Low Attendance, Inattentiveness, Good Grades

There's a post at Powerline by Paul Miringoff about a curious amalgam of frequent absence, lackadaisical classroom conduct and terrific grades earned by Dartmouth students, as described by his own daughter's bewildering experience as an undergraduate there. Although she herself was diligent and conscientious about class attendance and academic assignments, a significant number of her peers apparently were not: they attended class infrequently and played computer games or sent text messages when they did. And they also received very satisfactory grades, as they apparently expected to. Why is that? According to Miringoff, the unholy combination of an increasingly indulgent K-12 experience - which often allows students to sleep or use their cell phones during class sessions - and the rampant college grade inflation which accomodates a heady sense of entitlment virtually assures such students that they needn't worry. And, as I'm sure many readers could affirm, Dartmouth is hardly an isolated example; this seems to be the standard script at academic instituions across the board, whether Ivy League Universities or community colleges. Students see themselves as customers, and they're often enough treated as such. If there's a solution to this problem, I'm afraid that it's far more elusive than curricular reform.