Positive bias by profs?

[Dalya]

So, I missed my Bio final last Friday. I wrote the time down wrong and was an hour late and students had already finished when I got there, so I couldn't start. I e-mailed my prof and asked if there was any way I could retake it, assuming he'd say no. Then I got hospitalized Saturday. So I didn't check my e-mail until late Sunday night and I found he'd offered to let me take it Monday afternoon. But I still felt like crap and I was on pain pills, so I responded I wouldn't be able to, again assuming I wouldn't be given another chance.

Then he said that I could take it Wednesday, so I did. When I got there, he ripped off the short answer part and actually made it easier for me than the original exam. He told me the reason he let me make it up was because he looked up my transcript and saw that I'm an A student, therefore assumed I wasn't full of shit.

Well, I haven't worked hard in the class the whole semester, even though it's an easy and interesting class. I missed so many quizzes that my quiz average was a C (20% of your grade). So I assumed this whole time I'd get a B, max, and end up retaking the class anyway.

Just checked and I got an A- for the semester. I'm pretty sure he pulled that grade out of his ass and just assumed it's what I deserve. I don't know how I feel about that...

[aquaphase]

Sis, you're just figuring out now what it takes a lot of people until grad school to figure out: grades just aren't that important. When I was wrapping up my undergrad I had a poli-sci prof (who became my advisor in grad school) who I swore wasn't reading my papers, just returning them with an "A" on them. To prove my point during one of my last classes with her my senior year, I included the entire text of Green Eggs & Ham along with proper citations. I, of course, got my paper with an "A" on it and no mention of the Seuss text.

It took me a while to figure out that she had such confidence in my contributions that the grades didn't matter except as a mark on paper. Your prof probably saw your bio-related workload and made the same assumption in your favor.

[Dalya]

Hmm. This is hard for me to handle. The lesson seems to be that I only need to work hard sometimes, however, the reason I had such a good GPA is because I am so anal about working hard in school (except this fall...) Hmm. Tricky.

And yeah I have never really cared about my grades, but I have almost always felt I deserved the grades I got. I know when I deserve a B. And the only reason I pay attention to them is because of med school.

[katie]

To prove my point during one of my last classes with her my senior year, I included the entire text of Green Eggs & Ham along with proper citations. I, of course, got my paper with an "A" on it and no mention of the Seuss text.

derrick and i did a similar thing with our theatre history papers. the class was such a colossal joke. the teacher had taught everyone in the class previously, so he knew who were the "a" students and who just fucked off and graded that way. derrick and i used to slip dirty jokes into our papers (our oscar wilde papers were AWESOME) and he never once commented. he also scaled everything so ridiculously. i believe i had something like a 120 in that class. just so the dumb/lazy kids didn't fail.

ka"liberal arts education, ftw!"tie