The University of Michigan recently announced it would go pass-fail for freshmen and remove SAT and ACT requirements, all in the name of protecting mental health. Donald Thompson isn’t buying it.
In this 11-minute segment, Donald makes the case that lowering academic standards doesn’t protect young people — it underprepares them. The business world doesn’t go pass-fail. Pressure is the curriculum. Failure is how you build a career. And the generation coming out the other side of these policies is going to find that out the hard way.
Inside this episode:
• Why removing grades and test scores is a disservice — not a kindness
• The real job of a university: prepare students for the world they’re going to live in
• Why the business reality is a stress test on resiliency — and always will be
• Don’s mentoring story: the young professional who almost quit, stayed, and landed a new job in a down economy
• The difference between “I can’t handle this” and “I’m choosing not to” — and why that distinction is everything
• Who wins when standards drop: the people who kept them
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