Group Work Project Nightmares...

[Xenocrates]

Has any one of you ever had to work in a group and had to deal with people who are slackers, feeloaders or generally unconcerned with the proceedings of the project @ hand? This is an official shout out to people who've been through the university or at the very least, community college system and have had to deal with these obnoxious individuals. Share your stories here. We'd love to read them.

My Story

So there's like two of them really. The first one was with a certain young lady who was assigned to tabulate some graphs for a proposal we were doing. Needless to say that when we were to have a group meeting to discuss our contributions, she opted to get herself "some", instead of meeting with the group. We know this because she had not properly hung up her phone when she called to apologize for not being able to make it because of "personal matters". She was quite a screamer.

So anywho, on the day the project was to be handed in, she came with her graphs printed on completely different paper, unnumbered, and done with a dot-matrix printer. The project was done on typeset A5, numbered, and printed with a hi-rez laserjet colour printer - So you know there was some clash. Needless to say, another member of the group did what she was supposed to have done, so we were set. Luckily the lecturer realised her sloppy attempt at contributing to the project and failed her outrightly.

She is set to drop out at the end of this semester.

The second story has to do with a dude who (to say the least) spent his entire time @ school playing dominoes. As to why one would pay nearly $100,000 to come to university to play dominoes is beyond me. Anywho, this fella is a nototrious slacker. Dominoes in the morning, Dominoes in the evening, Dominoes when we were leaving the library @ 9 pm. We had a software engineering project to finish. After the project was finished, printed, bound and presented to the lecturer, this goodfella came to my house the next day to present to me his contribution as it were on a diskette, gleefully reminding me that we got an extension - one which nobody took advantage of. Needless to say, his name was docked from the project.

He has been disqualified (as of last week) from continuing the course.

Well, those were my horror stories. I've left out some of the more grotesque details for the palatability's sake.

What's your story?

[Nastro]

Hey we are starting a group study program for IT Certifications and this is exactly encouraging :icon_lol:

[kilaj1]

just curious...what did you say to them two people or what did they say to you after this?

[Xenocrates]

They both begged like desperate insurance salespersons. When I didn't give in, they resorted to malice. It's amazing how childish people can get. :rolleyes:

[BlackCryptoKnight]

I personally, have never been much of a fan of groupwork. All throughout my school years (Prep, High, University), I've had to do most of the work myself.
It reached the point where I would take on the whole project just to be prepared for when others didn't contribute so that it would be completed.

Anyways, my most memorable story goes like this:

Back when I was on campus, I had a course - CS29A (I think...) Systems Programming. We had a project to build our own version of UNIX file management utilities using C and making use of system calls etc. My group had 3 people. One was a girl and the other was a guy + me.

Now, I needed this grade something awful...having been in a sticky situation with failing some other courses and all - plus it was the 2nd time I was taking this particular course. The project counted toward a significant portion of the course final grade.

Shortly after the project kicks off...we lose contact with the guy. He just disappears. Can't reach him by phone, don't see him in class...nothing. He surfaces midway to the due date and says that he's in final year, he has an electronics project due that he has to complete for him to graduate, he doesn't need this course as badly, so sorry...he isn't going to be able to contribute.

The girl pulls her disappearing act a short time after that.

Now having been a veteran at watching group-work disintegrate, I remained calm, went to the lecturer, explained the situation, and handed in the completed project - coded entirely by myself from scratch with documentation and manual as required. The other 2 people had contributed something initially, but the darn things were so shoddy - basically the first draft- I didn't even bother to consider it.

They failed the course. I passed. I saw them around, smiled, waved, made small talk, watched them squirm uncomfortably, and went on my merry way.

I wonder what they're doing now? :eusa_thin

Sorry fi dem if wi eva haffi work together again one day :icon_twis

[Xenocrates]

That's the way you have to do it BCK. Stealthi-like. University ain't for kids.

[Chris]

wow, compared to you guys my university life seemed smooth. I don't really have any group horror stories to tell. I guess that I've been blessed to have been matched up with good guys. Hmmm ... then again, maybe one of them will soon come on and complain about me :o Seriously though, I tended to be the project leader or "deputy leader" whenever I had to work in groups.

[Greatis]

I haven't been to university yet but I've had some pretty weird stuff happen to me. In 8th grade we had a science research project about the human brain to do. three of us were in the group, we decided to split the work. Anyways after going home my bro said to me just do it all by yourself which I did.

now were supposed to do our own research and then meet at the library to put stuff together and have someone type it up and make it look pretty. That saturday I wait fi bout 6hrs at the St. James Parish library and none a did other people come. (now of course I was not wasting time mi did a finish up the entire project.)

MI carry in mi work on Monday and did teacher grade it (mi did get 100) regular stuff :rolleyes:. Anyways the other two peeps get zero and dem waan fight mi star. Mi affi defend mi self ina di wickidis way star.

[d_knight]

yo trust me greatis me share that pain star, the other day star when digicel was giving away an extra $100 with every credit purchased, my group members and I were supposed to meet up at school to work on our final project. the project is a website so we using some xhtml, php, mysql etc...
i got to ucc (worthington avenue, newkingston endz) at 11 am. 1 member was already there. he and i are actualy the one's who have been working on the project as far as development is concerned now if this project reach 60% i did 50 and the other guy there did 10%. anyway he and i waited and waited and waited, we left school at about 5:30. now we didn't get anyphone calls, but i could blame it on the fact that digicel was down but then was that really the cause.. I will never know for sure,

there is no ending ot this as in where grades are concerned because this project still isn't due yet

[Cocoa]

I have had group studies in high school with the Kingston College dudes and everything went smoothly. They were committed to the school Challenge Quiz Team, their love for God and school work. So I adopted that principle and studied with them.

However, when I did the year long Theological course at the Seminary in Texas, these christians (some of them), were straight shammers. We were suppose to meet up and study in depth on the the Holy Spirit and these 'spirituals', were caught up doing other things. And it was not praying either down by the church. I waited and waited and none showed up. Said they had to attend to family. Then one of the guys from the study team liked me, and he was the one who wanted to come to my house...but not to study. Ain't going to happen dude.

I didn't have it, so I provided my self with flash cards, repitition in writing and studied. Passed the test very well too. I don't even know about them. Some dropped out of the seminary.

People need to recognise time to play and time to study man.

[Pondadat]

When Im away from work I dont really want to talk about it. :rolleyes:

[Drew]

well the only thing remotely close to a horror story really was like this.....

final project for building and repairing computers. task completely scrap a fully loaded pc, then put it back together. (baby stuff for me nowadays) 4 of us in the group.

9am in the morning we were to begin. one of the girls and i were the only ones early in my group. anyway, the teacher said we were to begin, so we did. we all decided to do piece piece of the project. so i started to dismantle this computer, and looked at the other young lady and told her its her time to chip in. she is afraid of the metal scraping up her nails. anyways, about a little after 10 the other 2 members came(they apparantly was outside the buiding from 9.30, not sure why) anyway, we started one big argument because the others weren't helping.

so i completely took apart the pc without any help from 1, 2 or 3 of the other members. i had to leave school for about an hour which i discussed with my teacher before the start of the project, he said that was fine. so i took apart it, and left. when i came back not one component was reasembled. so the teacher came to us and said "since i saw andrew took apart the entire computer, its your guys job to take it apart and put it back together the following monday." so you know that the other members were upset with me.

i got 95% and the others had to do over the course because they were unable to take it apart totally or put it back together.

you reap what you sow.

[Greatis]

that is how it fi go Drew. Dem waan come live off your labour. Chrrrps

[Drew]

trust me, i know what you mean. but i'm like that, work has to be done, someone has to do it.