Not The Tiger Mom

P. J. O'Rourke reviews Amy Chua, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother:

Amy Chua, I’ve got bad news. "A"' students work for "B" students. Or not even. A businessman friend of mine corrected me. "No, P. J.," he said, " ‘B’ students work for ‘C’ students. ‘A’ students teach.”

I used to tell my students that it was okay to get an A if they found my course easy. A Math professor friend of mine says he prefers "B" students to "A" students, on average, since the temperment of the "A" students inclines them to unthinking acceptance. I'd like to see a scholarship for students with the widest variance between SAT scores and GPA. The kid with a combined 700 SAT (old style) and a 3.75 GPA would be an interesting kid to have in class. Ditto the kid with the 1560 SAT and the 1.75 GPA. I wonder if they'd get along in freshman Physics.