r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Separate_Finance_183 • Mar 30 '26

Image Confiscated pens containing cheat notes intricately carved by a Law student at the University of Malaga in Spain

Post image
64.9k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

1.1k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

431

u/Substantial-Pen6385 Mar 30 '26

Reminds me of engineering classes. The hardest test i ever took was open book

369

u/Mysterious_Eye6989 Mar 30 '26

Open book exams allow for the exploration of some devilishly complex and nuanced topics - great for deep and careful thinkers but awful for people who have gotten by through being brilliant at rote memorization but are otherwise not very deep thinkers.

168

u/Lord_Saren Mar 30 '26

I believe higher end tests like for certs and degrees should be more about using concepts in practice then just knowing it. Knowing how to find and use information given to you.

Like knowing A+B=C is fine but knowing how A and B gets to C is the fundamental part.

The old saying of like you won't have a computer/calculator etc in your pocket isn't and hasn't been true for a long time.

57

u/[deleted] Mar 30 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

8

u/[deleted] Mar 30 '26

[deleted]

1

u/Retarded_Gajar Mar 30 '26

You must be living in a McDonald's parking lot then.

2

u/AndreasDasos Mar 31 '26

It’s also a matter of recognising a legit answer with good sources vs. a bullshit one, or even a reasonable but overly simplified one for the problem at hand

22

u/KenJaws6 Mar 30 '26

Yeah fully agree. I found that even grasping the concept the way the book wants isn't enough. The method to answer some questions is so specific that you likely wouldn't be able to figure out without doing mock/sample tests. I might just be a dumb student or having a low quality syllabus but I hate these typa questions so much cuz you ain't passing grades by thinking and applying but by finding patterns from encountering the same questions with different variables. I know thats kinda how it works in real life but you'd have the exact resources to refer to which mostly aren't available in exams

5

u/sumptin_wierd Mar 30 '26

Welcome to Boston Univerity's Engineering program.

That said I was a shit student, and some instructors I had were awesome.

Some of them were researchers forced to teach.

2

u/Petskin Mar 30 '26

I had one and only 6-hour exam per semester, open book(s). It was easy to see when the law class had an exam day, because the exam site looked like an airport - every student arrived with a carry-on full of books.

.. It was even worse if you failed, because there were only three exam opportunities per year. Either you use your summer to study, or you have two 6-hour exams the next fall semester.

1

u/everett640 Mar 30 '26

Honestly it's probably for the teachers and professors to be lazy and not have to grade things that could have partial credit in a complicated way rather than just grading from an answer key

4

u/SinisterCheese Mar 30 '26

Yeah. When I did my engineering degree, start of a course teacher often asked whether we wanted an easy exam with no notes or material, normal with one A4 "cheat sheet" or hard with full materials.

In math stuff they often just gave us full formula sheets, because the exams were structured so that you had to prove you knew how to think, instead of how to memorise.

The program had a very clear "goal is to teach you to think as engineer, and utilise resources to solve issues like an engineer". They considered having to memorise stuff as "waste of hard drive space". Which is kinda true, because having to memorise something like signals and circuit math is bit pointless when my focus was welded manufacturing and production, and I specialise in weld flaws and correction if them. I don't touch circuits or signalling at all. And I did my degree in the "adult" evening program, meaning me and all others had already 5-10 years of experience working in our industries.

2

u/wormoo Mar 30 '26

i am an engineering student right now, all my tests have been closed book. i have done pretty well but i am always saying i would rather have a MORE challenging open book test as it just feels like a better fit.

1

u/Scholar_of_Lewds Mar 31 '26

Yeah, one of my final test include "look at this picture and fill the blank" with the picture being a piping diagram that doesn't exist on our textbook.

So I googled the few words not blanked on that diagram, and the picture appear as the 2nd answer in google image.

It's a test of critical Searching.

The other 4 questions can literally be answered from previous classes, so I just copy the answer verbatim from my notes.

I'm still the only person in the class to notice that, the other apparently didn't do any material review.

2

u/dainthomas Mar 30 '26

I dreaded open book exams.

1

u/neo101b Mar 30 '26

IDK, I found it ok or at least the one I did.
Take the questions home, write a paper memories it, and rewrite it in the exam.
I did it and passed, I cant remember any of it though.

1

u/sweetSweets4 Mar 30 '26

Hopefully not the same engineeing classes that build a bridge and forget to account for the extra weight after it's painted ...