I hate group projects.

[AGramatikas]

I hated group projects as well--until grad school. This is a post I recently made on another "group project" themed forum, and thought you would find it intriguing/useful as well...if not, oh well--it worked for me.

For me, going back to school to get my MBA was exciting--after a year of job searching, I was enthusiastic about getting the chance to really appreciate this education opportunity. However, after my first week of classes, I immediately had reservations. Every single one of my teachers had assigned us a group project, and I was flooded with the instant disdain for group projects that I had accumulated in undergrad.

Now, the upside to grad school: we have classes with a lot of the same people; I was able to clench a group that transcended across all three of my group projects; and most importantly, a girl named Brenna was in these groups. Brenna suggested that we use an online source called Group Table. She sent us an e-vite through the site, set up our account and joined the three separate groups that she had set up for each class. From here, we were able to upload and revise all of our documents in our "Binder," schedule due dates and tasks in our "Calendar," and collaborate virtually via live chat on the site.

We too had a power point project similar to yours--20mins divided among four people in the group. The one difference, we had this site to share each of our slides for each of us to review/revise and add to. We ended up getting the highest grade in the class, due to our ability to present a cohesive project that didn't appear to be done separately.

I swear by this site and highly recommend it for any future projects you may have.
www.grouptable.com

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

Funnily enough, I have pretty much the exact same project going on as the OP. However, given that this is like a bi-weekly thing for us, we're used to doing it. That, and the teacher limits us to only three slides, anyways. It definitely fixes any problems with time issues.

Anyways, with the exception of these easy bi-weekly Powerpoints, I tend to hate group projects, particularly if it's a reading assignment and we all have to share the same paper/book/screen/whatever. While I have never really been a genius student or child prodigy, I always excelled at reading. All throughout Elementary School, I was at least two grades ahead of my current class. (Example, by the 1st grade, I was reading at a 3rd grade level) As such, I read faster than the average person.

So I take my time reading a page, examining every part and absorbing all of the information. I'm ready to turn the page, but my partner/group is still on the second fucking paragraph! So I get to sit there and twiddle my thumbs for several minutes until we can finally turn the page and repeat the process.

And then there are the people you really wish were in a different group. The people who endlessly talk and don't do anything, or the self-appointed 'leaders' who are never satisfied with everyone else's work.

Another problem associated with this is finding a group to begin with. Sometimes instructors say "Only two people per group" yet don't bother counting to make sure there's an even number of students, so when there's inevitably a group with three people, they get antsy until you tell them we had no choice. Or if you were ever the type of person who always got 'picked last', you know how hard this could be at times. Like every student instantly hit it off or already knew each other...except you. So then you have to akwardly shuffle up to a couple of BFF's and ask to join them, and they get these looks of revulsion like you're intruding on their super-happy fun time.

Thankfully, college hasn't really been like that last paragraph. But grades K-12? Oh god.

 

[Sleepy Sol]

I don't mind if I get grouped with people that actually give a shit about the project we're assigned. Unfortunately, that's rarely the case, so I usually dislike group projects.

 

[Ursus Buckler]

I can't stand them, mainly from the fact that people are idiots. In a comprehensive school anyone I got paired with was such a monumental moron that I had to do the entirety of any presentation we ever did by myself. In a grammar school almost everyone is too 'cool' to actually say anything at all, meaning that I also have to end up doing the work by myself. I'm glad that it's not obligatory to be a group in Film Studies when you have to make an original film, because creatively, I can't stand the thought of someone shitting all over my ideas through being a fucking moron. Almost anyone I get paired with is either incompetent or just doesn't understand/listen to what I'm saying, so I'm better off just doing the whole bloody thing by myself. At the end of the day, I know what I want and they know what they want, and in my experience the two rarely marry up.

 

[b3nn3tt]

Well, I was quite lucky at uni, because the group I ended up with for our first group assigment were great, we all worked well together, put in the effort and did well in our presentations.

However, I can appreciate that sometimes people get stuck with others who don't pull their weight, or work well with the others. But in those cases, you either need to kick them out of the group, or force them to pull their socks up. In the OP's case, you should have insisted that everyone meet up to practice before the presentation, even if only once. If you haven't had a run-through together, then you don't know how well it will flow. Regardless of who the leader is, it is up to every member of the group to ensure that your end product works as a whole, not just as individual bits shoved together.

 

[Etni]

My favourite group project at the university was a course where the "final exam" of a sort was a presentation held in pairs. And when the presentation day came, my pair just decided not to show up and not to tell me she's not coming. That presentation obviously didn't go too well.

 

[Psychedelic Spartan]

yeah, one kid almost made me fail 8th grade science because he forgot to put 50% of the stuff we needed onto the board for the science fair, 40% of out overall grade. We got a 39 but luckily we got to make it up kind of and get a 63 on it. partially my teachers fault, could have had up to a 70/100 which she said she wanted to give us. It was her choice. she's a liar.

 

[EasySt17]

Group projects are great for underachievers and painfully awful for overachievers... Every time I knew one was going to happen I instantly started looking for someone who had a glimmer of understanding during lectures...unfortunately that was less than 10% of the class... because I live in America...

 

[NardBasket]

I despise group projects, and my school is all about them. So far in the professional world I've never had to share responsibility equally with three other random schmucks. Forced group work is the worst!