By Heather Monahan
Features Assignment Editor
It’s no secret Bonaventure has an earlier scheduled spring break compared to other colleges. Many students who go home are the only college students present in their hometowns during this time. While the early break can be rationalized by the Easter break Bonaventure also gets, both students and professors have yet to figure out why midterms are given this early in the semester.
Patrick Vecchio, a lecturer of journalism and mass communication, said he doesn’t give midterms in his classes.
“I think students are stressed enough this time of year,” Vecchio said. “I’m more concerned with how students are performing at the end of the semester.”
Vecchio said he doesn’t believe giving a midterm exam says anything about how well a student will do in a class.
“Going into midterm, they know where they stand,” he said. “They know that I know where they stand.”
While Vecchio said it is commonly believed that a midterm grade indicates how well a student will do in a class, he doesn’t like giving midterm grades at this time.
“All I care about is a student’s final grade,” Vecchio said. “There are steps we can take as a faculty to help the better students continue to succeed and to help the others do better.”
However, the Registrar’s Office requires professors at Bonaventure to submit student midterm grades at this time. Vecchio said because he doesn’t give a midterm exam, he bases the grades on assignments given this far into the semester.
“For students who haven’t done well, several factors come into play: attendance, efforts to seek extra help, potential for success and the like,” he said. “I won’t fail a student at midterm unless I need to remind him or her that the course is serious business. Not many students need such reminders.”
While Vecchio doesn’t like the idea of giving midterms or midterm grades, he said he knows other professors do and he doesn’t judge their decisions.
Rick Simpson, professor of English, said he doesn’t give midterms but also doesn’t have a problem with giving midterm grades.
“I’m on a slightly different schedule in my literature courses with the first exam coming about a third of a way through the semester, not at midterm,” Simpson said. “The grade on that exam becomes the student’s midterm grade.”
Simpson said as long as students are following the procedures he set, they should do well and said midterm grades are usually good indicators of how students will do in classes.
“That’s all a midterm grade can be in any circumstances — particularly in courses like mine,” he said. “Roughly two-thirds of the graded work is done after midterm. The second of three exams comes a few weeks after midterm, for example.”
Most professors say they don’t intend to avoid midterms during this time, but just schedule exams throughout the semester.
“I prefer breaking the material into tests covering relevant blocks of the course material as opposed to giving a midterm,” said marketing lecturer Kristen Ryan. “I don’t specifically avoid giving them before break — I schedule tests where logical breaks in the material fall.”
Ryan said because this is only her second semester at St. Bonaventure, she can’t compare the timing of submitting midterm grades to previous years.
“I’m a big fan of Moodle and use the gradebook for students to be able to check their scores on individual tests or assignments,” Ryan said. “For me, reporting midterm grades is just summarizing the students’ performance to date on any assessments and factoring in things like their attendance and participation to this point in the semester.”
However, Ryan sees midterm grades as more of a reflection on what students have done so far rather than an indication of how they will do at the final exam.
“I usually have larger projects due at the end of the semester — leaving room to improve if they are not happy with the grade they see at midterm,” she said. “For my courses, I think midterm grades are more of a reality check, giving students the opportunity to stay on course if they are happy with their midterm grade or change course if necessary.”
Junior marketing major Matt O’Connell said he has midterms in all four of his classes and dislikes how early in the semester they are scheduled.
“In most cases, the midterm is the only grade we have so far,” O’Connell said. “But I view them simply as another test, nothing really special and they don’t usually reflect how I’m doing in the class at all.”
However, freshman history major Mike Madonna said he believes midterms positively impact students.
“I think it’s good to get midterm grades now so that we (students) have a good idea of where our grades are at,” Madonna said. “This way we know where we need to improve. Some teachers are bad at posting grades on Moodle.”
Madonna says he thinks of midterm grades as a way to see what he needs to do for the remainder of the semester.
“If I’ve done well in a class, then I continue to do what I’m doing,” Madonna said. “If not, then I know I need to change. I think it would be even better if teachers posted grades a few times a semester.”
Whether or not students have midterms this week, students and professors can both agree that it’s a good time in the semester for a break to get rejuvenated.
