I hate group assignments

AWD>FWD · 11-12-2009, 02:17 PM

I know a lot of OT is college educated so you can relate to my frustration, although this is a fairly low-level class so a lot of the "I'm only here because mommy and daddy say so" crowd are still in class with me.

We were assigned a group speech about three weeks ago, our topic was to be ocean systems/reef systems/artificial reefs as it relates to sustainability. There were supposed to be 6 person groups, so my group is Kari the responsible girl with a 2 year old, Yoanna and Mathias the Greek brother and sister duo, Jordan the girl that proves the rule "the bigger the boobs the smaller the brain", and me. One of the people that was absent got thrown in our group, the guy that shows up high everyday to class on oxycontin.

Fast forward to this Tuesday, our group contracts were due and we wrote ours in class. OC boy was absent, so he was written out of the group, down to 5. Our group outline, which we split up between members and then compiled on GoogleDocs was supposed to be due Thursday. Suddenly Yoanna and Mathias decide they want to change the topic, I simply told them that I had already finished my research on the topic a week ago and if they wanted a topic change they should have suggested it weeks ago, not two days before the assignment was due. They had obviously not even started researching, so after the outline was split up I gave them a few ideas and sources to check out. Wednesday they posted their outline to GoogleDocs, it was about 8 lines and absolute horse ****. All they were talking about was global warming and greenhouse gasses. Kari sent an email response telling them to re-write it because she did not want to put her name on that work and I fully agreed. Yoanna then emailed the instructor and complained. I got an email from the instructor later saying that she had never approved our topic (she had) and she didn't think that there could be any local appeal or "call to action" for students since it is supposed to be a motivational presentation (again, horse **** I had all of that. There are actually several Reef Balls in the Edmonds Underwater Park in the Puget Sound. And several organizations with paypal accounts. Suck it.). She continued to say that we obviously were not working well as a group and that is a major criteria that affects my grade. We have yet to see any contribution from Jordan, it was well timed since we will probably have to change topics but it isn't a good sign. But now we will probably have to change our topic to geothermal power, which I think has less local appeal and I think students can do less to help out.

What's my problem? Cliff notes: I did my work, I started researching the topic when the topic was assigned, not when the outline was due. My portion of the outline was actually good and not half-assed or not there at all. Out of a group of 6 original members, 4 are not contributing and it's affecting my grade. AWD>FWD =

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NewsPhotog · 11-12-2009, 02:19 PM

I always hated group work. It proved to me that even the most useless wastes in society can succeed because others will eventually do the work for them.

Whitford · 11-12-2009, 02:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

I know a lot of OT is college educated so you can relate to my frustration, although this is a fairly low-level class so a lot of the "I'm only here because mommy and daddy say so" crowd are still in class with me.

We were assigned a group speech about three weeks ago, our topic was to be ocean systems/reef systems/artificial reefs as it relates to sustainability. There were supposed to be 6 person groups, so my group is Kari the responsible girl with a 2 year old, Yoanna and Mathias the Greek brother and sister duo, Jordan the girl that proves the rule "the bigger the boobs the smaller the brain", and me. One of the people that was absent got thrown in our group, the guy that shows up high everyday to class on oxycontin.

Fast forward to this Tuesday, our group contracts were due and we wrote ours in class. OC boy was absent, so he was written out of the group, down to 5. Our group outline, which we split up between members and then compiled on GoogleDocs was supposed to be due Thursday. Suddenly Yoanna and Mathias decide they want to change the topic, I simply told them that I had already finished my research on the topic a week ago and if they wanted a topic change they should have suggested it weeks ago, not two days before the assignment was due. They had obviously not even started researching, so after the outline was split up I gave them a few ideas and sources to check out. Wednesday they posted their outline to GoogleDocs, it was about 8 lines and absolute horse ****. All they were talking about was global warming and greenhouse gasses. Kari sent an email response telling them to re-write it because she did not want to put her name on that work and I fully agreed. Yoanna then emailed the instructor and complained. I got an email from the instructor later saying that she had never approved our topic (she had) and she didn't think that there could be any local appeal or "call to action" for students since it is supposed to be a motivational presentation (again, horse **** I had all of that. There are actually several Reef Balls in the Edmonds Underwater Park in the Puget Sound. And several organizations with paypal accounts. Suck it.). She continued to say that we obviously were not working well as a group and that is a major criteria that affects my grade. We have yet to see any contribution from Jordan, it was well timed since we will probably have to change topics but it isn't a good sign. But now we will probably have to change our topic to geothermal power, which I think has less local appeal and I think students can do less to help out.

What's my problem? I did my work, I started researching the topic when the topic was assigned, not when the outline was due. My portion of the outline was actually good and not half-assed or not there at all. Out of a group of 6 original members, 4 are not contributing and it's affecting my grade. AWD>FWD =

That you expect us to read all that.

AWD>FWD · 11-12-2009, 02:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Whitford

That you expect us to read all that.

I wrote that instead of writing CN. Maybe I'll edit it to suit the illiterate (erm... wait this is still OT)

cucamelsmd15 · 11-12-2009, 02:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

Out of a group of 6 original members, 4 are not contributing and it's affecting my grade.

Approach your professor early and often about this. I had this same thing happen during one of my courses.

"Oh, well, hes the method development Mr. Wizard, so he can do all the work" was one of the first things said (towards me) at our first group meeting.

I wound up doing all the work, but in the end, I got an A, and 4 other people failed the exercise, and ultimately, the class.

Whitford · 11-12-2009, 02:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

I wrote that instead of writing CN. Maybe I'll edit it to suit the illiterate (erm... wait this is still OT)

Look, you're not going to be spiking people's interests in here with a username like that.

eclone · 11-12-2009, 02:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

Jordan the girl that proves the rule "the bigger the boobs the smaller the brain"

This is all I see. pics. now.

Do you have proof that the original topic was approved?

SoobZero · 11-12-2009, 02:26 PM

sounds like community college

blahhblahh · 11-12-2009, 02:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SoobZero

sounds like community college

yep...

Jack ffr1846 · 11-12-2009, 02:42 PM

Do no work.

Skip class the day of presentation.

Although you get hosed, you have the satisfaction of knowing that the rest of the group went down the toilet in flames.

The class then gets graded on a curve. Hmmmm.....where will zero fit on that curve?

group projects suck.

the end

BGPunk2001 · 11-12-2009, 02:43 PM

I literally had to deal with this 2 months ago. It was some bull**** freshman level class where we did a group project.

- One dude completely flipped **** that they made me the team lead, to the point that he dropped out. Like full-on meltdown.

- One of the chicks was absolutely hopeless when it comes to computers, which is a problem because that is where most of our homework is based.

- One chick didn't care and came up with some excuse of being sick for like 3 weeks when 1 absence is supposed to drop you from the course.

- One guy was semi-decent. I just had to get on to him a lot.

- The last guy was basically my right hand. He and I pretty much pulled the whole group.

I gave most of them an absolutely scathing peer review. I'm sure it didn't help, and from the work that I got out of them, most of that group will never actually graduate unless they pull their heads out of their asses. Yes, I hate group projects in school with a passion as well. There's no motivation. If their job was on the line I bet you they would have had a fire up under their asses.

Jard · 11-12-2009, 02:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

Jordan the girl that proves the rule "the bigger the boobs the smaller the brain"

Pics or lock.

alcoolaid · 11-12-2009, 02:45 PM

Group papers are always tedious. It's either you have good partners or bad partners.

+1 on explaining your situation to the professor though.

AWD>FWD · 11-12-2009, 02:49 PM

Creeper move, but I'll oblige.

Whitford · 11-12-2009, 02:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

Creeper move, but I'll oblige.

I take back what I said.

Can has more?

Jard · 11-12-2009, 02:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

Creeper move, but I'll oblige.

barvo, kind sir, barvo

Now please tell me you are Urkel.

07WRBSTI · 11-12-2009, 02:54 PM

In school I had one class every spring semester that was group work. Engineering design projects, they were senior led and underclassmen worked for the seniors. If you didn't contribute your grade was seriously ****ed. Almost everyone worked really well in teams for several reasons:

1.) Seniors could fire your ass
2.) Most teams micro-managed the **** out of things
3.) Most worthless people don't make it past 1 or 2 semesters of engineering classes.

BGPunk2001 · 11-12-2009, 02:55 PM

^ Yeah, that sounds like a bit of different situation.

It sounds like how it SHOULD be.

alcoolaid · 11-12-2009, 02:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 07WRBSTI

3.) Most worthless people don't make it past 1 or 2 semesters of engineering classes.

This is very true.

Matt K · 11-12-2009, 02:57 PM

news flash: in the real world you almost always work in a group, and some of the other members are quite often retarded. Learn how to make it work now. It'll pay dividends later.

When I got stuck with a lame-o group in college, I'd always just kind of take over. tell everybody that i'd do my section, then i'd offer to "integrate" all the sections together at the end. That way you get the chance to basically rewrite everybody's ****ty contributions and still get a good grade.

Also, i'm worthless, and made it through 2 years of engineering school with a 3.5gpa, so your hypothesis is incorrect!

sha_zapple · 11-12-2009, 03:09 PM

Splitting projects up so everyone does a % of every task is always a disaster. Nobody writes the same, facts are repeated, and a lot of points are missed.

It's much easier to figure out peoples strong points and separate the project by tasks. Two people research/write, one person compiles/formats the paper, another person creates the presentation and presents, etc...

There's always a dud, don't expect them do to equivalent amounts of work, that's life. Make him the gopher or just write him off completely and make sure his name doesn't show up on the project.

moshter11 · 11-12-2009, 03:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWD>FWD

Creeper move, but I'll oblige.

group assignment with her? yes please

The Enemy · 11-12-2009, 03:14 PM

Congratulations, you have the skills to be a leader because you recognize everyone's issues and faults and suddenly you've just volunteered to be the leader. Now, as a leader you have to take charge and run the project. You have some people who don't understand what they're supposed to do, some who are misguided, some that will do what needs to be done, and a right-hand man. Sounds like a normal team to me! Now go figure out a way to make it work and realize that if you get 80% performance out of your team not to bitch about having to do the hardest 20% of the work.

Good luck!

JjSwee · 11-12-2009, 03:16 PM

I had a class where the groups worked suprisingly well except for one. The girl in one of the groups copy and pasted straight out of a website, verbatim, with no words of her own. They got caught and almost all failed the assignment. When confronted about it, she thought the copy/paste was acceptable.

missnexa · 11-12-2009, 03:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JjSwee

I had a class where the groups worked suprisingly well except for one. The girl in one of the groups copy and pasted straight out of a website, verbatim, with no words of her own. They got caught and almost all failed the assignment. When confronted about it, she thought the copy/paste was acceptable.

I love this.

I also love giants walls o' text in presentations and reading directly from a piece of paper as part of your presentation.

11-12-2009, 02:17 PM	#1
AWD>FWD Scooby Guru Member#: 107027 Join Date: Feb 2006 Chapter/Region: NWIC Location: Woodinville, WA Vehicle: 2007 343whp 374wtq SWP STi	I hate group assignments I know a lot of OT is college educated so you can relate to my frustration, although this is a fairly low-level class so a lot of the "I'm only here because mommy and daddy say so" crowd are still in class with me. We were assigned a group speech about three weeks ago, our topic was to be ocean systems/reef systems/artificial reefs as it relates to sustainability. There were supposed to be 6 person groups, so my group is Kari the responsible girl with a 2 year old, Yoanna and Mathias the Greek brother and sister duo, Jordan the girl that proves the rule "the bigger the boobs the smaller the brain", and me. One of the people that was absent got thrown in our group, the guy that shows up high everyday to class on oxycontin. Fast forward to this Tuesday, our group contracts were due and we wrote ours in class. OC boy was absent, so he was written out of the group, down to 5. Our group outline, which we split up between members and then compiled on GoogleDocs was supposed to be due Thursday. Suddenly Yoanna and Mathias decide they want to change the topic, I simply told them that I had already finished my research on the topic a week ago and if they wanted a topic change they should have suggested it weeks ago, not two days before the assignment was due. They had obviously not even started researching, so after the outline was split up I gave them a few ideas and sources to check out. Wednesday they posted their outline to GoogleDocs, it was about 8 lines and absolute horse **. All they were talking about was global warming and greenhouse gasses. Kari sent an email response telling them to re-write it because she did not want to put her name on that work and I fully agreed. Yoanna then emailed the instructor and complained. I got an email from the instructor later saying that she had never approved our topic (she had) and she didn't think that there could be any local appeal or "call to action" for students since it is supposed to be a motivational presentation (again, horse ** I had all of that. There are actually several Reef Balls in the Edmonds Underwater Park in the Puget Sound. And several organizations with paypal accounts. Suck it.). She continued to say that we obviously were not working well as a group and that is a major criteria that affects my grade. We have yet to see any contribution from Jordan, it was well timed since we will probably have to change topics but it isn't a good sign. But now we will probably have to change our topic to geothermal power, which I think has less local appeal and I think students can do less to help out. What's my problem? Cliff notes: I did my work, I started researching the topic when the topic was assigned, not when the outline was due. My portion of the outline was actually good and not half-assed or not there at all. Out of a group of 6 original members, 4 are not contributing and it's affecting my grade. AWD>FWD = * Registered users of the site do not see these ads.

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11-12-2009, 02:19 PM	#2
NewsPhotog Scooby Newbie Member#: 185008 Join Date: Jul 2008 Chapter/Region: MAIC Location: Lancaster, PA Vehicle: '08 WRX OBP	I always hated group work. It proved to me that even the most useless wastes in society can succeed because others will eventually do the work for them.

11-12-2009, 02:26 PM	#8
SoobZero Scooby Newbie Member#: 157226 Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Moorpark, CA Vehicle: 2007 STi - UGM cough..scic..cough	sounds like community college

11-12-2009, 02:42 PM	#10
Jack ffr1846 Ernie Ball Music Man Moderator Member#: 13699 Join Date: Dec 2001 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: Hopkinton, MA Vehicle: 2008 LGT Having Vendor Relations	Do no work. Skip class the day of presentation. Although you get hosed, you have the satisfaction of knowing that the rest of the group went down the toilet in flames. The class then gets graded on a curve. Hmmmm.....where will zero fit on that curve? group projects suck. the end

11-12-2009, 02:43 PM	#11
BGPunk2001 Scooby Specialist Member#: 46134 Join Date: Oct 2003 Chapter/Region: TXIC Location: RIP Roger Lauderdale	I literally had to deal with this 2 months ago. It was some bull** freshman level class where we did a group project. - One dude completely flipped ** that they made me the team lead, to the point that he dropped out. Like full-on meltdown. - One of the chicks was absolutely hopeless when it comes to computers, which is a problem because that is where most of our homework is based. - One chick didn't care and came up with some excuse of being sick for like 3 weeks when 1 absence is supposed to drop you from the course. - One guy was semi-decent. I just had to get on to him a lot. - The last guy was basically my right hand. He and I pretty much pulled the whole group. I gave most of them an absolutely scathing peer review. I'm sure it didn't help, and from the work that I got out of them, most of that group will never actually graduate unless they pull their heads out of their asses. Yes, I hate group projects in school with a passion as well. There's no motivation. If their job was on the line I bet you they would have had a fire up under their asses.

11-12-2009, 02:45 PM	#13
alcoolaid Scooby Specialist Member#: 134949 Join Date: Dec 2006 Chapter/Region: VIC Location: Vancouver, BC Vehicle: '07 SWP STi 511WHP Twinscroll T4 BW S300sx	Group papers are always tedious. It's either you have good partners or bad partners. +1 on explaining your situation to the professor though.

11-12-2009, 02:49 PM	#14
AWD>FWD Scooby Guru Member#: 107027 Join Date: Feb 2006 Chapter/Region: NWIC Location: Woodinville, WA Vehicle: 2007 343whp 374wtq SWP STi	Creeper move, but I'll oblige.

11-12-2009, 02:54 PM	#17
07WRBSTI Scooby Newbie Member#: 147586 Join Date: Apr 2007 Chapter/Region: MWSOC Location: Eating waffles Vehicle: 94 Olds Cutlass Supreme	In school I had one class every spring semester that was group work. Engineering design projects, they were senior led and underclassmen worked for the seniors. If you didn't contribute your grade was seriously **ed. Almost everyone worked really well in teams for several reasons: 1.) Seniors could fire your ass 2.) Most teams micro-managed the ** out of things 3.) Most worthless people don't make it past 1 or 2 semesters of engineering classes.

11-12-2009, 02:55 PM	#18
BGPunk2001 Scooby Specialist Member#: 46134 Join Date: Oct 2003 Chapter/Region: TXIC Location: RIP Roger Lauderdale	^ Yeah, that sounds like a bit of different situation. It sounds like how it SHOULD be.

11-12-2009, 02:57 PM	#20
Matt K Scooby Specialist Member#: 45204 Join Date: Oct 2003 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: you are so complex Vehicle: 16 you don't respond to danger	news flash: in the real world you almost always work in a group, and some of the other members are quite often retarded. Learn how to make it work now. It'll pay dividends later. When I got stuck with a lame-o group in college, I'd always just kind of take over. tell everybody that i'd do my section, then i'd offer to "integrate" all the sections together at the end. That way you get the chance to basically rewrite everybody's ****ty contributions and still get a good grade. Also, i'm worthless, and made it through 2 years of engineering school with a 3.5gpa, so your hypothesis is incorrect!

11-12-2009, 03:09 PM	#21
sha_zapple Scooby Specialist Member#: 41012 Join Date: Aug 2003 Chapter/Region: E. Canada Vehicle: 1998 Legacy L	Splitting projects up so everyone does a % of every task is always a disaster. Nobody writes the same, facts are repeated, and a lot of points are missed. It's much easier to figure out peoples strong points and separate the project by tasks. Two people research/write, one person compiles/formats the paper, another person creates the presentation and presents, etc... There's always a dud, don't expect them do to equivalent amounts of work, that's life. Make him the gopher or just write him off completely and make sure his name doesn't show up on the project.

11-12-2009, 03:14 PM	#23
The Enemy Scooby Specialist Member#: 12851 Join Date: Nov 2001 Chapter/Region: South East Location: Loitering Outlaw	Congratulations, you have the skills to be a leader because you recognize everyone's issues and faults and suddenly you've just volunteered to be the leader. Now, as a leader you have to take charge and run the project. You have some people who don't understand what they're supposed to do, some who are misguided, some that will do what needs to be done, and a right-hand man. Sounds like a normal team to me! Now go figure out a way to make it work and realize that if you get 80% performance out of your team not to bitch about having to do the hardest 20% of the work. Good luck!

11-12-2009, 03:16 PM	#24
JjSwee Scooby Newbie Member#: 75880 Join Date: Nov 2004 Chapter/Region: Tri-State Location: Philadelphia, PA Vehicle: 1997 Legacy GT	I had a class where the groups worked suprisingly well except for one. The girl in one of the groups copy and pasted straight out of a website, verbatim, with no words of her own. They got caught and almost all failed the assignment. When confronted about it, she thought the copy/paste was acceptable.