With finals right around the corner, even students hitting the books might be surprised by the grade they get.
According to an article in the New York Times, more and more students feel they deserve an a for effort, not necessarily an a for excellence.
Krisen Miller, who works at the English Center, said she has seen the same attitude in some of the students that come to them for help.
"Particularly during the first semester, a lot of students come in who made A's all through high school are coming in and they got a C on their first paper," Miller, an English graduate student, said. "They don't understand why."
Elizabeth Mueller, coordinator for academic coaching and counseling. said she has been noticing this general attitude on campus for about 10 years.
"What we've seen in our office is that they did not have to study in high school, that they basically would open their textbooks and their notes the day of the test and get A's and B's," Mueller said. "Even though they're told over and over again that's not going to work at the college level, many of them don't understand that not only will that not work at the college level."
Chris King, who also works at the English Center, said he agrees a lot of students come in after their first paper confused about their grade.
"You have to go through it and explain that the expectations change a lot from high school to college," King, a junior in broadcast journalism, said. "You can't just write down you opinion. You have to really do the research, put the work in and meet the teacher's expectations."
Kendra Santora, a senior in biomedical sciences, said she can understand why students sometimes feel they should be graded based on effort.
"I do feel like sometimes we put a lot of effort into things and don't recieve the grades that our efforts show, depending on what the teacher puts on the test," Santora said.
Miller, who has worked at the center for eight years, said she can understand why people feel like they should get an a just based on completing the work, especially coming from high school, where they may have been graded on if they did what was asked of them and not the quality of the work.
"The difference is now when you get to college it's not so much did you do it, but how well did you do it," Miller said.
Miller said one common misconception about the English Center is that they are going to agree with the student and tell them their teacher was wrong.
"What we do is we sort of take them through what the teacher said and then also point them to the rubric," Miller said.
Miller said they do this to help explain to students why their paper merited a c and not an a.
"If it is a good paper, then it's a C," Miller said. "It has to go above and beyond good to be a B or an A."
Miller said she recommeds students talk to their teacher before they turn the paper in to get a better grasp of what their teacher's expecations are. She said most teachers are willing to look overdrafts and tell students what they can add to their papers to improve and what they need to change.
"Most teachers are pretty good about working with students ahead a time and helping them," Miller said.
Santora said she also talks to her teachers after a test if she thinks she received a grade she did not deserve.
"Then they can tell you how to study next time for the test," Santora said.
Mueller said students don't realize that just looking over notes two days before a test, even if it is more than what they did in high school, is not going to be enough.
"Studying is a whole plethera of activities, looking over notes is only a small part of what is required for studying. Studying is actually actively working with the material, not just looking at it," Mueller said.
King said even if students made good grades in high school, they may still need some help.
"They get here and they realize that the writing process is maybe a little bit more complex than in high school," King said. "You have to really dig deeper to find those ideas that aren't just on the surface."
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