Parable of the Parachute Packer

First, a comic from xkcd.com, because if you are anything like me, after hearing this argument, you are going to be pretty choked with your old teachers and the old way of doing things...



At First glance, this doesn't seem to have much to do with education, so let me use another example that ake the comparison a bit more obvious. I like to call it the parachute packers parable. Pretend you have 3 students. If you have taught for a while, you will probably imagine a past student when you hear their descriptions.

The Set up
Student 1 is a bit of a flake. They miss a great number of classes, but they show great potential to be a great parachute packer some day. When they try they get 100%, when they don't try they just doodle on the test. They get 50% on the final, and their average mark ends up being 50% as well

Student 2 showed great promise at the beginning of the year. They tried really hard, and received excellent grades. Unfortunately one bad mark seemed to ruin their motivation, and they checked out mentally. Their final mark ended up being zero, but their average was 50%

Student 3 struggled. In the beginning, they just didn't get it. They failed their first 3 tests, but by the 4th test they started to get it, and on their last 2 tests they did very well, and they got 100% on the final.
Their final mark was 50%

	Test 1	Test 2	Test 3	Test 4	Test 5	Test 6	Final
Student 1	100	0	100	0	100	0	50
Student 2	100	100	100	50	0	0	0
Student 3	0	0	0	50	100	100	100

Here is a graph of their marks








The Choices

So all 3 students ended up with 50% in the course which, for the sake of argument, we will say is a pass. Which student would you want to pack your parachute?

 I suppose if you have a death wish, you would want student 2, who apparently forgot everything they learned about parachute packing by the time the final rolled around. Maybe they were extrinsically motivated initially by the high marks, but when that motivation wore off, they stopped trying. Or maybe the embarrassment of doing poorly was too much of a hit to their self-esteem. Either way, not my first choice for a parachute packer. 

You are going skydiving, so maybe you like to live dangerously, so maybe student 1 is your preferred packer. You have a 50/50 chance that they are on the ball that day, and by the time the final came around, they seemed to understand half of the concepts, so "YOLO" right? Do you want the student that put in the effort occasionally so that they would pass, but didn't care enough to try for the whole year?

Or, maybe you (like me) think YOLO means you should always wear a helmet, and seat belts are a must, so you want packer #3, who by the end of the course understood all of the concepts, but was punished by not understanding it at the beginning.

The Moral

We are checking for understanding, at least that is what we tell ourselves. But why does it matter if they don't understand something right away? What if it takes a while for the whole point of something to sink in? All 3 of these students received the same mark, do you think they all deserved the same mark?

Well? What do you think? Do you think they all deserved the same mark?