Point/Counterpoint
Amit Kapoor & Christian Saarbach (WG'08) Contributing Writers
Issue date: 4/14/08 Section: Perspectives
POINT
I Have Excellent Class Participation
Yay, grades! The new grading system has been really effective - recitation of my GPA has advanced a slot in my brain: where it was once placed in my cerebellum alongside the third line of the periodic table, it is now next to the cartography of outer Angola. Even more academically credible, these cute little grades are made up of anywhere from 10% to 50% class participation! Yippee. I like to think of our professors as high school football coaches, sitting in a sweaty locker room watching videotapes of class to meticulously keep score of our participation.
In reality though, participation grades are as arbitrary as your admission to this school. (No, I'm kidding - you deserved to get in. You're so smart.) The real black box formula for participation grades is locked away in a vault with the identity of the other grassy knoll gunman, Scott Ward's hard drive, and the ABP contract. Either that, or there's a roving gypsy whom professors consult at the beginning of each quarter to forecast participation. She makes a great falafel, too.
Isn't it ridiculous enough that half of class is devoted to people's comments? This is like me paying thousands of dollars to go see an Obama speech, and when I get there he tells me, "You know what we should do instead. I'll stand here, and you can recite nursery rhymes to me." Unfortunately, though, I'm a grade monger - love 'em like Coco Puffs. Not coincidentally, I also become psychologically depressed when I lose at Connect Four, and ask the WaWa lady everyday to tell me I'm handsome. Yep, I am that guy. The throat-clearing, middle-section-sitting, chair-reclining, pen-raising, hand-gesturing, class participator.
I have three fortes: the answer, the question, and the comment. Do not confuse mine with genuine questions or insightful comments that come every now and then - with the frequency of Haley's comet. Nope, I get my answers in early, to such questions like "What business is the Marshmallow Peeps company in?" (A: Leveraged buyouts?), "Can anyone summarize the case?" (A: It's 14 pages), and my favorite: "What should the firm do?" I'm the guy whose answer is always "Do nothing." God, I'm brilliant. Two participation points for that one. This makes so much sense - of course people would write a case where the answer is to pretend like the case was never written. It's like, "Monty, I will choose neither door number 1, 2, or 3, nor do I want the money. I'll just stand here and hope that things I want come to me."
Also known as Wharton Dating.
COUNTERPOINT
Your Previous Experience is Completely Irrelevant
OK, one thing I don't miss from first year is the case studies. I remember we had a case day in early September, with the sole purpose apparently being to make us glad that we didn't go to Harvard. I remember they were doing the pros and cons of the case method and after a few predictable "pros" from the peanut gallery (real world application of concepts, allows for creative thinking, rainbows are pretty, I like unicorns, etc.), I raised my hand for a "con" and said something groundbreaking like, "99% of the stuff we learn for this case isn't applicable to any other situation, so it's basically useless to us." Case method fever ---- CATCH IT!
Why do I bring this up now? Because people at Wharton tend to make VERY strained connections that somehow revolve around how important they used to be in their previous lives. It's cool though, I quickly developed a failsafe method to deal with comments that people tried to relate to their experiences.
If they used to work at the company, just believe half of whatever they say and throw the other half out. Which half is which is up to you. If they used to work at an investment bank and worked on a deal involving the company, stop listening immediately or you'll be asleep in 10 seconds. And finally, I cannot overstate this: any sentence that begins with "I used to work in consulting and..." should be met with an immediate withdrawal from the classroom. Use whatever excuse you have to. Bathroom break. Need to see the school nurse. Left your Cranberries CD in Koo Plaza, whatever, just get out of there now!
This isn't to say that I didn't learn anything from my classmates' prior experiences. For instance, one of my cohort-mates used to work at Amazon, and I just bought underwear from there the other day. Imagine if she hadn't worked there! And apparently they eat ice cream in Russia, too, even though it's cold. What's that all about? Finally, be sure to remember Porter's Five Forces: electricity, magnetism, gravity, whatever the one is that keeps you from falling out of a roller coaster, and of course, the dark side of the force from Star Wars. And if anyone says they used to work as a Jedi, feel free to jack them up with your light saber.
 |
Yay, grades! The new grading system has been really effective - recitation of my GPA has advanced a slot in my brain: where it was once placed in my cerebellum alongside the third line of the periodic table, it is now next to the cartography of outer Angola. Even more academically credible, these cute little grades are made up of anywhere from 10% to 50% class participation! Yippee. I like to think of our professors as high school football coaches, sitting in a sweaty locker room watching videotapes of class to meticulously keep score of our participation.
In reality though, participation grades are as arbitrary as your admission to this school. (No, I'm kidding - you deserved to get in. You're so smart.) The real black box formula for participation grades is locked away in a vault with the identity of the other grassy knoll gunman, Scott Ward's hard drive, and the ABP contract. Either that, or there's a roving gypsy whom professors consult at the beginning of each quarter to forecast participation. She makes a great falafel, too.
Isn't it ridiculous enough that half of class is devoted to people's comments? This is like me paying thousands of dollars to go see an Obama speech, and when I get there he tells me, "You know what we should do instead. I'll stand here, and you can recite nursery rhymes to me." Unfortunately, though, I'm a grade monger - love 'em like Coco Puffs. Not coincidentally, I also become psychologically depressed when I lose at Connect Four, and ask the WaWa lady everyday to tell me I'm handsome. Yep, I am that guy. The throat-clearing, middle-section-sitting, chair-reclining, pen-raising, hand-gesturing, class participator.
I have three fortes: the answer, the question, and the comment. Do not confuse mine with genuine questions or insightful comments that come every now and then - with the frequency of Haley's comet. Nope, I get my answers in early, to such questions like "What business is the Marshmallow Peeps company in?" (A: Leveraged buyouts?), "Can anyone summarize the case?" (A: It's 14 pages), and my favorite: "What should the firm do?" I'm the guy whose answer is always "Do nothing." God, I'm brilliant. Two participation points for that one. This makes so much sense - of course people would write a case where the answer is to pretend like the case was never written. It's like, "Monty, I will choose neither door number 1, 2, or 3, nor do I want the money. I'll just stand here and hope that things I want come to me."
Also known as Wharton Dating.
COUNTERPOINT
 |
OK, one thing I don't miss from first year is the case studies. I remember we had a case day in early September, with the sole purpose apparently being to make us glad that we didn't go to Harvard. I remember they were doing the pros and cons of the case method and after a few predictable "pros" from the peanut gallery (real world application of concepts, allows for creative thinking, rainbows are pretty, I like unicorns, etc.), I raised my hand for a "con" and said something groundbreaking like, "99% of the stuff we learn for this case isn't applicable to any other situation, so it's basically useless to us." Case method fever ---- CATCH IT!
Why do I bring this up now? Because people at Wharton tend to make VERY strained connections that somehow revolve around how important they used to be in their previous lives. It's cool though, I quickly developed a failsafe method to deal with comments that people tried to relate to their experiences.
If they used to work at the company, just believe half of whatever they say and throw the other half out. Which half is which is up to you. If they used to work at an investment bank and worked on a deal involving the company, stop listening immediately or you'll be asleep in 10 seconds. And finally, I cannot overstate this: any sentence that begins with "I used to work in consulting and..." should be met with an immediate withdrawal from the classroom. Use whatever excuse you have to. Bathroom break. Need to see the school nurse. Left your Cranberries CD in Koo Plaza, whatever, just get out of there now!
This isn't to say that I didn't learn anything from my classmates' prior experiences. For instance, one of my cohort-mates used to work at Amazon, and I just bought underwear from there the other day. Imagine if she hadn't worked there! And apparently they eat ice cream in Russia, too, even though it's cold. What's that all about? Finally, be sure to remember Porter's Five Forces: electricity, magnetism, gravity, whatever the one is that keeps you from falling out of a roller coaster, and of course, the dark side of the force from Star Wars. And if anyone says they used to work as a Jedi, feel free to jack them up with your light saber.
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