If you’ve been at De Anza long enough, chances are you’ve sat in a class while a professor asked who’d like to have a take-home final instead of an in-person one, and I’ll be the first to admit I’m that person putting both of their hands in the air.

In true Silicon Valley fashion, aren’t most of us trying to avoid traffic and instead work from home? 

De Anza students these days are under extreme pressure. With over impaction hitting local state schools and more competition than ever for admittance to UC’s us students have a lot to worry about.

Apart from the full course loads and academic pressure, chances are if you’re a local student or have a work permit you’re also working a job to keep up with the high cost of living in the area.

 One less thing students could worry about is the dreaded in-class final.

Professors should do their best to adapt courses to the modern way of learning and living. With the introduction of take-home finals, we’re able to make the final fit to our schedule, which means we’re less stressed and will likely produce better results. With the use of final collaborative projects, we learn time management and teamwork skills that are congruent to modern-day life and the workforce. 

Remember when your teachers used to tell you that you needed to memorize all of your multiplication tables because you would never carry a calculator around? That idea is just laughable now.

So imagine this scenario, you’ve got a professor and they give you a blue book final or fill in the blank final and you’ve got one hour to complete the test and you can’t use notes. 

Now ask yourself this question, what kind of future career am I aiming for that will ever require me to put my skills and knowledge to the test in such a manner? And unless your answer is in the law or medical field the chances of that are slim. I can only imagine that the way in which we currently test our knowledge on a subject in college will likely seem laughable in 10 years.

So the next time you’re sitting in class taking a vote on the final throw those hands in the air. Skip out morning traffic, and while you’re at it skip out on outdated ways of testing knowledge as well. 

Image by tjevans from Pixabay