Friday, November 20, 2015
In class this week during symposium I took the stand as Sartre. The subject of removing grades arose. From the stand point of Sartre, I believe that grades should be removed because now, since we have grades, the student is in Bad Faith because the student is acting as a being-in-itself because they are worried about getting good grades. Like the waiter in the cafe example, the waiter is acting as a waiter so that he or she can get wages and good tips. The student is being a student in the same way the waiter is being a waiter. The student is being a student for grades instead of doing it for knowledge. The student goes to class "because they have to" so they can get good grades and pass the class. Because, the student says that they go to class because they have to, the student is fleeing their freedom and this is bad faith. I also believe this not in the stand point of Sartre. I do believe that grades limit our ability to truly learn. Grades, to me, only measure the ability of the student to memorize material long enough to pass the test.
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I agree with your post Rhonda. Achieving certain grades are so stressful to the point where we "forget" the objectives of the class, which is not merely learning the material for like five months and then forget but to learn and retain that material for (ideally) the rest of our lives. I also believe that grades can cause dislike in a subject. For example, I am taking Embryology this semester, something that I thought would be interesting to take. But now, I'm struggling so much in that class that I do not want to see the term "embryology" or "germ layer" ever again in life!
ReplyDeleteI agree with you! After discussing the waiter in a cafe, I realized that students are often the same way. Some students would not be in class if they did not have to or even participate in class discussions if they did not have to. However, our grades depend on it so we act in that way to better our grade just as waiters do to receive a tip. I also agree that students memorize material for the test. Teachers especially in high school were more concerned with test grades than they were students' individual grades. They do that because their pay depend on the test grade which is not a fair measurement either.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you 100% Rhonda. Students due the bare minimum to pass a test. They just do enough so that they will be able to pass the test. Grades put unnecessary stress on students for no reason at all. Grades are mainly based on what you memorize and how much of the material you grasp. If it was up to me school wouldn't be based on grades at all!
ReplyDeleteI agree. In all actuality, we have the freedom to NOT go to class but we all know that technically, we still do. If we don't attend, that is an F for failure to attend. Yes we have freedom, but to accomplish goals and abide by the laws of this country, we have to operate on Bad Faith.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your point as well. Many people consider grades as a measure of being a good student. They put their GPA on resumes and applications. It is a way to feel like our accomplishments are recorded. However, just because someone does well in a class does not mean that they have learned the material. I know that I have people ask me about a class that I have taken in the past and I have no idea what they are talking about anymore. If I were learning for comprehension instead of a grade maybe I would have been able to answer their questions better.
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