Return Full Max Record

Is there a t-sql shortcut/ quick way to return the full max record.

So basically if I had:
prog_area glh description
HS 200 health and social care
EN 300 engineering
HS 400 health care
EN 250 engineering and construction

so grouping by prog_area and taking max glh would return appropriate descriptions like:
HS 400 health care
EN 300 engineering

This is quite a simple example and I would be using it on much larger datasets. I know how to do it by doing a join to itself with max glh but it seems to me there should be an easier way to return the appropriate full record set. Hopefully somethin fast in t-sql