No more empathy for me~ee!

In middle school biology, we did an experiment. We were given yams, which we would sprout in cups of water. We then had to make hypotheses about how the yams would grow, based on descriptions of yam plants in our books, and make notes of our observations as they grew.

Here’s what was supposed to happen: we were supposed to see that the actual growth of the plant did not resemble our hypotheses. We were then supposed to figure out that these were, in fact, sweet potatoes.

What actually happened was that every single student in every single class lied in their notes so that their observations perfectly matched their hypotheses. See, everyone assumed the mismatch meant they had done something wrong in the process of growing the plant or that they had misunderstood the dichotomous key or the plant identification terminology. And, thanks to the wonders of a public school education, everyone assumed the wrong results would get us a failing grade. We were trying to pass. We didn’t want to get bitched out by the teacher. Curiosity, learning, science - that had nothing to do with why we were sitting in that classroom. So we all lied.

The teacher was furious. She tried to fail every student, but the administration stepped in and told her she wasn’t allowed to because a 100% fail rate is recognized as a failure of the teacher, not the class. It wasn’t even her fault, really, though her being a notorious hard-ass didn’t help. It was a failure of the entire educational system.

During one science class we were learning about electricity and circuits. We were given the entire class period to complete one experiment, we had to make a simple circuit with a light bulb and record some data, and by class the next day we were expected to turn in our report on the experiment. Like most science classes the entire class was divided into groups of about 4-5 and expected to work within their groups. It should have been a very simple plug and chug experiment. There was one problem.

There was only one light bulb to be shared by a class of about 20-30 students. One light bulb to be shared between about 5-6 groups that each had to setup the circuit, run the experiment, and take the data. Every other piece of equipment needed for the experiment was present in the appropriate quantities for the entire class to run their experiment. This was the only equipment that was not properly provided. That entire class was spent with most of the class doing nothing, waiting for the single light bulb as each group setup, ran, and collected the experimental data. I spent the entire class, nervously staring at the clock begging it to move slower or my classmates faster to ensure my group had the time to run our own experiment and get the data we needed.

I think most of you can guess that did not happen.

Despite all the other students moving as quickly and diligently as they could, not all the groups were able to run the experiment. When we turned to the teacher, expecting her to see that we had done the best we possibly could with the materials and time provided us and extend the deadline, she simply said that we had had enough time in class to complete the experiment and it was our fault that we hadn’t. The assignment was still due the next day.

I then spent the rest of the school day extremely stressed, unable to call my parents to get their advice on it and hearing all my classmates grumble about having to do the experiment at home. When I finally got home, which was an hour after school ended because both my parents worked, I told my mother I needed to run this experiment or else I would get a zero. The last time she had done circuits was in high school and she told me to wait until my father came home. When he got home around 6:30pm that night I frantically told him about the experiment we had to run and how it was due the next day and I hadn’t been able to run it in class.

Luckily he knew how to do the experiment, because during all the time in class I was too focused on my fear of not getting the light bulb before the bell to actually think about and understand what to do for the experiment (and admittedly I have some trouble with circuits in general). Luckily, while we had to spend 20 minutes digging in the garage we were able to find all the necessary materials for the experiment. Luckily, I was able to collect the data and write it up to present for class the next day.

Notice there was a lot of luck involved.

Now, you may be wondering why my class had all the necessary supplies provided in the appropriate quantities except the light bulb. Maybe the school couldn’t afford it? Maybe all the light bulbs broke last minute? Maybe the teacher thought the experiments wouldn’t take as long as they did?

No.

It was entirely on purpose. The teacher had setup the experiment this way on purpose under the assumption that all the 6th, maybe 7th graders (I don’t remember which it was) in her class would understand that there wasn’t enough time for each group to separately run the experiment and instead would run a single experiment hooking up all the wires from the other groups to the single light bulb to create a single experiment we could all collect data from. She very loudly expressed her disappointment in us the next day while collecting our reports. She admittedly was also seen as something of a hard ass grader.

It wasn’t that all the students were bad at science, we were a high performing class. It wasn’t that the students were territorial over work, plenty of my classmates were willing to edit an essay or check over some math when not under the watchful eyes of a teacher. But we had all grown up in an environment where you did not reach out for help when you needed to, you were expected to figure it out on your own. And when you finally did reach out for help, it better only be to the pre-approved individuals or else it would constitute cheating, which mean a zero grade and additional penalties. A death sentence in a school environment where a B was seen as a minimum grade and anything below it a failure. Where there was extreme pressure to do well at all times, where grades were shared and compared among students and having too low a grade made you a pitiable thing to the other students.

Keep your eyes on your own paper, privacy screens up, no cheating.

In such an environment, what group of 10 to maybe 12 year olds is going to realize they can work together outside of their designated groups to create one experiment for everyone to use for their reports, especially under the watchful eye of a hard ass teacher?