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Fri 8 Oct, 2004 10:21 am
When I was in college, I took six hours of American History with a professor who gave 50% of the grade on class participation and 50% of the grade on the final exam. As he had the reputation of never deviating from the assigned text, I studied that and spent the time at a paying job. I made an F for class participation but aced the final exams netting a C for the coursework. Conversely a classmate attended and partcipated in every class but failed the final exams and he also netted a C for the coursework.
Which of us succeeded? Both? Either? Neither?
Think about your child, your child's school, your doctor, your accountant, your auto mechanic, your congressman,etc. How much credit should be give for effort in the classroom, at the workplace, in government, etc.?
Is really good effort enough or in all cases should a minimum of measurable results be required to pass?
The following illustrates the problem:
Quote:Believe It Or Not
by Walter E. Williams
Benedict College, Columbia, South Carolina enforces an academic policy that defies belief. Say I'm a freshman taking your class in biology. I learn little from your lectures, assigned readings and homework. I do attend class every day; take notes and manage to average 40 percent on the graded work for the semester. What grade might you give me? I'm betting that all but the academic elite would say, "Sorry, Williams, but no cigar," and I'd earn an F for the course. But, if you're a professor at Benedict College, you'd be fired.
That's exactly what happened to Professors Milwood Motley, Chairman of Benedict's Biological and Physical Sciences Department and Larry Williams of the same department, both of whom refused to go along with the college's Success Equals Effort (SEE) policy. SEE is a policy where 60 percent of a freshman's grade is based on effort and the rest on academic performance. In their sophomore year, the formula drops to 50-50 and isn't used at all for junior and senior years. In defense of his policy, Benedict's president, Dr. David H. Swinton said that the students "have to get an A in effort to guarantee that if they fail the subject matter, they can get the minimum passing grade. I don't think that's a bad thing."
According to the Associated Press story, carried in TheState.com (8/20/04), Professor Motley said the policy compromises the integrity of Benedict. Students are being passed to increase student retention by falsely boosting academic performance. When Professors Motley and Williams began assigning grades based upon academic performance, Professor Motley said the administration "told us to go back and recalculate the grades, and I just refused to do it." At that point Dr. Swinton fired both for insubordination. Dr. William Gunn, a faculty member for 40 years and president of Benedict College's chapter of the American Association of University Professors, is dead set against the policy and believes most other faculty are as well. Writing in TheState.com (9/22/04), Dr. Gunn says the SEE policy not only harms today's student but as well Benedict graduates who will see their degrees come under suspicion.
Dr. Winton's policy borders on lunacy. Imagine a freshman gets an A for effort in his algebra class but has virtually no grasp of the material, earning him an F grade. Under the college's SEE policy, the student would be assigned a C for the course. What can we expect when the student takes Algebra II and later takes a course where algebra is a tool? He'll fall further and further behind because he hasn't grasped the material from the earlier courses. He'll graduate only if the fraudulent grading continues and his job prospects will depend upon racial preferences.
Here's my question to you: Can you think of a more effective way to discredit and cast doubt on the degrees of all students who graduate from Benedict? How would you like people to be certified in any activity that way - your doctor, your tax accountant, your mechanic or anybody upon whom you depend for reliable proficient service?
Whatever academic handicaps Benedict's students have when they enter - their median SAT score is 803 - are disguised and exacerbated by the school's SEE policy. Harvard-educated Dr. Swinton acknowledged he would not implement such a policy at a more selective institution and does not know of a similar policy at any other college.
The blame for this academic madness cannot wholly be placed at its president's feet. Benedict's Board of Trustees bear the blame for either enacting or tolerating this policy. Also culpable are those as taxpayers and donors whose funds make it possible for this madness to continue. While I know it's probably not the case but I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out that the South Carolina Ku Klux Klan were Benedict's largest contributors.
Walter E. Williams
c43-04
October 4, 2004
http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/wew/articles/04/believeit.html
Foxfyre, I come from good teacher stock, and my grandmother was an award-winning debater. Let me tell you a story about the worst teacher I ever had....
He taught high-school geography. He refused to divert from the government-required material. It was his 'blue book' that ruled him, and the way he taught. He failed me on several 'fill in the blank' tests for giving flippant but humorous answers. I have to paraphrase, but this should serve as an example: "What was the importance of Delaware?"
I might have answered something like "Is it so important what Delaware? She has a reputation to protect, I know, but really, isn't it her business?"
I wasn't the only one upset by this man's teaching methods, or lack thereof. The entire class, many of them creative thinkers, despised him.
One day, I brought one of those laughing boxes to class, those things they put into dolls, you press a button, it laughs. We tortured him with it. Every time he made an idiotic statement, someone pressed the button. We passed it around so he never knew where it was.
Then, our city had a garbage strike. You can just imagine the winks and nods that went around the classroom, knowing that the 'garbage was not going to be collected' pending union issues. Heh heh....that classroom was turned into a dump within 24 hours.
Personally, I feel that an education system that streamlines people into a 'middle ground' for the sake of 'uniformity' is ridiculous. What we really need are better teachers, smaller classes, and more one on one interaction.
As for professionals, say doctors, I have had good ones and bad ones. Ultimately, one must judge the individual on their own merits, not on their education.
The real issue here is that universities can't make up their minds on how to actually teach the students. They argue about the merits of 'effort' vs. 'academic achievement', while ignoring the fact that every student is an individual, with different needs.
Cav writes:
Quote:As for professionals, say doctors, I have had good ones and bad ones. Ultimately, one must judge the individual on their own merits, not on their education.
While I enjoyed your story immensely having had some abysmal teachers in my past along with some superb ones--perhaps it is pertinent that it was the superb ones that made me have to work the hardest for my grades--I think the question is not so much how something is taught, but how the teaching (etc.) is determined to be effective or successful.
And can you really always separate credentials from ability? For instance, how much would you trust your doctor, however skilled he might be, if he had not passed the Medical Board Exams? On the other hand, even if he has the credentials, is that enough to prove his ability? Do you expect your doctor to be able to doctor competently?
Do you give your employees a lot of credit for trying really hard when they simply don't seem to get it?
back in olden times when I was a gradual school student I had a prof for "Philosophy of History" anywho during the first lecture I made a few challanges to his thesis so he called me into his office and offered an immediate A for the course but only if I never showed my face in his class room again. I accepted the A.
in inches. :wink:
Ok seriously though, I have to agree with Cav in saying experiece and actual ability are more important to me than education. Besides, how good an education you have is based on what you wanted to learn. I think a community college student could be just as smart upon graduation as a Harvard grad if they wanted to put forth the extra personal effort. Good Will Hunting is a nice example
Grinning at Dys and thinking real hard about what it would be like to have him in my class. Do you feel yourself sufficiently educated in the philosophy of history.
Foxfyre wrote:Cav writes:
Quote:As for professionals, say doctors, I have had good ones and bad ones. Ultimately, one must judge the individual on their own merits, not on their education.
While I enjoyed your story immensely having had some abysmal teachers in my past along with some superb ones--perhaps it is pertinent that it was the superb ones that made me have to work the hardest for my grades--I think the question is not so much how something is taught, but how the teaching (etc.) is determined to be effective or successful.
And can you really always separate credentials from ability? For instance, how much would you trust your doctor, however skilled he might be, if he had not passed the Medical Board Exams? On the other hand, even if he has the credentials, is that enough to prove his ability? Do you expect your doctor to be able to doctor competently?
Do you give your employees a lot of credit for trying really hard when they simply don't seem to get it?
Hi everybody! Hi Doctor Nick. Clearly, nobody would trust a doctor who didn't have proper academic credentials. Credentials may give a sense of skill, but "bedside manner", continuing with the doctor analogy, is a talent that is innate. Ultimately, whatever education you get, you will only be judged by your actions afterwards, i.e. how you use it, how you incorporate your personality into the good and bad teaching you received. Remember the good teachers, succeed in the real world, and that will make them proud. Keep track of the good ones Foxy, they won't disappoint you.
Well most of my teachers are now dead I think but I'll do my best to keep track of them.
Foxfyre wrote:Well most of my teachers are now dead I think but I'll do my best to keep track of them.
Well, I was actually referring to anyone you might have the chance to educate yourself. :wink:
What a very interesting question -- and an impossible one to answer. All of my best teachers were in first through 4th grade. After that, complete garbage until college. In my first three years in university the only good teacher I had was a very smart and thorough foreign grad student for calculus. In my final year I had, again, one good teacher. The one thing that all of my excellent teachers had in common was that they told you upfront what the rules were and what was expected of each student. Then they stuck to it. They also made an effort to interact with each student to make sure they didn't fall too far behind (as long as they were still showing up for class).
I'm still not sure how you measure success, but I think that if your objective is to impart a particular knowledge or skill then you have to have some way of measuring that success AS YOU GO, not after the class has ended or the school year is over and that you have to step in to correct it as soon as you see a problem. This requires of course, smaller classrooms and teachers that give a ****. The problem in most universities is the lecture format. I call it trickle down education.
I can add, subtract, multiply, divide, do percentages, and other basic math with no difficulty. When it gets to the more advanced math, however, I have little or no aptitude. I received two A's in math, one in highschool and one in college, from professors who were among the worst teachers in the system and were tormented very much by their students. I got the A's because I was nice to these teachers.
I could say I was successful in diplomacy (okay kissing up). Could I say I was a success in math?
Is trying really hard enough?
Foxfyre, that's really very sad. I have met so many people who never had a good math teacher and I think that is terrible. Once someone has it in their head that they 'aren't good at math' then they miss out on a lot. Even more sadly, I see this mostly in women and girls. Someone is sending the message to our girls that math and science are things that boys are good at and that makes me sick.
One of the things that I've always loved about math was how unsubjective it was. You either get it right, or you get it wrong. There's really not much to interpret. And in that case I think, no, trying hard really isn't enough.
I've always believed my success in math was due to having several excellent math teachers in early education and a few good ones in advanced education.
I had some great math teachers Freeduck, but I honestly do not have the aptitude for advanced math. Being more of an astract thinker, I generally do better in the more subjective courses. That isn't a 'gender' thing--though I do think men, being more right brained, probably do on average have a small advantage in math--but just a fact of life. Some people have inate ability to write or paint beautiful portraits or compose symphanies and some don't. I believe everybody has an inate talent or talents for something. Mine just didn't happen to be math and I'm okay with that. My life has not required advanced math and I have two kids, a boy and a girl, who are very good at it to do it for me on the rare occasion that I need it.
The point for me, however, is do I deserve those A's implying that I actually mastered the subject? I didn't of course. A decent teacher would have properly failed me. I would then have hired a tutor and trained myself sufficiently to get a passing grade. As it turned out I got the grade without doing that.
Should that be the rule for passing in school now? Should success mean actually demonstrating that a minimum amount of the coursework has been learned? Or is trying really hard enough?
I had a math teacher that passed me just because he was tired of looking at me. Seriously. He caught me giving him the bird one day. I never had my book. I sat in back of the class. And I rarely turned in my homework. I couldn't understand a word he said. What a waste of my money.
Fox, I hear you. I guess my answer to the question in the thread is that no, trying in and of itself is not enough. And I think things like class participation should be considered only when someone's grade is on the borderline. As in, almost an A plus active classroom participation means an A, minus the classroom participation means a B.
So, I think that when we are giving the grade based more on participation than on success it is because our teaching methods aren't working.
The question is still out there and doesn't necessarily have to relate to education.
What is your definition of success?
Success--meeting or exceeding your personal goals...?
I recently had a psychology test over material I hadn't previously known. It was one of three major tests this quarter. I was highly distracted in the days before the test with personal business, and only studied for 30 minutes, when I usually spend three or four hours over a few days studying for a major test.
I expected a low 70. Even though I pulled a 90, I was oddly disappointed. I didn't get my usual endorphin fix. I finally figured out I don't know what to do with a positive reinforcement (good grade) for bad behavior (not studying).
I hadn't acheived my brand of success. The grade wasn't my big motivator--it was a command of the material. I just skimmed enough to get through the test.
I have also experienced dramatic events which look a lot like failure to most people, when in fact, they have been my greatest personal successes.
Fox, I suck at math, too. There is a wide gulf between my ability and grades for ALL other subjects....and math. It's hard to believe one person can have such disparate abilities.
LOL Lash. I bet you can do all the math you need though. I have long been an amateur scholar of all the quirks that make us unique as individuals (explaining my interest in temperament typing) and really do believe men tend to be right brained that gives them an edge in math and some other subjects while women tend to be left brained giving them an edge in verbal and interpersonal relationship skills and some other subject.. That of course does not exclude some men from sucking at math and being very good in verbal skills, etc.; ditto for women re math etc.
I know what you mean though in how what you perceive as success would look like failure to another person.
I suspect success means different things to each of us.
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