Why are so many premeds stupid?

[QofQuimica]

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If it isn't available to everyone in the class it isn't fair. Everyone should have their notes, book, access to study groups, and internet. These are all fair ways to study. Unless there is a library of old exams available to all the students I don't think it is fair.

Life is inherently unfair. Wouldn't it make things more fair if we could distribute equally good high school educations to everyone? Equal work ethics? Or, even better, equal IQs? I'm not saying you're wrong to feel the way you do, but you will never be able to make life completely fair.

One thing that amazes me about teaching premeds is that the same students who cannot read their textbook to learn the Sn1 mechanism have more than enough ingenuity to find old exams and memorize the questions. 😕

 

[Bluntman]

I know you are talking about after school, but in school the answer should be found in your book or notes if not then you are right your instructors are silly and you should change schools.

If you just don't feel like reading your book and it's easier to look at an old test I would say that is just pure laziness and not the teachers fault.

(I'm saying in general, not directing it toward you.)

Nutmeg- I know you have good intentions with your altruistic beliefs (hell, so did the Ruskies), but this type of pure thought mainly gets people absolutely trampled on in the real world.

 

[Nutmeg1621]

Life is inherently unfair. Wouldn't it make things more fair if we could distribute equally good high school educations to everyone? Equal work ethics? Or, even better, equal IQs? I'm not saying you're wrong to feel the way you do, but you will never be able to make life completely fair.

One thing that amazes me about teaching premeds is that the same students who cannot read their textbook to learn the Sn1 mechanism have more than enough ingenuity to find old exams and memorize the questions. 😕

You are right that life will never be fair, but it is my decision not to contribute in making things unfair for other people.

And I lol at your second point. That is so true.

 

[JohnnyOU]

If she really does study all the time like you say, and is failing all her prereqs, maybe medicine is not for her.

You don't have to be a genious, but you have to be able to understand the materials or how can you help patients?

 

[Nutmeg1621]

Nutmeg- I know you have good intentions with your altruistic beliefs (hell, so did the Ruskies), but this type of pure thought mainly gets people absolutely trampled on in the real world.

I've been ok thus far. Made it through high school, the military, and now I embark on my pre-med adventures.

I have been doing good in my classes (3.89 gpa thusfar), and I believe it was you that pointed out that she wasn't doing great and that was the whole point in this thread. But just b/c you are behind doesn't mean it's ok to "cheat." If it is your definition of cheating. It's the whole robin hood theory, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. Some think it is ok, and to others it is still stealing.

 

[DrBowtie]

Ask in the Med forums if they would use old tests if available. I think most would laugh that the question was even being asked.

 

[Aseptic]

So my friend is your "noble" pre-med or whatever you may call it. And she is doing so bad in all her pre-reqs even though she studies her ass off. The big difference why the kids do well in these classes is whether or not you have old tests/old quizzes/old hws etc, and I offered them to her, and she's like no thanks I want to do this on my own effort. Wtf? Are you ******ed? It isn't cheating or anything, it's being smart about the professor's laziness, and using it to your advantage. There's nothing wrong about that. Now that I think about it, she pisses me off because she's one of those do-good, I am right everyone else is wrong, superconservative catholic girls (but not that there's anything wrong with that ).


Discuss.

with that attitude please do humanity a favor and spec in something like derm where you always have time to ask google for a diagnosis and you don't have to worry about killing your patient by not finding the old answer in time.

 

[Rafa]

with that attitude please do humanity a favor and spec in something like derm where you always have time to ask google for a diagnosis and you don't have to worry about killing your patient by not finding the old answer in time.

Waitwaitdon't tell me...

he'll make a (drumroll)...HORRIBLE DOCTORRR!!! won't he?

 

[Monette]

Waitwaitdon't tell me...

he'll make a (drumroll)...HORRIBLE DOCTORRR!!! won't he?

AAAHHHH, you beat me to it 😛

 

[Anastasis]

sorry, double post!

 

[Anastasis]

with that attitude please do humanity a favor and spec in something like derm where you always have time to ask google for a diagnosis and you don't have to worry about killing your patient by not finding the old answer in time.

Oh lord. 🙄 I honestly never thought I would reach the point where the soapbox people pissed me off so much. Seriously, if you can't counter his argument in some coherent, reasoned way and need to resort to ad hominem attacks, please save us the trouble of needing to scroll past your posts.

 

[Anastasis]

So my friend is your "noble" pre-med or whatever you may call it. And she is doing so bad in all her pre-reqs even though she studies her ass off. The big difference why the kids do well in these classes is whether or not you have old tests/old quizzes/old hws etc, and I offered them to her, and she's like no thanks I want to do this on my own effort. Wtf? Are you ******ed? It isn't cheating or anything, it's being smart about the professor's laziness, and using it to your advantage. There's nothing wrong about that. Now that I think about it, she pisses me off because she's one of those do-good, I am right everyone else is wrong, superconservative catholic girls (but not that there's anything wrong with that ).


Discuss.

If you're just flat out memorizing the answers, that's not so great, but not really cheating. It will just come back and bite you right on the @$$ if you ever need those concepts again.

If you're using the old exams so that you better understand how the professor tests and what concepts he really stresses, then I see no problem with this. Heck, I do it.

I agree with someone else (I think it was Q) who said that if the professor intentionally keeps his exams behind and doesn't give them back to students, then THAT would be cheating (or at the very least, not very honest).

 

[MasterMD]

there is nothing wrong with learning what your professor's testing personality is... good profs dont give the same tests twice anyway 😉 and if they were worried about... or if it was ILLEGAL... they would recollect the tests.. like many at my university do. anyone who thinks this is cheating is extremely disallusioned, and since the profs aren't worried about it, they dont think it's cheating either. interestingly enough... i've had many profs who offer old exams for you to get an idea of what they expect... wow isn't it a breath of fresh air to have professors who are confident enough in their knowledge of the material not to even have to think about this "cheating"... 🙄

 

[tifa]

So my friend is your "noble" pre-med or whatever you may call it. And she is doing so bad in all her pre-reqs even though she studies her ass off. The big difference why the kids do well in these classes is whether or not you have old tests/old quizzes/old hws etc, and I offered them to her, and she's like no thanks I want to do this on my own effort. Wtf? Are you ******ed? It isn't cheating or anything, it's being smart about the professor's laziness, and using it to your advantage. There's nothing wrong about that. Now that I think about it, she pisses me off because she's one of those do-good, I am right everyone else is wrong, superconservative catholic girls (but not that there's anything wrong with that ).


Discuss.

I agree with you. No shame in getting help where you can find it.

 

[CTSballer11]

Ask in the Med forums if they would use old tests if available. I think most would laugh that the question was even being asked.

You beat me too it.

 

[mchou]

there is nothing wrong with learning what your professor's testing personality is... good profs dont give the same tests twice anyway 😉 and if they were worried about... or if it was ILLEGAL... they would recollect the tests.. like many at my university do. anyone who thinks this is cheating is extremely disallusioned, and since the profs aren't worried about it, they dont think it's cheating either. interestingly enough... i've had many profs who offer old exams for you to get an idea of what they expect... wow isn't it a breath of fresh air to have professors who are confident enough in their knowledge of the material not to even have to think about this "cheating"... 🙄

I'd actually have to agree here.

First, I think the professor has a responsibility to challenge students with questions that force you to think, not regurgitate. And in that sense, the professor should provide tests with new questions, rather than used/old ones. This should make using old exams ineffective in cheating, when cheating is defined as knowing the answers ahead of time/because of something you had that you weren't supposed to.

Old exams should provide the students with insight as to how to approach questions because when a TA is grading 80 exams a night, they start to look for ... yup you said it... key words/phrases. That of course is contradictory to what I just said. I just said we should be looking for a way of thinking, but in reality... the mechanisms involved in grading are all about presentation and memorization.

You have to remember what enzyme p53 is and put it down by name to score that last point, even if you understand how the active amino acid in that enzyme works. Don't name it? Lose points. It's that simple. So here is where I always felt old exams came in handy, and why I used them when available. Because to some extent, you can understand the concepts really well but forget the little name of that enzyme and your score drops.

And frankly, in the pre med field, both the score and your understanding matter. And, having spoken with a lot of doctors who are in my opinion, excellent care givers, the biggest thing I noticed was that they don't have all the answers... and they also RARELY make decisions by themselves. Physicians in a hospital consult others before handing down a prescription for medication and what one doesn't know, her peer often does. Doesn't make either of them a bad doctor, at least they know to consult others when they're not positive.

So in response to the OP, yes I agree, you should use an old test when you have access as long as the professor hasn't prohibited it. Professors are usually aware that exams leak out one way or another, and are responsible for telling their students if it's ok to use them or not. As for learning on your own, sure some people study best by themselves, but it's good to remember that you don't have to make decisions all on your own right after you graduate med school, that's what we have internship, residency, and fellowship sometimes for. You think our attendings graduated the way they are now? Ha!

 

[notdeadyet]

Nutmeg- I know you have good intentions with your altruistic beliefs (hell, so did the Ruskies), but this type of pure thought mainly gets people absolutely trampled on in the real world.

Ah, talk of the "real world" from 21 year olds... I do love it so...

Adding to the main discussion, many universities require you to sign an Honor Pledge for every course you take. Many of these include agreeing not to use old exam material.

I have no problems using previous material if nothing prohibits it. But if you are told not to and do anyway, I don't really see ethically how this is different from hiding a crib sheet up your sleeve.

 

[Bluntman]

Ah, talk of the "real world" from 21 year olds... I do love it so...

Don't you have something better to do with your time than to dig through my mdapps to come up with this?

 

[gregMD]

according to my prof, same thing happened in canadian med schools
im really worried about my family physician too cuz he came from one of those
QUOTE]


are you trying to say that there is something wrong with Canadian med schools?

 

[OctoDoc]

I was an organic chemistry professor (if you throw anything at me, throw money!). I gave out four (four!) of my previous exams, both blank and the answer keys, so the students could see what and how I tested. They could use the old exams as practice exams. I even said that I would base some of the exam questions on the old ones.

It didn't matter one single bit. My students' scores were truly no different than when I didn't give them the exams (i.e. there were no old exams of mine floating around because either I was a new professor outright, or a new one to that university, both situations in which I have been). I think that this is because the better prepared students didn't have to rely on my old exams to perform well - they understood the material to do well regardless. The poorly performing students probably didn't understand the material well enough so that even when confronted with VERY similar questions on their exam, the changes I made (changing a chlorine to a bromine, adding superfluous side groups, turning the molecule around, asking for a reagent instead of the product for the same reaction, etc.) were too much for them.

Don't immediately consider a professor as lazy because his current exams are similar to old ones. He knows from quantifiable experience that it makes very little difference.

 

[MasterMD]

I was an organic chemistry professor (if you throw anything at me, throw money!). I gave out four (four!) of my previous exams, both blank and the answer keys, so the students could see what and how I tested. They could use the old exams as practice exams. I even said that I would base some of the exam questions on the old ones.

It didn't matter one single bit. My students' scores were truly no different than when I didn't give them the exams (i.e. there were no old exams of mine floating around because either I was a new professor outright, or a new one to that university, both situations in which I have been). I think that this is because the better prepared students didn't have to rely on my old exams to perform well - they understood the material to do well regardless. The poorly performing students probably didn't understand the material well enough so that even when confronted with VERY similar questions on their exam, the changes I made (changing a chlorine to a bromine, adding superfluous side groups, turning the molecule around, asking for a reagent instead of the product for the same reaction, etc.) were too much for them.

Don't immediately consider a professor as lazy because his current exams are similar to old ones. He knows from quantifiable experience that it makes very little difference.

i hope i didnt offend you.. but what i meant is that i know profs who give the SAME exact exam every semester....

 

[JimmyG]

\begin{rant}
Where are the good candidates going? Probably where the other guy said... or they're just using their brains on their own time. I think another problem is that not as many great minds are being created anymore, as the school system here is ridiculous and most students I've met are lazy as hell. I can't figure out why most people are in college other than that its the next thing after highschool. They don't want to learn the material they take classes for, they don't go to classes, and even most good students don't learn much outside of their textbooks or lectures. Schools here seem to have taken a shift to teaching to the lowest common denominator in the class. If a class is filled with *******es, the entire class is dumbed down so that people won't have to chose between working hard or failing. It goes back to the "everyone deserves a chance" idea. Guess what: everyone doesn't deserve a chance at being a nuclear physicist either, unless you have the brains or a work ethic that makes up for it. Someone needs to get the balls to step up to some of these people and say "I'm sorry, but you're just not cut out to be digging around in someone's brain." I think the laziness seen pretty much everywhere in this country is going to be our downfall.\end{rant}

I agree with this. But I do have to say that in our state, the so-called "smarter" kids, or the ones who make better grades are still the ones being accepted into medical school (avg. GPA 3.56) over law school (avg. GPA 3.2). But, then again, even the smarter kids, go into physical therapy (avg. GPA 3.6)

 

[OctoDoc]

i hope i didnt offend you.. but what i meant is that i know profs who give the SAME exact exam every semester....

No, no offense at all. I think it is funny to hear students expounding of this subject, when most of their views come from such a limited world-view filter (in this subject for sure). Students having the audacity to think they know what their professor thinks and does, when they are handicapped by not being on the other side of the issue for umpteen years. Priceless I tell you, priceless!

 

[cfdavid]

😎

So my friend is your "noble" pre-med or whatever you may call it. And she is doing so bad in all her pre-reqs even though she studies her ass off. The big difference why the kids do well in these classes is whether or not you have old tests/old quizzes/old hws etc, and I offered them to her, and she's like no thanks I want to do this on my own effort. Wtf? Are you ******ed? It isn't cheating or anything, it's being smart about the professor's laziness, and using it to your advantage. There's nothing wrong about that. Now that I think about it, she pisses me off because she's one of those do-good, I am right everyone else is wrong, superconservative catholic girls (but not that there's anything wrong with that ).


Discuss.

She's obviously got good work-ethic. She also seems to be self-sufficient in her studies. And she seems willing to work harder in order to either learn more and stay consistent with her personal ethics/morals, even when there is considerable risk to her grade and therefore prospects for med school.

I'd say she's a pretty admirable chick, provided she doesn't pass judgement on others that do it differently. And you're not obligated to follow her personal agenda, so continue not to.

 

[OctoDoc]

Thinking about this reminds me of the time that I was sick of hearing my o-chem students say that my exam questions came out of nowhere, the material wasn't in the lectures, nor in the book, etc. My personal favorite was that because I have graduate students, I am unaccustomed to teaching undergrads, and so I am testing at the graduate student level. My insistence that I make questions based on the textbook either fell on deaf ears or were countered by outright denial.

I tried to put the matter to rest by making one exam with questions taken from in-chapter examples and assigned end-of-chapter problems. ONLY. And no changes whatsoever to the questions.

The result? No better performance on the part of the students. On the answer key, I gave the answer, and also the page number of the textbook to which they could find the question and material. I find it incredible that some students still held fast to their beliefs regarding my course. Only one student went through the previous exams and came to me to say, "Oh my god, you're right, it's ALL in the book!"

To be absolutely honest, it was about this point that I thought to myself, "if these students are going to be doctors, I can be one, too." Keep in mind that I had some scary-bright students as well as the ones that struggled to get good grades; those that also were also generous and personable - those were the ones that I wanted to be my doctors in the future!

 

[Saluki]

Thinking about this reminds me of the time that I was sick of hearing my o-chem students say that my exam questions came out of nowhere, the material wasn't in the lectures, nor in the book, etc. My personal favorite was that because I have graduate students, I am unaccustomed to teaching undergrads, and so I am testing at the graduate student level. My insistence that I make questions based on the textbook either fell on deaf ears or were countered by outright denial.

I tried to put the matter to rest by making one exam with questions taken from in-chapter examples and assigned end-of-chapter problems. ONLY. And no changes whatsoever to the questions.

The result? No better performance on the part of the students. On the answer key, I gave the answer, and also the page number of the textbook to which they could find the question and material. I find it incredible that some students still held fast to their beliefs regarding my course. Only one student went through the previous exams and came to me to say, "Oh my god, you're right, it's ALL in the book!"

To be absolutely honest, it was about this point that I thought to myself, "if these students are going to be doctors, I can be one, too." Keep in mind that I had some scary-bright students as well as the ones that struggled to get good grades; those that also were also generous and personable - those were the ones that I wanted to be my doctors in the future!

People can be funny sometimes... I'm a humanities major, and my advisor, whom I love to death, is one of the only female professors in my department. She is an incredible teacher, but she is also one of the hardest graders I've ever encountered. Every semester I hear people whining about how they didn't get the grade they wanted, and it's always because:
a)she doesn't like guys
b)she plays favorites and you can only get an A if you're one of her favorites
c)she doesn't like sorority girls
or my personal favorite, which I've only heard once
d)she's jealous of the attractive girls in the class and so never gives them good grades- I guess that makes me chopped liver- oh well

 

[CTSballer11]

People can be funny sometimes... I'm a humanities major, and my advisor, whom I love to death, is one of the only female professors in my department. She is an incredible teacher, but she is also one of the hardest graders I've ever encountered. Every semester I hear people whining about how they didn't get the grade they wanted, and it's always because:
a)she doesn't like guys
b)she plays favorites and you can only get an A if you're one of her favorites
c)she doesn't like sorority girls
or my personal favorite, which I've only heard once
d)she's jealous of the attractive girls in the class and so never gives them good grades- I guess that makes me chopped liver- oh well

You sound a little naive. If you take a course where the grading is subjective then other factors come into play. Believe it or not but professors are human and they may not always grade people fairly. I had a B in English 101 and I went to my prof office during finals week and I just flat out asked her would it be such a big deal if she would bump me up to an A. She did it just like that.

 

[eddie13231]

I agree with the poster who said yes, "pre-meds" are dumb, and I find that most of them are. Remember anyone can be pre-med and can most often escape with a B in early pre-reqs; but a B average won't get you into med school (usually). The people I see who got accepted this year are very bright people whom I consider very intelligent. They will be MED students. Of course there are always those pre-meds who preach about their neurosurgery skills while disecting a crab in general bio. However, I have not personally known one of the people to get to med school and I wouldn't want them in my class.

 

[notdeadyet]

Don't you have something better to do with your time than to dig through my mdapps to come up with this?

Dig? I found your comment amusing and clicked on your signature link. If you don't want it out there, don't link to it.

I just found your "in the real world" thing funny, given context. Seriously, if I hurt your feelings, I do apologize...

 

[Nutmeg1621]

Of course there are always those pre-meds who preach about their neurosurgery skills while disecting a crab in general bio.

 

[Bluntman]

Dig? I found your comment amusing and clicked on your signature link. If you don't want it out there, don't link to it.

I just found your "in the real world" thing funny, given context. Seriously, if I hurt your feelings, I do apologize...

No worries man.

 

[eastsidaz]

People can be funny sometimes... I'm a humanities major, and my advisor, whom I love to death, is one of the only female professors in my department. She is an incredible teacher, but she is also one of the hardest graders I've ever encountered. Every semester I hear people whining about how they didn't get the grade they wanted, and it's always because:
a)she doesn't like guys
b)she plays favorites and you can only get an A if you're one of her favorites
c)she doesn't like sorority girls
or my personal favorite, which I've only heard once
d)she's jealous of the attractive girls in the class and so never gives them good grades- I guess that makes me chopped liver- oh well

Wait, Saluki, you're a girl? :hits forehead:

 

[chad5871]

Why are so many premeds stupid?

Simple. It’s a whole lot easier to be pre-med than it is to be med.

👍 👍 👍

 

[anon-y-mouse]

what's the big deal? old tests are OUT there and it is a professor's responsibility to ensure that s/he creates an appropriate test. deficient students are denoted through subpar grades. how about deficient tenured professors? given that there are myriad ways of testing a particular topic, surely some ways are better than others. how are students supposed to know what sorts of questions a professor puts on his/her tests? (memorization/regurgitation, vs application, for example) some professors aren't straightforward with this information and some will blatantly mislead students. the most fair solution to this problem is for the first test in any course to be dropped, and the following tests to be pastiches of that first audition test. stealing past tests from the professor's office is obviously wrong. obtaining previous tests that *have been released* is NOT forbidden. is it fair? maybe not. some would argue that the medical school admissions game - most especially the emphasis placed on various stats - is NOT fair, but that's the symptom of a flawed system we have to live with. some people should stop whining and just deal with it.

 

[Wackie]

I can't say for sure if I'm a stupid premed or not.

I can say that every time I get an A on a multiple choice test, I'm still not sure if I learned the material. Give me a fill in the blank test and if I get an A on it, I know I've learned the material.
I struggle with the fact that a multiple choice test is enough to jog my memory on something. It's happened before where I'm asked to recall information and I can't. If someone says, "Okay, stupid premedie...it starts with a C" then I'll get it.
I can pass a test and not have learned anything. I know this and it worries me.

 

[TypeA]

If you're just flat out memorizing the answers, that's not so great, but not really cheating. It will just come back and bite you right on the @$$ if you ever need those concepts again.

If you're using the old exams so that you better understand how the professor tests and what concepts he really stresses, then I see no problem with this. Heck, I do it.

I agree with someone else (I think it was Q) who said that if the professor intentionally keeps his exams behind and doesn't give them back to students, then THAT would be cheating (or at the very least, not very honest).

I can't believe that this conversation had to continue past this post. It can't be laid out any more clearly.

 

[pnasty]

i also dont see what the big deal is, especially if the professor allows you to do it or even facilitates it

at first i didnt even know they had old tests (i thought they always take them back) but then on one orgo test a group of students had old tests and two problems were the exact same as on old test (60% of the grade). You have go to be kidding me if you think anyone should not use old tests and lose that big of an advantage to other students. It's one thing if the professor says not too, otherwise its fair game. I have never met anyone who only studies from old tests and does no other work for an exam. Most people do both because you dont know if you will see those problems again or not, and they are always good practice to see what difficulty level you will be facing

On another note: I once had a professor that was so strict on cheating he said that if anyone could figure out a way to do it without him catching you, you probably deserved an A because you were both smart enough to do it and had you actually studied would have been able to get an A using that amount of time anyways (i guess he thought it would take awhile to figure it out). I always thought that was funny

 

[OctoDoc]

i also dont see what the big deal is, especially if the professor allows you to do it or even facilitates it

at first i didnt even know they had old tests (i thought they always take them back) but then on one orgo test a group of students had old tests and two problems were the exact same as on old test (60% of the grade). You have go to be kidding me if you think anyone should not use old tests and lose that big of an advantage to other students. It's one thing if the professor says not too, otherwise its fair game. I have never met anyone who only studies from old tests and does no other work for an exam. Most people do both because you dont know if you will see those problems again or not, and they are always good practice to see what difficulty level you will be facing

On another note: I once had a professor that was so strict on cheating he said that if anyone could figure out a way to do it without him catching you, you probably deserved an A because you were both smart enough to do it and had you actually studied would have been able to get an A using that amount of time anyways (i guess he thought it would take awhile to figure it out). I always thought that was funny

I had a Quantitative Analysis (chemistry) prof that said his final exam was for sale, starting a week before the exam. The price went down as the exam date drew near. I don't remember how much it cost initially, but it was only affordable (for students pooling their money) about 10 minutes before the exam. The prof had a pretty good sense of humor.

 

[CptCrunch]

We have our heads up our butts.

 

[LJDHC05]

The thing that amazes me about this conversation is that the gross assumption that your profs dont automatically assume that older students share materials with younger students. This was pretty much a forgone conclusion at my college, so the majority of profs just shared the old exams and authored new exams or worked on a 4 year rotation of exams so that older materials were purged from the rotation before they repeated. It's not cheating unless the prof EXPLICITLY FORBIDS the use of old exams.

On a separate note, who the hell memorizes old exam material anyway?

 

[Nutmeg1621]

On a separate note, who the hell memorizes old exam material anyway?

You got me.

I have never had a professor give back an exam for us to keep in my entire time in college. They always take them and the answer key back up. What I hated about my last biology professor was that he had us answer on a scantron but when he handed them back he didn't hand the tests back. So we couldn't see what answers we got wrong. But the teachers that did give the tests out took them back up after class.

 

[OctoDoc]

The thing that amazes me about this conversation is that the gross assumption that your profs dont automatically assume that older students share materials with younger students.

This echos what I said earlier. Right on!

On a separate note, who the hell memorizes old exam material anyway?

The safe, the unenlightened, the lazy, and/or the desperate.

 

[vincikai]

i would do both :]

 

[freshh.]

She reminds me of a girl I knew in high school. She couldn't handle high school Anatomy and barely got through Trig, but swore she was going to be a doctor. Anyway we ended up in the same Bio class in college and when she was flunking basic things, I offered to help (I had an A and Biology was my major). She basically gave me the same response and had to withdraw from my college to go to another school.

The one she's at now is a party school, but she's happy with her A's. I still don't understand why she didn't take my help. It's not like I was trying to throw it in her face or anything.

 

[akinf]

So my friend is your "noble" pre-med or whatever you may call it. And she is doing so bad in all her pre-reqs even though she studies her ass off. The big difference why the kids do well in these classes is whether or not you have old tests/old quizzes/old hws etc, and I offered them to her, and she's like no thanks I want to do this on my own effort. Wtf? Are you ******ed? It isn't cheating or anything, it's being smart about the professor's laziness, and using it to your advantage. There's nothing wrong about that. Now that I think about it, she pisses me off because she's one of those do-good, I am right everyone else is wrong, superconservative catholic girls (but not that there's anything wrong with that ).


Discuss.

Old exams are a good way of getting a feel for the type of questions you will be exposed to. However, a professor would not provide them thinking that if you just did that, you'd ace the course. Not doing old exams when they are available is not all that intelligent. However, if you are crunched for time, old exams are a last priority; they should only be attempted after you have studied thoroughly. Anyways, tell your friend it is NOT cheating, and that she is only making bad decisions by not using the old exams.

 

[MediMama23]

You got me.

I have never had a professor give back an exam for us to keep in my entire time in college. They always take them and the answer key back up. What I hated about my last biology professor was that he had us answer on a scantron but when he handed them back he didn't hand the tests back. So we couldn't see what answers we got wrong. But the teachers that did give the tests out took them back up after class.

That sucks. We got all of our tests back. Man, they really didn't trust you guys! 👎

 

[TheOpsonizer]

I don't feel obliged to defend this, but getting old exams is wrong when not everyone can get them.

But more importantly, few things give me as much pleasure as smokin' the jokers who get the hookups with old exams. This is just my sadistic side talking.

If you are also a fan of academia as a means for retribution read the following story:

Last week was my physio final. The class was given the option of not taking the exam and taking the mean of 2 other exams as a final grade. Having aced those exams, I should have not even taken the exam. But I did. Why you may ask? Simply to blow up the curve for the rest of the stack.

So, for the minority of peeps here who think it's a bit unfair for others to get old exams, don't worry, I notched one on the score tab for us.

 

[Nutmeg1621]

I don't feel obliged to defend this, but getting old exams is wrong when not everyone can get them.

But more importantly, few things give me as much pleasure as smokin' the jokers who get the hookups with old exams. This is just my sadistic side talking.

If you are also a fan of academia as a means for retribution read the following story:

Last week was my physio final. The class was given the option of not taking the exam and taking the mean of 2 other exams as a final grade. Having aced those exams, I should have not even taken the exam. But I did. Why you may ask? Simply to blow up the curve for the rest of the stack.

So, for the minority of peeps here who think it's a bit unfair for others to get old exams, don't worry, I notched one on the score tab for us.

👍

 

[OctoDoc]

I don't feel obliged to defend this, but getting old exams is wrong when not everyone can get them.

Life isn't fair.

So, for the minority of peeps here who think it's a bit unfair for others to get old exams, don't worry, I notched one on the score tab for us.

I was in a similar situation, but took the average. I knew that I would still have the highest grade in the class, regardless of the other students' performance on the exams. Why screw them when you outclass them outright? I was satisfied just knowing that they knew, especially when I didn't show up for the final.

 

[^=^]

Lucky!