334 THE PROB LEMS OF EDUCATION ARE NOT GE NE TIChas been encountered in every scholastic domain in which inquiries have
been conducted.”^25
Among employers there is now considerable uncertainty about whether
college grades predict potential in a job. Many will agree— and surveys
suggest— that GPA is a useful indicator of who can “hit the ground
running.” But, again, the correlation may be due to noncognitive factors.
J. Scott Armstrong has claimed that the relationship between grades and
job per for mance is low and is becoming lower in recent studies. He cites
research from a variety of occupations that suggests that those with
good college grades did no better in the job than those without.^26
Others are also skeptical. For example, Trudy Steinfeld, executive di-
rector of the Wasserman Center for Career Development at New York
University, has deplored the fi x on grade scores as longer- term predictors
of job per for mance: “Nobody even cares about G.P.A. aft er a few years,”
she says.^27 Th at is also the view of Laszlo Bock, a vice president of human
resources at Google. In an interview with the New York Times (June 13,
2013) he said, “One of the things we’ve seen from all our data crunching
is that GPAs are worthless as a criteria for hiring, and test scores are
worthless—no correlation at all except for brand- new college grads,
where there’s a slight correlation. Google famously used to ask every one
for a transcript and GPAs and test scores, but we don’t anymore, unless
you’re just a few years out of school. We found that they don’t predict any-
thing.... What’s in ter est ing is the proportion of people without any college
education at Google has increased over time as well.”^28
Th ey are not alone. As reported by the BBC (January 18, 2016), pub-
lisher Penguin Random House deci ded that job applicants will no longer
be required to have a university degree. Th e fi rm wants to have a more
varied intake of staff , because there is no clear link between holding a
degree and per for mance on a job. Th is announcement follows a series of
other companies dropping academic requirements for applicants. For
example, Ernst and Young has scrapped its former threshold for certain
A- level and degree requirements and is removing all academic and edu-
cation details from its application pro cess. PriceWater houseCooper has
also announced that it would stop using A- levels grades as a threshold for
selecting gradu ate recruits.
This content downloaded from 139.184.14.159 on Tue, 17 Oct 2017 13:58:56 UTChttp://www.ebook3000.com