On the importance of grades to our lives, I think the only thing you left out is that college is not always about learning the material you’re going to use later in life. This is especially true in the “soft” fields–arts, English, etc. That is, college is about learning how to attack assigned work, how to manage [or not manage] time, how to assign priorities [i.e. physics is last], and how to deal with personalities that may be less than favorable [i.e. Gruner]. Getting an A in the arts certainly includes creating work [essays, films, what have you] that is capable of connecting with the grader/reader. It is also dependent on finding out what said arbiter of letters expects, and molding your talent to it [that's why I can bs most papers, but have to think hard about this one].

If one is to hold those two views valid, then studying and working hard [even if only for the grade], will inherently instill values that will benefit all–even in fields where the letter itself will not matter.

2) In my classes so far, grades have correlated with the understanding of the material. In the two classes I’ve ever gotten A’s in, I’ve truly understood it. In fact, even in the classes I get B’s in, I feel like I understand it. As for the majority that are C’s, I feel like I did enough to pass the class, and if it comes up again, I’ll be able to pick it up.

3) Too many professors grade absolutely, which is actually a problem. While the percentage you get on an exam should be a factor, it matters about what you learn and how you adjust to the class. The best professor I’ve ever had was my physics 1A/C prof. You could bomb the two midterms but nail the final and get an A. He looked at each person individually and looked at how much effort they put into the class (doing hw), and looked to see if your grades improved as the exams went by. His saying was, “A if you’ve truly mastered the material. B if you’re doing great. C if you stand a chance at passing the next class.”

3) I can honestly say that in the arts, grades don’t mean squat. They can’t teach you how to be creative. They can’t teach you to think for yourself and make something new and innovative that’s never been seen before. However, when it comes to engineering, I do believe grades are important (which is ironic considering I’m not studying 24/7 to get A’s). Knowing how to work out problems and use equations is important in engineering, and if one person can do it better than the other, then they’re the ones who are going to get the job.

4) But alas, there are the completely useless classes (a la Oceanography). I’m 90% sure of what fields I’d like to get into in Civil Engineering, but that doesn’t mean I can’t skip the courses related to the other fields :/
In relation to the non-major GEs, well, of course you’re not going to learn anything that’ll apply to your job, and you probably won’t use it later in life.. but they’re for your enjoyment really. I took a linguistics class, didn’t enjoy it, am never going to use it. But I also took a history of electronic music and loved the hell out of it. Will I ever need to know the history of it? No, but it’s good trivia when trying to impress other people in the genre who are in-the-know

5) Lastly, in response to how grades will affect my life…. They won’t. Or at least I’ll try not to let them. I guess they might affect whether I get a job or not.. but what’s important to me is just graduating (”C’s get degrees!”). 20 years from now will I or anyone else care if I got a B- in science of engineering materials??? Absolutely not.

Don’t let grades rule your life and time here in college. I’m enjoying the ride, even if it does mean me staying here a little longer than 4 years.

To ramble more, I think the same could be said about high school. I really felt I enjoyed it and had a great time. All the other honors kids and nerds were studying their butts off and doing way too many extra curricular activities and they had no free time and no time to do anything they wanted. Meanwhile I had a few jobs, made friends, hung out with kids in the neighborhood, and enjoyed my time there… And y’know what? At the end of it all we all still got into the same university!