Dude, That’s Rude: Virtual Finals Edition

With the end of the semester in sight, naturally we’re starting to think about our finals (or that delicious apple pie you had at Thanksgiving). While some professors have chosen to go with normal final exams (or as normal as things can be when your classes are entirely virtual) others, unfortunately, have chosen to grace us with the few circumstances that make taking a final from your childhood bedroom in your parents’ house even harder. In just a few short weeks, you and I will find ourselves taking some of these unfortunate exams thinking, “dude… that’s rude.”

Group Projects

This might seem like the hottest of takes, but hear me out: group projects are actually worse than a plain old final exam. Not only do they require a substantial amount of time and effort to complete (at least a test is over in 90 minutes, right?), but they’re difficult too. Somehow the fact that we have a week or two to work on these has convinced some of our professors that we are suddenly capable of solving climate change or curing cancer all in a short eight-page final essay.

Now onto the worst part of the final group project: the group. We’ve all been the one person in the group who does the entire assignment — you’d think that once you got to Harvard, your days of being the group project dictator would be over, but you were so wrong. The problems that come with working in a group are only exacerbated by being online. But hey, just because I can’t aggressively stare at you during section until you admit how little you’ve done won’t stop me from spamming you with texts until I see edits on the shared Google Doc. Needless to say, group projects are quite literally the devil in disguise.

Exams Right Before/After Move-Out

Normally, an exam right before Thanksgiving is fair game (sort of). While slightly cruel, it’s doable. This year, however, on campus students are expected to move out of their dorms by the Sunday before Thanksgiving. It seems especially rude to expect students to study for exams while also packing up 12 weeks worth of stuff and hauling it across the country (WHY didn’t I listen to all of the emails telling me to “pack light.”) To make matters worse, some professors have chosen the Monday and Tuesday before Thanksgiving to make exams/essays due. We just got home — let us breathe!!! Not only do we get to suddenly readjust to living with our parents for the next two months, but we also get to take an assessment on optimizing functions (everyone’s dream) — welcome home!

The Right-After-Thanksgiving Final

Okay, this one was brutal even before classes were virtual, but it’s only being made infinitely worse by not coming back to campus after Thanksgiving. Being back home for that glorious Thanksgiving-through-Christmas-blur time of year almost guarantees we won’t be studying for our post-Thanksgiving finals as much as we should be. We can almost hear the Mariah Carey blasting and see the twinkling Christmas lights draped around our hometowns’ trees already. Despite your professors’ best attempt to make this seem less bad than it really is by telling you to take a break over Thanksgiving and enjoy time with family, the only real way to prep for an exam in the first week of December is to (you guessed it) study over Thanksgiving break. Please don’t make us spend this beautiful time of year glued to our computer screens (My blue-light damaged eyes beg of you.) Get in the holiday spirit and ditch those horrible first-week-of December finals.

Finals were never our favorite part of Harvard, but hey, you didn’t end up here without having taken a test or two in your time. But the combination of Zoom fatigue and an early move-out for those on campus makes us even less inclined to study for said virtual exams. If any of your professors try to hit you with these especially evil virtual exams, make sure to unmute yourself on Zoom and tell them, “dude, that’s rude.”