Putting the “C” in “Average”

Anybody who has ever sat down to construct an assignment for students knows that it can be time consuming and difficult work.  Trying to balance the amount of work that students have to do with the goals you want them to achieve and the assignment’s proportion of the course grade often takes me much longer than I anticipate.  Grading assignments is similarly time consuming.  Both of these factors add to the frustration associated with a stack of assignments in which many of the students seem to have forgotten that the assignment had any guidelines at all.  If I may, allow me to address the college students out there:

Students, if your instructor puts the time into constructing an assignment the least you can do is read it!  I have also heard from numerous sources that there is a high correlation between following the guidelines of an assignment and doing well on said assignment, partially because so many of your peers will fail to follow these guidelines that whatever you turn in will look like a masterwork by comparison.

I should note that this has been true of students at each of the institutions where I have taught but I sometimes wonder if the students in one of my courses have conspired to rid the planet of grade inflation one requirement at a time.