Discover Top Posts Tagged with #finals week?

sporophyte sporocyte megasporocyte microsporocyte microsporophylls ugh ugh ugh guh megaspore microsporangium megasporangium microspore megasporophyll spore spore spore spore pain pain pain pain sporangiophore sporangia STROBILUS

i say STROBILUS!!!!

#STROBILUS #finals week?#no. the final week.

I s2g if anyone texts me within the next 24 hours I am killing them and then myself

#holly's thoughts #finals week?#more like my final week on earth

The best part of finals is people talking about acing exams bc then I get to make ace jokes

#ace #finals week?#asexual

Drowning in tea and exams...

I've given up and moved the kettle to my room, though, so that's a plus. My life has turned into non-stop tea drinking and trying to convince Phoebe that watching Hamlet counts as studying for our English Renaissance Literature exam.

(It totally counts.)

As I ponder absolutely everything else I could be doing on this beautiful day instead of studying, I also find myself thinking about how very different the school system is here versus the one at home. Here's how it works (or at least my understanding of it):

Attendance isn't always compulsory.

Students have the option to register as a "non-attending" student. Basically, they never have to go to class. The professor assigns them extra readings and such to help them prepare for the exam and then they're good to go. For attending students, there didn't seem to be much of a way (if any) to enforce attendance. There were participation points in a couple of my classes, sure, and some teachers called roll, but neither of those seemed to genuinely impact grades.

Obviously, this is pretty different from WVU. At home, there are some pretty strict attendance policies (the English department allows 3 absences before the student fails). Furthermore, every teacher I've ever had takes participation grades pretty seriously.

You can retake exams.

A dream come true! If you dislike your score the first time around, you have the option to reject the grade. After that, it's just a matter of retaking the exam at the next sitting. Pretty cool, right? Moreover, there doesn't seem to be a limit on how many times you can retake an exam. For example: if I fail one of my exams in January, there might be a second sitting in February. If I still hate my grade, I could go again in September and then again in January and so on. Best of all, you don't have to retake the entire class. It's literally just the exam.

Yeah, definitely not a thing at home. Failing requires you to retake the entire class at the next available opportunity. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing; if you don't understand the material, repeating the class would be helpful. Any other reason and it becomes a punishment.

Homework is nonexistent.

It's really just not a thing here. At least, not the way it is at home. Readings are common, but obviously you can't grade a reading. There simply isn't a lot of padding; your exam is your grade. Occasionally there might be a midterm project or an essay, but other that's about it. In short: don't screw it up. Or do. You can always retake the exam.

There isn't really a set timetable.

Oh, two of your classes are at 9am on Wednesday? That's fine! Doesn't matter! Just alternate weeks. You'll be fine. Have a MWF class? Better check times and room numbers; it's likely to be at a totally different time every day. If a teacher cancels class, they're free to reschedule it at a convenient time. There just doesn't seem to be a lot of structure and everything is very flexible. At home, I always know where and when my classes are. I always know when something is due or what to study for an exam or even what format the exam will be in - I'm very prepared. It's all very structured and I like it that way.

There are definitely benefits to each system. At home, I know what I'm doing. Here, I'm forced to figure it out for myself and just hope for the best - two things that I'm not usually the best at. So far, this experience has been an exercise in both patience and independence. I'm forced to just take things as they come, rather than worrying and over-planning. It's probably a good thing. Maybe.

For example: Phoebe and I had an exam today. We studied all week. This morning, we went into town early and got all psyched up and ready (or at least ready for it to be over) . . . only to be told to come back tomorrow. For no reason at all. She just felt like tomorrow would be a better day. Even though we'd registered for this morning.