On Handling Academia: Strive, Scoff, or Skip

Gentle spring wind, velvety river bank, luscious ultra violet rays not-withstanding, it is once again Reading Period. For a strange three week interlude we live only in a doomed freedom that is the present. Some of us study 15 hours a day, some of us do nothing but play pool, some of us quietly lose our minds.

But although there may be 6200 different results when the great shadow has finally passed, there are not really so many different struggles going on. Undergraduates react to the imminence of examinations much as they reacted to the inexorable presence of Harvard University all year: in one of three fundamentally different ways.

Striving in Earnest

Probably the largest number of Harvard and Radcliffe students choose to strive. Strivers respect the academic system and its requirements. Humble in the presence of so much to be learned, they tackle their reading assignments from page one. They want to learn what a book or a course wants to teach. They pick courses for the utility of their subject matter; sometimes, in their devotion, exceeding concentration requirements. And they try hard to be present at every lecture, to compile a complete set of notes, to hand in all papers on time. Some Strivers copy a friend's notes if they miss the first five minutes of a lecture. These are the Andrew Carnegies of Harvard, the Thomas Gradgrinds, yea, even the Abraham Lincolns.

When Strivers do badly on an exam, they blame themselves for not studying enough, or for not organizing their information adequately. "Everyone could get good marks," they say "if they just studied more (or harder, or better)." Seniors do better than freshman, they declare, because they have learned how to study. To them, grades are extremely rational, accurate measurements of achievement. Some Strivers get all A's, some get all A's and B's, some get grades that settle around B-/C+; but a single student's grades generally do not fluctuate very much. Their patterned method of working meets with a consistent degree of success. Given the nature of Harvard markings, a Striver rarely flunks out; more likely a bad Striver gets a C- and the listless comment "dull."

But the top Strivers manifest a truly breathtaking mastery of the material and the system. They apportion their time wisely, assess the importance of reading materials correctly, digest their subject.

Teachers respect them, they win numerous academic honors, frequently they hold top posts on extracurricular activities. They are praised as "extremely competent," "well organized," "commendable." And thus rewarded, they are supremely satisfied. Their world is orderly. The best men win. They have gotten "a lot out of" their courses. Their parents swell with pride.

As exam period approaches, these students are probably studying hard, although fairly confident in the knowledge that they have studied well all year. They know, from their interest and application, how they are going to do on an exam even before they enter. And they are correct. When one Strives and succeeds, the competitive excitement of examinations is very pleasant; when one Strives and does poorly, it is a merciless goad to improve.

Scoffing with an Evil Laugh

But while the Strivers are thus occupying themselves, another, much smaller group of students is vehemently scorning them. These students prefer to Scoff. They spend endless hours at their private passtime--playing pool, cards, tennis or the horses; acting, writing, carousing, or talking to friends. Rather than give themselves over to any academic system, they deny all systems violently. They only begin a paper weeks after it is due, boasting about their devilry or bemoaning their assured doom. They dip into books just before an exam and fish out some facts to fool the grader. They pick courses for their easiness, seeking out "guts" or indepent study or special unknown seminars. During their rare appearances at a lecture, they generally don't bother to take notes.

I Striving friends of theirs think they are "lazy" or "only hurting themselves" and give them solicitous advice, Scoffers in turn fell superior to such more disciplined academics. They mock people who spend all their time in the library and call studying "lonely."

A Scoffer thinks of exams and papers as jousts between himself and the grader. He tries to please the grader, to "psych him out," to catch his fancy with a gimmick. A typical Scofer ploy is to make a highly improbable comparison: "What Charles Dickens has in common with Channel 4."

Yet they too meet with a fairly consistent degree of success. Some get into group one, have papers called "brilliant" and teachers who adore them ruefully and become as a result extreme cynics. Some get consistent Gentlemen's C's. Others spend every weekend in Peru, pay someone to take their exams for them, and get bounced out. In every case, their grades make sense, as a measure of innate ability, cleverness, or writing skill. A bad mark is a slap in the face. If they are in A-1 condition on exam day, or hit on a really neat trick, they can pretty certainly rack up. They can tell whether they have pulled it off from the moment they finish writing. When a student Scoffs and succeeds, like Hud, the A's are flourished as proof of his innate superiority; when a student Scoffs and fails, he becomes the town bum.

Although no Scoffer would be caught dead studying for exams earlier than exam week (at which time he may exert veritably superhuman efforts), chances are the spectre of examinations is never completely absent from his thoughts. Engaged in casual poker marathons, putting on faces of nonchalance to the world, he may perhaps shriek in his night-mares "The system is evil, unfair, stupid!"

Skipping Along on Whims

Midway between the Striving and the Scoffing fall the Skippers. They are impressed by both extremes. Instead of going to 99% or 10% of their classes, they range in between, averaging in the vicinity of 60%. Every time they sleep through a lecture they resolve to become more systematic. But as soon as they get interested in a distracting activity, or idea, or single course, they throw off academic discipline cavalierly, pleased to be free-wheeling. In their secret hearts, they are unconvinced that the system is either all right or all wrong.

In some courses, they take copious notes; others they stop attending after the first meeting. They generally begin studying for exams late in the year, and enjoy it so much so they wish (a little) they had started earlier. Even as seniors, they have not settled on a pattern of studying, but Skip around erratically.

Characteristically, a Skipper has absolutely no idea of how he did on an exam when he finishes it. As often as not, he thinks he got an A when he got a D or vice versa. Most of his grades are incomprehensible to him; lowest, for instance in precisely the courses he likes the best and does the most work in. But on the other hand, some seem completely fair. So he concludes finally that "Marks are totally irrational!" Ask a Skipper about them and he will laugh and shrug. He doesn't know why some people get such consistent grades, or how he would go about improving his own.

If, for a time, he pursues either hard work or gimmicky cleverness exclusively, he inevitably fails in the end. He has probably not mastered either technique, but tried to Scoff through a rugged lower level Gen Ed course or Strive through creative writing.

Skippers' marks are always infinitely chaotic and variable. They range from groups 2 to 6 from semester to semester; from A to E in a single marking period. When a Skipper has his moments of success, he sees it as "good luck," a freak communion with a grader, an unexpected compliment. And when he happens to flunk out (with marks like two A's and two E's, his low marks do not faze him at all, since he thinks they are so crazy. He has a moderately unshakable estimate of his own intelligence and a measure of satisfaction with courses completely independent of grades. To his parents, a Skipper must be constantly explaining that his funny marks "don't mean anything."

Skippers choose courses for mixed motives, trying out professors or fields that seem appealing. They often change fields, and never stop wondering if they are in the wrong one. They feel vaguely wronged by the system, but are not positive it isn't their own fault. During reading period they are the most perplexed of all students; the most uncertain of what to do. And yet their confusion is not particularly painful. For the Skippers are more interested in choosing a way, in improvising and experimenting, than in succeeding in a chosen way. A cross between Hamlet and Charlie Brown, they are buffeted around by fate, and seem to live in a perpetual, half-serious identify crisis.

The system, expanded to its full glory at this time of year, is not kind to Skippers. It may be comfortable enough to Skip along all year, but when confronted with a ten foot brick wall of exams, logic and public opinion demand something more consistent. One should either try to Strive over the wall or Scoff around it, not simply bumble happily among the bricks.