I hate group projects.

[minuialear]

So no, it's not my fault. I'm not their mother. Moreover, for a project like this you don't need everyone to meet up. Coordination is hardly the issue when you just need a sequence of people to say their 4 minute sections. You just need people to know their 4 minutes (they said they all did). Is it my fault that my teammates were liars?

First of all there's the very real possibility that your partners were rambling due to nerves, rather than because they failed to do any sort of preparation beforehand. But regardless of whether they did practice independently or not, it frankly doesn't matter if you weren't the official leader: if you saw issues with how the group was being led, and if you cared that much about the presentation, you should have spoken up and made sure those issues were being addressed (and should have gone to the professor for help if you couldn't get your team to agree to get its act in gear). When you get into the real world, where this project could have made the difference between you getting paid or being unemployed, you won't be able to use the excuse, "But it's not my fault; I wasn't the leader."

This is one point of having group projects in college: to prepare you for the real world. And in the real world, you will have to deal with a broad range of colleagues (some of which are extremely competant people, and some of which are significantly worse than the people in your group). And in the real world, your client's not going to cut you any slack for allowing the rest of your group to drag you down with them, regardless of just how bad they truly were. You will be held equally accountable for your group's presentation. Accordingly, you have to learn how to work with other people (which includes making sure things get done, understanding how others work so that you can ensure those things get done, etc). If you don't, then you are indirectly guilty for anything that happens as a result.

You made a mistake (which is a normal, common occurrence in college), so accept it, learn from it, and move on.

 

[Newtonyd]

It doesn't matter. You should have said "hey guys, we need to rehearse our presentation!". You don't have to be the leader to do that. Also, your team mates aren't lairs. This is the product of you not being a good group and practicing your presentation. They might have very well thought their part of the project was just 4 minutes, and didn't realize it took them so long (probably because of a lack of practice). If you had stood up and made your group mates rehearse, then you wouldn't be making this thread. All you are doing now is sitting around and passing blame on the internet. Stop acting like this isn't your fault. If a group project fails like yours did, it is the fault of everyone in the groups. Not the one person who went over, or the second person who went over. It is everyone's fault for not working together. Stop deferring blame. All you had to do is ask that your team mates rehearse the project once, and it would have been fine.

Oh, and by the way: when you get a job, you will constantly be on a team. This is the reality of being an adult... you are expected to work with others. There are very few jobs that will allow you to work effectively alone. Working with other people is how the world works. Chalk this up as a learning experience, and move on.

If this were any other forum, my words would be much harsher.

No, I'm sorry. This is wrong. I asked them to make sure it was 4 minutes. They did not. We couldn't rehearse together because of scheduling, especially one person who had two jobs (the other person who didn't get to speak). Nor should we need to, it's far easier to rehearse your part by yourself. Anyone else added would have made it extraneous.

They clearly didn't rehearse at all, if they had they would have noticed. I did rehearse. They made mistakes on the project, my only mistake was overestimating their competence and work ethic. Thus I come here to rant. You've never complained about idiots at work?

I suppose I could have spent hours with each person making sure their presentation was excellent, but I really shouldn't have to. I don't expect anyone to make each baby-step with me, not in a 300 class in college. Honestly, if they tried, I would get annoyed. I've done dozens of presentations by this point. I suppose it's the chef's fault if the cook doesn't know how to boil water?

And please, keep your harsh language in its holster. You might frighten the children.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Well, I've always despised group projects. Hated them with a passion is more like it, actually. I sort of thought that I would never see them again when I got to middle school. As it turned out, I had to deal with them there, too. Finally, high school. And no balls group projects, until I get into a health class. The teacher there mainly taught kindergarten kids before getting transferred for some reason, and apparently she thinks that the same methods she applies to little children in a classroom setting will apply to a gaggle of teenagers.

Imagine my rage and disappointment when EVERYONE is so thrilled to be making sparkling glittery posters, and buddying up with their friends, and doing completely ridiculous activities, all in the name of learning about alcohol, and tobacco, and drugs.

Meanwhile, every time I hear her announce something like 'You'll need a partner...' or, 'Everyone get into groups of x number!,' I just glare at her, hoping that some how my rage will be converting into laser beams that shoot out of my eyes.

I guess I'm the only one who has ever walked through the doors of ANY school in my town, who learns best when alone and only with generic worksheet type material. I don't need to be pairing up with a bunch of random people to do my work. And I'm pretty sure that we don't need colorful posters and light-hearted group activities to convey the topic of '1001 reasons why smoking will kill you and everyone around you.' Every time someone asks me why I'm so quiet and withdrawn all the time, my reply is 'Maybe when you all stop sucking so much I'll attempt to strike up a conversation.'

It's not that you're alone, it's that educators like to pretend that students who work best alone don't exist. As far as I can tell, about 90% of what they teach prospective teachers about how to do things in class is stuff that was thought up by some psychologist who never actually worked with students, and hasn't been in a classroom since getting that PhD. There is supposed to be some amount of research that shows that working in groups benefits all students, when in reality it's usually one student who takes it seriously and does all of the work, while the rest of them just sit their, thankful that somebody else is doing the work.

OT: I hate group projects. It was bad enough in Highschool, where the worst I had to deal with was a group that didn't really care about their grades. In college, I have all that, plus the added bonus of scheduling time to work with people whose schedules don't really match up. It is not pleasant. That said, I'll probably have my students doing the occasional group project, because some students actually do work better in groups. I'll just be sure to always give students the option to do things on their own, because with some of them, that's what they'll be doing regardless of what group they're in.

Edit: Darn it, I just noticed an embarrassing typo, and the post has already been quoted, so fixing it won't get rid of it completely. I need to stop posting late at night.

 

[smithy_2045]

Sounds like it's your own fault for working as 5 individuals, instead of as one group.

 

[Stall]

No, I'm sorry. This is wrong. I asked them to make sure it was 4 minutes. They did not. We couldn't rehearse together because of scheduling, especially one person who had two jobs (the other person who didn't get to speak). Nor should we need to, it's far easier to rehearse your part by yourself. Anyone else added would have made it extraneous.

They clearly didn't rehearse at all, if they had they would have noticed. I did rehearse. They made mistakes on the project, my only mistake was overestimating their competence and work ethic. Thus I come here to rant. You've never complained about idiots at work?

I suppose I could have spent hours with each person making sure their presentation was excellent, but I really shouldn't have to. I don't expect anyone to make each baby-step with me, not in a 300 class in college. Honestly, if they tried, I would get annoyed. I've done dozens of presentations by this point. I suppose it's the chef's fault if the cook doesn't know how to boil water?

And please, keep your harsh language in its holster. You might frighten the children.

Whatever you need to tell yourself man. If you really have to sit around and pass off all the blame, then go for it. But at the end of the day, you are at fault as well. When a group project fails, it's everyone's fault. You could have taken the initiative and asked them to rehearse together. But you didn't. You didn't have to sit around and baby them like children. All you had to do is say "Hey guys! We really need to rehearse this to get a good grade! When can we meet?". You weren't willing to take that initiative, or assumed you didn't have to, and now you are paying the price.

You did make another mistake: it was not working as a group in a group project. The kind of attitude you are displaying now will cost you promotions and raises in the real world. Hell, it might even cost you a job. You should work on fixing your disdain for working as a group and try to learn from this experience instead learning this the EVEN HARDER way when you get a job as a professional.

 

[Smooth Operator]

They are group projects for a reason, it's not every man for himself, you all should have get together and go through the stuff you all had to see how it fits... the real challenge in these is to coordinate with everyone.

Most jobs will need a group effort, and if you learn to coordinate groups beforehand you have a very high chance of quick progression to higher positions so try to pay attention.
And if that doesn't sell it let me put it like this, ladies love the leaders

 

[similar.squirrel]

They are necessary to some extent in almost every career. That is why they make you do them in college.

 

[evenest]

No, I'm sorry. This is wrong. I asked them to make sure it was 4 minutes. They did not. We couldn't rehearse together because of scheduling, especially one person who had two jobs (the other person who didn't get to speak). Nor should we need to, it's far easier to rehearse your part by yourself. Anyone else added would have made it extraneous.

They clearly didn't rehearse at all, if they had they would have noticed. I did rehearse. They made mistakes on the project, my only mistake was overestimating their competence and work ethic. Thus I come here to rant. You've never complained about idiots at work?

I suppose I could have spent hours with each person making sure their presentation was excellent, but I really shouldn't have to. I don't expect anyone to make each baby-step with me, not in a 300 class in college. Honestly, if they tried, I would get annoyed. I've done dozens of presentations by this point. I suppose it's the chef's fault if the cook doesn't know how to boil water?

There are so many posts in this thread that I want to respond to, but I don't have the time, nor do I think it would be appropriate. As a former instructor, we don't assign group projects to torment students. We were all students at one point. If your instructor models the class and projects on what types of projects students will be doing once they've graduated, you should be thankful that you're being given a space to find out just how badly things can go without the ramification of losing the job.

Rehearsal isn't just so that you can remember your part and be more comfortable with what you are doing, it is (among other things) designed to familiarize the entire group with the complete project so that the individual members can tailor their respective parts to compliment one another. That woman who knew everything and liked to talk probably covered a great deal of what the other speakers were going to be covering. If that's the case, she might have realized it during rehearsal and been able to control herself. If not, the group could have recognized that she should have gone last as a way to sum up what the other members touched upon. You could have critiqued one another and made suggestion on how to improve upon the entire project instead of viewing each others' work as unconnected.

It is each members job to see that the group succeeds in its presentation. To put blame on the "leader" doesn't begin to address the problem. Imagine if this were a presentation for a company that your company wanted to work with. Going over the time permitted, looking disjointed and disconnected with one another would have been disastrous. Having three of the four members on the team looking sloppy would not have earned you the job/contract you were looking for. As a group, the company would have failed, even if one of its members looked brilliant while doing it.

Few jobs have people working by themselves. Even my current job where I am the only paid employee, I still rely on the volunteer membership to help me do my job. Ultimately, if those people didn't do what they were asked for, it would still be me who looked like I had failed. And to touch on the chef analogy, it may not be the chef's fault that the cook can't boil water, but if the chef cannot then make the proper dish in a way that pleases the patron (because the cook failed to do something), that chef and his restaurant are soon going to be without patrons. It would behoove that person to make sure those around him succeed so that he succeeds.

I get the distinct impression that you didn't much buy into the group project either. You wanted to do your individual part and get out. It sounds a great deal like each of you failed one another.

 

[evenest]

It's not that you're alone, it's that educators like to pretend that students who work best alone don't exist. As far as I can tell, about 90% of what they teach prospective teachers about how to do things in class is stuff that was thought up by some psychologist who never actually worked with students, and hasn't been in a classroom since getting that PhD. There is supposed to be some amount of research that shows that working in groups benefits all students, when in reality it's usually one student who takes it seriously and does all of the work, while the rest of them just sit their, thankful that somebody else is doing the work.

You make several assertions here that are troubling. Educators are never that far from their own classwork. They constantly attend lectures and conferences, interact with other educators, etc.

Your claim that they got the "stuff that was thought up by some psychologist who never actually worked with students" is also troubling in that it undercuts a process that does occur and assumes that teachers, like the students you hold up as lazy and/or incompetent, are simply looking to give you busy work without any purpose behind it. First off, class pedagogy is a serious and ever evolving science, and I can think of no one in academia who would work from a premise that doesn't have some foundation of research behind it.

It seems to me that the example you hold up at the end as the rule of all group projects suggests that the individual who did all the work while the others sat on their asses should have taken steps to remedy the problem before the day of the presentation. It may be that the professor in your example didn't take steps to ensure accountability among the project members; all I can say to that is, in my experience of teaching for ten years and being a student for almost fifteen-years, teachers have been around the block a few times and have set up a process that far too many students do not pursue (other than coming to the teacher on the day of the project to air their grievances.

I am sorry that you and many more like you see classroom projects as something designed to annoy the hell out of you and that serve no purpose. It is a shame, and perhaps educators need to do a better job of underpinning their assignments with a real-world antecedent. But my experience suggests to me that it doesn't matter if no one is willing to listen to it. How can you add something to a cup that is already full?

 

[Esotera]

University labs are terrible, it's partnered work, so you're stuck with someone who either doesn't understand english very well, hasn't read the practical brief, or is hungover/still drunk. Or more typically, a combination of all three.

Group projects can work if it's a good group, just the majority of the time it isn't.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

It's not that you're alone, it's that educators like to pretend that students who work best alone don't exist. As far as I can tell, about 90% of what they teach prospective teachers about how to do things in class is stuff that was thought up by some psychologist who never actually worked with students, and hasn't been in a classroom since getting that PhD. There is supposed to be some amount of research that shows that working in groups benefits all students, when in reality it's usually one student who takes it seriously and does all of the work, while the rest of them just sit their, thankful that somebody else is doing the work.

You make several assertions here that are troubling. Educators are never that far from their own classwork. They constantly attend lectures and conferences, interact with other educators, etc.

Your claim that they got the "stuff that was thought up by some psychologist who never actually worked with students" is also troubling in that it undercuts a process that does occur and assumes that teachers, like the students you hold up as lazy and/or incompetent, are simply looking to give you busy work without any purpose behind it. First off, class pedagogy is a serious and ever evolving science, and I can think of no one in academia who would work from a premise that doesn't have some foundation of research behind it.

It seems to me that the example you hold up at the end as the rule of all group projects suggests that the individual who did all the work while the others sat on their asses should have taken steps to remedy the problem before the day of the presentation. It may be that the professor in your example didn't take steps to ensure accountability among the project members; all I can say to that is, in my experience of teaching for ten years and being a student for almost fifteen-years, teachers have been around the block a few times and have set up a process that far too many students do not pursue (other than coming to the teacher on the day of the project to air their grievances.

I am sorry that you and many more like you see classroom projects as something designed to annoy the hell out of you and that serve no purpose. It is a shame, and perhaps educators need to do a better job of underpinning their assignments with a real-world antecedent. But my experience suggests to me that it doesn't matter if no one is willing to listen to it. How can you add something to a cup that is already full?

Hey, that's my experience as a senior in an education department. Pedagogy is so heavily based on fads that it's not even funny. They teach us so little that is actually useful in working with kids, and so much that some bureaucrat somewhere thought was a good idea, that I was seriously considering dropping the program until my microteach finally put me in an actual classroom.

Edit: Basically, there's research, and there's research. Education is the only profession that I know of that goes back to ancient times and still gets complete paradigm shifts every 10 years or so. Other professions do not change how they do things as quickly or to as great a degree as educators do; imagine if Lawyers came up with an entirely new form of logic every 10 or 20 years -- yes, forget laws, we're talking the basic premises you need to read them here -- that's pretty much what teachers do. When you've got a profession that, in a sense goes back to the dawn of time, and has a definite tradition going back at least to Ancient Greece, ordinarily you'd see a bit more stability.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

edit: double post due to lag

 

[Levethian]

Totally agree with OP. Emerged after 5 years studying architecture, and I can safely say that group projects can go and fek themselves.

The university group-work dynamic bears no resemblance to office teamwork in practice, so is staggeringly useless.

Your team-mates screwed up. Each individual team member should have rehearsed their 4 minute part of their presentation.
Your professors screwed up. They should have enforced a time limit on each member.

Presumably you were graded as a group, so should be fine in the end.

 

[Dr.Fantastic]

I hate group projects. I always get paired up with either the Clueless idiot, Procrastinator, Dumb Hot chick, and the "Do all the work or I punch you in the face" Guy.
I RARELY get a good partner.

One shitty group project sticks in my mind. We had to do a history project 6th grade where A greek myth was Given. I was doing the visuals( Had to make a board game based off the myths). I busted my ass to make it look perfect since the project counted for half of your grade(I had a C in history at the time). I spent a good 7 hours on the project(We were given a week). My partner was given the two page essay since my handwriting was and is shitty. So the date comes, I had my portion but did he have the essay? NO HE FUCKING DIDNT! NOT EVEN A SINGLE GODDAMN SENTENCE READY! I told my teacher and she told me that "I was responsible for him not having the essay, since I was his partner". So instead of getting A's and B's, I got an F. 4 A's, 3 B's, and an F.

Fuck Group projects.

 

[JoJo]

Listen, there's a number of issues with rehearsing.

1. I'm not the leader.
2. They were told what was needed (4 minutes) and they all agreed.
3. Everyone has to schedule around work and school, we were lucky there was time to meet at all.
4. We had 9 days to do this project.

So no, it's not my fault. I'm not their mother. Moreover, for a project like this you don't need everyone to meet up. Coordination is hardly the issue when you just need a sequence of people to say their 4 minute sections. You just need people to know their 4 minutes (they said they all did). Is it my fault that my teammates were liars?

Just because you aren't the leader doesn't mean you can't take control or help organise the group. I understand this situation was frustrating but it really is your entire group's (including you) fault for not rehearsing even once. I also don't understand why you let your group members take so long, I would have made angry gestures at them once they had gone over the time limit until they sped up or sat down.

I actually really enjoy group work as I like taking control and making sure the group keeps to schedule, plus it means I can do the parts which interest me and I'm good at. I don't know why people don't like working in groups, it can be the most fun kind of work if you do it right.

 

[SirDoom]

Group projects almost always go badly with me, for various reasons.

Four standard cases.

1- I'm the only interest one, everyone else doesn't care. (I do all the work)
2- Everyone else is more interested than me, and I can't get a word in edgewise (I do little of the work)
3- Nobody cares, really. (We all do an equal share of the work, but the end result sucks.)
4- It actually works!

Of the four, I rarely see that last one. Even the most successful lab I've been in was basically just a "Ok, everyone has the basic numbers. Now go do the calculations on your own- I'm going to lunch." In other words the group is disbanded as soon as everyone has the bare minimum they need for their own individual reports.

Then you have the work speed differences. If you're given one week to do a project, you'll always have the guy who wants to meet up on day 2 of 7 with the finished product ready for team review, the guy who won't do his part until an hour before the actual presentation, and the guy who has a combination of 20+ credit hours of classes, a full time job, and 2 sports taking up all his free time.

To top it all off, style is a big factor as well. It's rare to see a "You do chapter 1, I'll do 2, and he can do 3" situation work out, as the sections won't blend together as they would if it was done by one person.

So, in my mind, group projects are terrible. Unless you get a group of people who have compatible schedules, who can work well together, and who all work at roughly the same speed, you'll end up with a messy thrown-together end result that is worse that what any one of you could have made on your own.

 

[Stall]

It's not that you're alone, it's that educators like to pretend that students who work best alone don't exist.

Or maybe instructors assign group projects because they know that's how the real world works -_-. Working well alone is a worthless skill in the long run, since the number of jobs where you effectively work by yourself are few and far in between. Working with other people is an essential skill in EVERY profession, hence is why instructors assign group projects: so you can LEARN to work with other people.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

It's not that you're alone, it's that educators like to pretend that students who work best alone don't exist.

Or maybe instructors assign group projects because they know that's how the real world works -_-. Working well alone is a worthless skill in the long run, since the number of jobs where you effectively work by yourself are few and far in between. Working with other people is an essential skill in EVERY profession, hence is why instructors assign group projects: so you can LEARN to work with other people.

No, it's literally because there's research that shows that students learn better in groups. I'm an ed major, and we talk about this sort of thing all the time.

 

[Random Encounter]

Usually the complaints about group projects are how their team didn't finish the project in time or some members half assed their part of the assignment.

As bad as I am when it comes to assignments, I still prefer to work by myself.