvard up and down.

Harvard set, as a policy, that the "average" grade would be a B+, not a C.

Here's another article from Purdue:

Two thirds of the graduates from Harvard Law School walk out with honors.

Wow, two thirds? Kinda blows up the thought that honors at Harvard Law are special.....

Keep learning, you're getting there.

mirage  posted on  2008-09-09   22:18:27 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


Replies to Comment # 85.

#87. To: mirage (#85)

That's right.. it doesn't have anything to do with the fact that those with the highest GPAs and SAT scores go to schools like Harvard, Yale etc. If they are getting better grades it can't be because they earn them. The school knows how smart they really are so they just give them the grades to keep them happy. Go back to FR where you are more at home.

bush_is_a_moonie  posted on  2008-09-09 22:22:00 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


End Trace Mode for Comment # 85.

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