Colleges and college professors seem to have an endless supply of devices with which to torture students. Sometimes it baffles me that we pay for the privilege. A sampling of these devices includes, but is certainly not limited to: attendance points (are we in kindergarten?), participation points (you’re assuming someone in the class has something interesting to say), problem sets (just call it a take-home exam), and “optional” readings. All this is bad enough. And yet, the gods have seen fit to gift professors with one last, ultimate tool to inflict distress. The famed, the dreaded, the utterly horrendous – the group project.
I hate group projects. I’m an introvert, and worse, a perfectionist. In context, this means that I’m terrible at working with other people while being simultaneously unsatisfied with whatever everyone else is doing. This isn’t a fun situation for anyone. Not for me, not for my group members, not for my classmates, and certainly not for the professor who assigned the project in the first place. I’m sure there are all kinds of social psychology behind the continued assignation of group projects, and I’m not about to get into that. Instead, I’ve got my own list of reasons why group projects should be consigned to the dustbin of educational history.
They’re time-consuming.
Yeah, I know, we’re supposed to be devoting our every waking minute to school, but that’s just not feasible. Some of us have work. Some of us have a social life. Some of us just need five seconds where we’re not thinking about organic chemistry or statistical analysis. And all of us, regardless of what our other circumstances may be, have classes in addition to the one we’ve had a group project assigned in. Group projects are a time-suck, and professors almost never budget in-class time to work on them. Professors seem to be under the impression that their class is the only one we’re taking, so they all feel justified in heaping on the group work, to the detriment of the student. Case in point: I have group projects in all three of my classes this quarter, for which I’m expected to meet outside of class. No.
They’re unfair.
Raise your hand if you’ve been in a group where nobody did any work or contributed any ideas. There’s no way to learn to hate your classmates more quickly than if you wind up in a group project with them, so if professors are trying to build community by assigning group work, they’re going about it in absolutely the wrong way. It’s not fair to tie one person’s grade and learning experience to their ability to work with two to five other people, all of whom have the potential to single-handedly tank the project. It’s not leveling the playing field. It’s definitely not fair.
They aren’t an accurate measure of skills and knowledge.
Whatever you see coming out of a group project, you can be certain it was nobody’s first choice. To get to the final product, group members have to compromise and collaborate with people who just barely share their interests. Work ethics differ. Interests differ. Ability to compromise and play nice with others differs. Group projects don’t enhance creativity. They just stifle it.
On behalf of students everywhere, I humbly beg colleges and college professors to stop assigning group projects. We learned how to share and play nice in kindergarten. We don’t need a refresher course.
