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The Law of Work
Law of Work Archive

Are you an 'entitled' student?

by David Doorey November 11, 2008
written by David Doorey November 11, 2008

There’s a great story in the National Post today describing a study that measured the extent to which undergraduate students believe that they are ‘entitled’ to good marks simply because they attend classes or do assigned readings.  The story suggests that many students in the 18-25 age group today believe that university education is like shopping in a retail store, where the ‘customer is always right’, so that professors are there to ‘serve’ them.  Are you a student that thinks they are ‘entitled’?
My colleague at York, Professor Louise Ripley, has a great discussion of grades on her website.   My own sense is that attitudes of students have changed.  I have multiple university degrees, and yet in my entire ‘career’ as a student, I never once spoke to a professor about my grades.  Now, as a prof, I routinely get inquiries from students who believe their marks should be higher because they studied hard.  We didn’t have email when I did my undergrad degree in the late 1980s, so if we wanted to speak to a professor, we needed to make the effort to attend office hours.  Nowadays, I usually sit alone during office hours, but I get dozens of emails a week from students, many of which are asking me to summarize what they missed when the didn’t come to class.  It would never have occurred to me to ask a prof about a missed lecture–you just got the notes from another student.
One thing I find students today often don’t understand is that they are measured relative to other students.  Everyone is marked using the same grading grid, and it is usually very obvious which papers/tests/exams deserve an “A”.  At York, we have mandatory grade distributions, so that, for example, no professor can grant grades in the “A” range to more than 15% of students, and 30-40% of students must receive a grade in the “C” range.  In other words, “C” grades are common, and relatively few people will get “A’s”.  This helps ensure that getting an “A” actually means something–that your performance was superior.  The moral of the story is that students need to work harder and do better than the people sitting beside them if they want to get the best marks.  You are in a competition, just like you will be when you start looking for careers.  This is why university is not a ‘service’ designed to give you good grades.  The job of your professor in terms of grades is to ensure that you receive the grade you earned relative to the performance of your peers.  
But I’d be interested to hear any comments you might have of this story or my comments.

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David Doorey

Professor Doorey is an Associate Professor of Work Law and Industrial Relations at York University. He is Academic Director of Osgoode Hall Law School’s executive LLM Program in Labour and Employment Law and a Senior Research Associate at Harvard Law School’s Labor and Worklife Program. Professor Doorey is a graduate of Osgoode Hall Law School (LL.B., Ph.D), London School of Economics (LLM Labour Law), and the University of Toronto (B.A., M.I.R.).

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