The Real-Life Reality of Due Dates & Deadlines
You are at work and suddenly realize you didn't send in your car payment. It was due yesterday. What will happen? Nothing. You still have your car; you legally have 30-90 days to pay without penalty.
You are at a baseball game and it goes into extra innings. Now what? Nothing. It makes the game more exciting!
There is a community center being built in your community and it is supposed to be finished by October. In March of the following year, city residents are wondering if it will ever open. Grand Opening occurs in August. Several deadlines are missed. What happened? The Center still opened and people still came. The contractors just didn't get bonus for finishing on time or early.
A company is late by several days getting paychecks out to its employees. What happened to the company? Nothing. No one quit, because the employees need to job. The company did not give more money to make up for being late. It just happens.
An employee misses a deadline for a project. What happens? Well, the project still needs to be completed. She works on it until it is completed. Depending upon the project, she may not receive a bonus, may receive a basic pay for the project. Or, nothing will happen because she informed those in charge she needed more time to get the large project finished.
A student is at school and a major project is due, and he is not finished. What happens? He loses a letter grade because it is a day late, which ended his A in the class, which ended his straight A streak all through high school, which lowers his class rank standing which affected scholarship opportunities. But, oh well, we are preparing them for the real world. NOT!
Am I exaggerating, not really. I think most of us know situations where students have been heavily penalized for late work all in the name of preparing them for the real world. No matter what we teachers do, grades are subjective and so are deadlines and due dates. However, due dates seems to have more of an influence on grades than the content of the work itself. And what is really interesting, upon reading and scanning and reading and searching, I can't find one Missouri Learning Standard nor one Common Core standard that includes students must meet deadlines. Yet, not meeting a deadline has the most influential effect on the grade. Do students still earn lower grades for poor work? of course. But haven't you witnessed a superb project that was a day late, and the teacher said, "If you had turned it in on time, it would have been an A." Really? The missed DEADLINE dropped it a full letter grade? A non-learning standard kept a perfect project from being an "A"?
Are deadlines important? Yes, they are. We need to find a way to manage deadlines without due-dating students' lives at school. This may mean some work really doesn't have deadlines but the assessing is completed as the student works, meaning a final project does not necessarily indicate learned objective attained. Does a student need to take test to show mastery? Nope. Does a student need a final science project to demonstrate research? Nope. Let's pick and choose what has a deadline so deadlines have real meanings.
Please note: I have taught 26 years in 2 districts and in 4 schools, and in seven summer school settings; I attended seven schools in five different school districts before graduating from high school; I have worked in residential camp settings, children's homes, after-school programs, and enrichment programs; I have worked with students from various economic groups; I have taught as an adjunct faculty member at three area universities; I have read over 500 books since 2010 and countless journals. When reading my blog, please realize I am not writing about current teaching experiences. I read, research, talk, and have varied educational connections from which I learn about educational practices and experiences of others. Not all of what I write is personally affecting me; but it is touching someone in the world of education.
You are at a baseball game and it goes into extra innings. Now what? Nothing. It makes the game more exciting!
There is a community center being built in your community and it is supposed to be finished by October. In March of the following year, city residents are wondering if it will ever open. Grand Opening occurs in August. Several deadlines are missed. What happened? The Center still opened and people still came. The contractors just didn't get bonus for finishing on time or early.
A company is late by several days getting paychecks out to its employees. What happened to the company? Nothing. No one quit, because the employees need to job. The company did not give more money to make up for being late. It just happens.
An employee misses a deadline for a project. What happens? Well, the project still needs to be completed. She works on it until it is completed. Depending upon the project, she may not receive a bonus, may receive a basic pay for the project. Or, nothing will happen because she informed those in charge she needed more time to get the large project finished.
.......
A student is at school and a major project is due, and he is not finished. What happens? He loses a letter grade because it is a day late, which ended his A in the class, which ended his straight A streak all through high school, which lowers his class rank standing which affected scholarship opportunities. But, oh well, we are preparing them for the real world. NOT!
Am I exaggerating, not really. I think most of us know situations where students have been heavily penalized for late work all in the name of preparing them for the real world. No matter what we teachers do, grades are subjective and so are deadlines and due dates. However, due dates seems to have more of an influence on grades than the content of the work itself. And what is really interesting, upon reading and scanning and reading and searching, I can't find one Missouri Learning Standard nor one Common Core standard that includes students must meet deadlines. Yet, not meeting a deadline has the most influential effect on the grade. Do students still earn lower grades for poor work? of course. But haven't you witnessed a superb project that was a day late, and the teacher said, "If you had turned it in on time, it would have been an A." Really? The missed DEADLINE dropped it a full letter grade? A non-learning standard kept a perfect project from being an "A"?
Are deadlines important? Yes, they are. We need to find a way to manage deadlines without due-dating students' lives at school. This may mean some work really doesn't have deadlines but the assessing is completed as the student works, meaning a final project does not necessarily indicate learned objective attained. Does a student need to take test to show mastery? Nope. Does a student need a final science project to demonstrate research? Nope. Let's pick and choose what has a deadline so deadlines have real meanings.
Please note: I have taught 26 years in 2 districts and in 4 schools, and in seven summer school settings; I attended seven schools in five different school districts before graduating from high school; I have worked in residential camp settings, children's homes, after-school programs, and enrichment programs; I have worked with students from various economic groups; I have taught as an adjunct faculty member at three area universities; I have read over 500 books since 2010 and countless journals. When reading my blog, please realize I am not writing about current teaching experiences. I read, research, talk, and have varied educational connections from which I learn about educational practices and experiences of others. Not all of what I write is personally affecting me; but it is touching someone in the world of education.
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