Work Smarter

I’m totally counting down the days until the last day of class. I love teaching, and always miss it when I’m not in the classroom, especially in the summer. But right now, I’m looking forward to getting away.

I think I’m particularly disheartened because the last couple of weeks I’ve had so many students complaining about their grades. They didn’t take the time to see me the first half of the semester when they were getting B’s on their writing assignments, but they’re becoming indignant that they’re not getting A’s even though they are trying hard and doing the work. (Unfortunately for them they’re trying harder, but making the same mistakes over and over.) They don’t get that they need to work smarter, not just harder.

The effort that they put into the class is evident, and I don’t take that for granted, nor does it go totally unrewarded. Still, when the assignment asks you to do particular things that you don’t do, regardless of the effort that you put in, you haven’t earned an A. And, so many of these students look at B’s (even B+’s) like they might as well be F’s.

School and getting good grades was always important to me, so I’m not unsympathetic. It’s just so frustrating that instead of coming to talk with me during office hours to review their papers and my comments, they want to just blame me and whine about how what I want them to do in their papers is either so unlike everything they’ve done before (and therefore unreasonable), or just too picky.

They’ve lost sight of what it means to learn because they’re too focused on grades. One student even said to me that she feels like she’s learning a lot, but that none of that matters if she’s not getting an A.

Really, is this what education in our society is coming to?

*sigh*

Actually, several students did come to see me early in the semester to talk about their performance in my class, and since then have noticeable improved. I need to remember that and not let these few skew my view.