We know Harvard students have to be smart to get into the Ivy League school, but do they all deserve the grades they get while there?

The mean reported GPA for Harvard University’s class of 2015 is 3.64, just below an A-, according to a senior survey in The Harvard Crimson.

Though grade inflation has been a continuing topic of conversation at Harvard, the Crimson says, students think their top grades are fairly earned. Of this year’s graduating class, 72 percent think “grade inflation is not much of a problem or not a problem at all at Harvard,’’ according to the survey.


In 2013, the student newspaper reported that students most frequently get A’s. Professor Harvey C. Mansfield was quoted then as saying, “If this is true or nearly true, it represents a failure on the part of this faculty and its leadership to maintain our academic standards.’’

But Harvard students take their education seriously, the report continues. Eighty-six percent of the class said academics were either “very important’’ or “absolutely essential’’ to them, and 80 percent reported being “satisfied or very satisfied with their concentration.’’

Honest grades or not, they’re off to bigger things: 71 percent are heading straight into the workforce after graduation.

New England schools on the 2014 Forbes list of America’s Top Colleges: