What are the grade point averages that correspond to cum laude, magna cum laude, and summa cum laude? I’m pretty sure summa is a 4.0, but what are the others? Is it the same at every college?
Deb
It may be different from school to school, but where I went:
summa cum laude: 3.8 - 4.0
magna cum laude: 3.6 - 3.8
cum laude: 3.4 - 3.6
For us the cutoffs were 3.9, 3.75, and 3.5, I believe.
My school (UCLA) was the same as Cabbage’s.
Other schools set their levels by the amount of the donation your parents give. 
Obviously, it depends on where you are. UT (Texas) had the same scale Cabbage reports when I went there (frustrated 3.57 checking in).
My law school had a very heavy and merciless curve, so our honors were a bit lower than at most undergrads, maybe even most grad schools:
Summa cum laude: 3.5+
Magna cum laude: 3.25-3.49
Cum laude: 3.0-3.24
Wow. I got hosed.
No, you didn’t, believe me. The honors system reflected the fact that only a certain number of A’s and B’s existed for any given class, regardless of how well everyone did…only the top 6% of a core class could get an A or something like that, so the grades for even the very top students were relatively low overall. Only 6 students out of 180 graduated Summa Cum Laude.
What was worse, if you got below a 3.0, you were gone after the first year. Thanks for the 6 grand, sorry you can’t stay. My entering class had an attrition rate of around 40%, if you can believe that. Finals time for first years got pretty ugly.
Whoops, make that “if you got below a 2.0, you were gone after the first year”.
My undergrad school did it by percentages within schools: top 1% summa cum laude; next 3% magna; next 8%, cum laude. By doing this within schools it prevented the engineering majors from having to compete with the humanities majors like me.
Thanks. I’ll keep studying. It’s an Education degree and as long as you get the multitude of projects turned in on time, show up at class, and do well on exams, you’ll get an A. Right now I’m halfway through with a 4.0, but I know I’ll make a B somewhere down the line! Just curious about the lauds I’ll get if I keep doing well. My college years weren’t that great 
Deb
It varies wildly by school. I believe Harvard was in the news recently because it gives cum laude to any undergrad who completes an honors thesis, which is a majority of the graduating class. Also, as noted above, many schools work it on a percentage basis, so their GPA cutoffs vary each year.
At my law school (Geogetown), the top 1/3 got cum laude and the top 10% got magna, although if you had the GPA but there was some reason the faculty felt you didn’t deserve honors (like a disciplinary problem), you didn’t get them. Also, a few of the very top students were considered for summa, usually two or three a year, although there wasn’t a firm percentage cutoff.
My undergrad school (Cornell) gave summa to anyone with a GPA of 4.0 or higher (the grade scale included an A+ worth 4.3 points, although I never met anyone who got one). IIRC, cum laude and magna also had fixed G.P.A. cutoffs, but since I was never anywhere near them I didn’t pay close attention.
–Cliffy
The University of Delaware was the same way. Each college figured the cut-offs by a percentage (probably similar to the numbers givens by Opus1) This pissed off us engineers since our numbers were so high (I managed cum laude) What made it worse was looking over at the College of Agriculture and seeing that probably half of our class would have made cum laude with thier scale.
-Big G
“At a place I recently worked” I kvetched to the department Chair that High Honors only required a 3.5 while it was a 3.7something where I had been a student. Said Chair got all steamed claiming I was just imagining things. No school could conceivably have such high standards.
Thanks gang.
The idea that a 3.3 is considered “honors” is just appalling.