Rants; A Tale Of Epic Annoyance

College Finals

YOOOOOOO WHAT'S UP EVERYONE IT'S BEEN LIKE TWO YEARS 

Before I begin, an update: I'm now almost twenty, and I'm a Psychology major in college. When I started this book, I was..Sixteen? I think? I was pissed at the world, and wanted everyone to understand why I loathed existence so much. I was an anxious mess, full of self doubt and fear, and now.. 

Well, it's about the same, but I'm better dressed and I know a lot more puns. 

College finals are single-handedly the worst experience that comes with earning a degree. Whoever decided upon the idea that a cumulative, 100 question test regarding the entirety of a semester of information should be held at 8:00 am on a Monday, in my personal opinion, should be placed on trial for crimes against the Geneva Convention. Furthermore, whoever decided upon the existence of cumulative exams as a whole, in likeness of the first guy, should also be tried in front of a jury of his peers for the same crime. What does making me relive and regurgitate an entire 15 weeks' worth of knowledge provide for you, other than an excessive signature stating that I was listening the entire time you were babbling about ratio scales? What kind of sadistic pleasure do you gain from me trying to remember positivist theories from the first week of classes, while I'm running on two hours of sleep, a Monster Java energy drink, and dwindling willpower? 

The best part, dear reader, is that it is entirely up to the professor as to whether or not they use cumulative exams. On what shaded and dark part of this green earth do you, Professor Person, deem it a necessity to create exams over the entirety of a semester, when the only thing we haven't previously tested on is the new information following our previous exam? Doesn't it make more sense to test as you go along, rather than doing so, and then additionally testing over the information already made into exams? Albeit, I recognize that you want to ensure that your students are absorbing the information you're providing, but you could very easily have five point pop quizzes, or in class assignments of the same caliber that call upon that previous knowledge. But for the love of everything that is holy and not, do NOT ask me to recite information you gave me the third day of the semester when we haven't discussed it in class for over four months. 

In addition to cumulative finals, one of my favourite parts of finals week has to be the condescending study groups that pop up in your email, being led by different students. Albeit, I led one myself, but I can assure everyone that it was the least condescending group, filled with snacks and complaints about our professor handling our class in the least professional way possible. Nay, this is not the realm of condescension that fuels my anger, dear reader, oh no. Rather, it's the student led, "I'm a freshman in a 2000s level class so I'm going to boss you all around and act like a dick whenever you ask a question that I feel you should know the answer to, even though this is a study group and the entire point of a study group is to ask questions you're uncertain of" nonsense that I despise with the entirety of my sophomore soul. Don't lead a study group, built and designed to help students study, if your sole purpose as the ""leader"" of the group is to belittle and snub the questions that are thrown to you by curious students. 

Finally, the third main thing in the trifecta of shit that annoys me to death about college finals, is professors continuing to assign homework into finals week. As I type this, I have a paper due tomorrow, my last day of finals, for the class I'm taking a final in, /tomorrow/. Why the professor would feel that the singular last day of testing, when all students are trying their best to evacuate campus as swiftly as possible, absolutely baffles me to my very core. Why would you want to grade a paper during your break? On what part of this torture room of a planet would you decide that a paper on the singular last day of testing  is something of value to you, as a teaching professional? Do you enjoy knowing that 90% of your students will forget about it, and will voice type their papers on their phones while driving home so they can make sure not to lose any points on the last day? Do you derive pleasure from knowing that most every student is going to completely bullshit that last paper, in an attempt to finally breathe a sigh of relief as they gain another semester of education under their belt?

In conclusion, finals suck, and they're my least favourite part of trying to become a Psychologist. 

-M