Amazing: This Senior Is Taking Eight Advanced CIS Courses AND Has a 0.4 GPA

Four classes is a nice course load. Many Penn students take five in a semester. Some real overachievers take six. But Engineering senior Ken Hooper has taken on EIGHT classes this fall -- and somehow still has a GPA of 0.4.

Hooper, a Computer and Information Science major, says he decided to take on the extra courses because he wanted a challenge, and because he’s been taking three courses a semester for the past two years. Literally the only thing he knows how to do is code, so he opted to take CIS classes for all eight of his credits.

Anyone can sign up for eight courses, but it takes someone truly special to achieve a 0.4 GPA while completing them. Hooper says he’s reached the mark by “never doing any homework or tests, except that time I showed up for a random GEOL 100 midterm.”

It’s hard work to get such a low GPA. “Sometimes, I feel like completing an assignment, but then I remember that I can’t ruin this 0.4,” Hooper said.

Dave Jobs, the CIS major director, said he was baffled by Hooper’s decision to take so many classes. “I’ve seen a couple kids take on huge course loads, but none of them have had such an abysmal GPA,” he said. “He’s throwing his education and future to the wind.”

But Hooper says he’s handling his work just fine: “I’m just doing what I’ve always done: nothing."