Is It Fair for Some Students to Get Extra Time on Exams?

[General_Sax]

Today I wrote a chemistry mid term examination. I was nearly finished when I heard "OK, times up, bring your test to the front", too bad i didn't finish I thought. On my way to the front I noticed people still writing the exam. I thought well that's unfair, but hey that's life. After I handed my exam in I looked around, and people were STILL writing the exam. I did a quick calculation: at that time (who knows if they kept writing) these people had 6% more time to write the exam than I did.


I decided to talk to the prof about the matter, just to inform her as to what is happening. She told me that she had discussed the matter with her TA's and they had fanned out to bring the "stragglers" in. I told her that's not what happened, she says something along the lines of "I only saw a few keep writing" ... uumm WHAT?

Why is it acceptable for these "few" to have an unfair advantage over me? What they're doing amounts to cheating plain and simple. I'm competing against a number of these students for entrance into second year programs, and she finds it acceptable to provide them with an unfair advantage? If I was the prof. I would've taken their exams and given them all 0! Because they're cheaters.

All the while one TA was giving me a dirty look. I was thinking "Yeah, I'm ratting you out for doing a terrible job".

Is my experience the norm? In the future, should I flagrantly disregard the rules and continue to write an exam until they rip it out of my hands?

 

[Sorry!]

Is my experience the norm? In the future, should I flagrantly disregard the rules and continue to write an exam until they rip it out of my hands?

I wouldn't say your experience is the norm. I've heard plenty of stories of people receiving 0 for continuing to write. However imagine the position the TA is into give a a mark of 0 to these people who just took the 3 hours to write the damn thing anyways just because they wanted to finish writing down their final thought. They should have gone around forcing people to submit but hey that's not what they did that's life.

If I were you I would feel that if I was comfortable enough to get up with my unfinished exam and hand it in that regardless of how much extra time these people took I would probably end up doing better anyways.

 

[ideasrule]

If the professor felt generous and wanted to give people a little more time, why did you not take advantage of it? In the real world, you'll rarely be in a situation where doing a problem 6% quicker will make a huge difference. If somebody needed several extra minutes on a three-hour exam to finish their calculations, I really don't think it's a big deal.

 

[rasmhop]

I told her that's not what happened, she says something along the lines of "I only saw a few keep writing" ... uumm WHAT?

Are you saying "uumm WHAT" due to the inaccurate number of people continuing to write, or due to the relaxed nature of the reply?

Why is it acceptable for these "few" to have an unfair advantage over me? What they're doing amounts to cheating plain and simple.

I agree and I think it's totally unacceptable if nothing is done about it.

If I was the prof. I would've taken their exams and given them all 0! Because they're cheaters.

In my opinion this would be the proper response, but only if the prof. made sure to inform everyone in unambiguous terms before the tests that to keep writing would be considered cheating. Some people may be under the mistaken impression that this is acceptable due to prior experiences with inaction from the professors' side.

All the while one TA was giving me a dirty look. I was thinking "Yeah, I'm ratting you out for doing a terrible job".

I'm thinking that perhaps the right thing here to do is to tell the prof. discretely that he/she really ought to do something about it because the scores have a lasting effect for you. Depending on policy you may even point out the fact that it's against university/department policy to ignore the issue, in a non-accusatory manner of course (I know it would be against policy at my university to accept such behavior). Don't go blaming the TA or prof. because that is likely to give you bad results, but urge them to consider the problem.

Is my experience the norm? In the future, should I flagrantly disregard the rules and continue to write an exam until they rip it out of my hands?

I don't know whether it's the norm since frankly I have never really stayed till the end of a college test, but the instructors make sure to inform us prior to every test that not stopping to write will result in a 0 and no one I have spoken to have complained about this kind of behavior so I suppose it's not an issue here. I have been attending some math competitions when in high school (such as IMO), and there it was never an issue (everyone stopped the second time was called).

I would advice against disregarding the rules since:
1) It's frankly an inconsiderate thing to do.
2) The time you do it, you may be unlucky that the prof. listen to you, or that you have another prof. who do give 0s for this behavior.
3) Most tests are made such that a good student will be able to finish in time.

 

[General_Sax]

Are you saying "uumm WHAT" due to the inaccurate number of people continuing to write, or due to the relaxed nature of the reply?

The implication that she allowed the few an unfair advantage over the many.

I'm thinking that perhaps the right thing here to do is to tell the prof. discretely that he/she really ought to do something about it because the scores have a lasting effect for you.

Yeah, I'm thinking about going to her office hours one day to speak about the matter. I just want to say my piece. My problem is that on the front of the test it says: "You have 50 minutes to complete this examination", and she doesn't enforce this rule.

Really it's more than that; I had 50 minutes to determine 20% of my mark, why should some have 53 minutes?

 

[Redbelly98]

Is my experience the norm? In the future, should I flagrantly disregard the rules and continue to write an exam until they rip it out of my hands?

I once had a high school teacher tell our class that we should do exactly that.

Now that you have seen that people are permitted to keep writing a few extra minutes, you may want to use that to your advantage in future exams if you are not quite finished with writing something down.

 

[DrClapeyron]

rules were meant to be broken. in these situations it doesn't help to be the leader, it's not like the professor is going to fail half the class.

 

[Pengwuino]

I wouldn't worry about it. People who finish at the last second usually don't get much help by having a few more minutes to finish the test in my experience.

 

[Moonbear]

Perhaps all the people who were supposed to hand in their exams when time was up did so. It's possible that the TAs failed to be discreet about allowing a few students to remain who were granted extra time or an untimed exam due to learning disabilities, or some other issue.

Beyond that, I agree with Pengwuino that those who are desperately struggling beyond the allotted exam time are usually getting pretty lousy scores anyway. I have never had an A student be the last one to leave an exam, but have regularly had that last person lingering get the lowest score. Even when I was a TA and worked for one professor whose only time limit on exams was that the students had to turn in their papers if another class needed to use the room (oh, did I HATE that assignment on exam days), and one student always tried to stay forever...he still got the lowest score even if he sat there for an hour longer than everyone else.

 

[ideasrule]

P
Beyond that, I agree with Pengwuino that those who are desperately struggling beyond the allotted exam time are usually getting pretty lousy scores anyway. I have never had an A student be the last one to leave an exam

That's quite interesting. I used to get the top mark in my science and english classes, but I was always the last person to hand in my test. (My philosophy was that taking advantage of every available second can't possibly disadvantage me in any way.) By contrast, the people who hand in tests 20 minutes before the end of class tend to get below-average scores.

 

[dotman]

Why is it acceptable for these "few" to have an unfair advantage over me? What they're doing amounts to cheating plain and simple.

That's one way to look at it I suppose. The other way is that you failed to take advantage of an opportunity given to all of the students in the class (to work a few extra minutes).

The best, most effective, people in real life, know which rules can be bent, and which can be broken. This one can be bent, sometimes, if need be, and now you've learned that. Instead of mouthing off to the professor and everyone else about how your experience didn't live up to your idealized vision of fairness, perhaps you should take the lesson that this is how the world works, and learn from it.

If I was the prof. I would've taken their exams and given them all 0! Because they're cheaters.

Heh. Sure you would have. And had no problems when your supervisor comes down on you, because he just got 20 calls from students and parents of students outraged at this blatant overpunishment. All actions have consequences.

In the future, should I flagrantly disregard the rules and continue to write an exam until they rip it out of my hands?

Learning how far you can push the limits is part of learning to function in the real world. There's a middle ground.

But most importantly, life isn't always fair. Deal with it.

All of this said, I agree with the previous posters that a few extra minutes shouldn't be necessary, or make a difference. Personally, I think its better to focus on your own knowledge and mastery, then to get caught up in the competition with Joe Schmoe.

 

[Moonbear]

That's quite interesting. I used to get the top mark in my science and english classes, but I was always the last person to hand in my test. (My philosophy was that taking advantage of every available second can't possibly disadvantage me in any way.) By contrast, the people who hand in tests 20 minutes before the end of class tend to get below-average scores.

Not in my classes. If they know the stuff well, they can finish the test in 20 minutes, still take another 20 minutes to go through and recheck all their answers, and turn it in 20 minutes early. I've also encountered a lot of students who do more harm than good by spending too much time rechecking...they end up second-guessing themselves and changing right answers to wrong ones.

There are sometimes good students who stay until the end of the exam just to give themselves time to consider one or two questions they had difficulty on, or to double check, etc., but they have no problem with just turning in the exam as soon as time is called, because they really were done with it well before that. They aren't the very last out the door. The last ones out the door are just the type the OP is talking about, the ones who are desperately trying to scramble for some extra time.

When I give exams, I hand them out from the front to the back of the room, and then collect from front to back, so generally, it ends up pretty even if someone in the back is still writing when I take the exams from the front row, since the students in the front row never wait until everyone has their exams to begin (and I'm not going to spend a lot of time doing silly things like sealing the exam book so they can't start).

The only time I ever had an issue with a professor who allowed students to take longer to complete the exam was one chemistry course I took. We weren't told ahead of time we could have longer than the scheduled lecture period, but then students were allowed to stay as much as a half hour or more later. I had another class right after that one, so had to leave to get to my other class. I thought that if we were going to be given the option of THAT much extra time, not just 3 or 5 minutes, the professor should have either let us know ahead of time so we could let the instructor of the next class know the situation, or find out if people had other classes to get to and not allow the added time if we couldn't all use it.

I don't have those particular issues with the classes I teach, because all my students are in the same major and take all their classes together, so if one has a conflict, they all do.

 

[Redbelly98]

.
.
.
The best, most effective, people in real life, know which rules can be bent, and which can be broken.
.
.
.
Learning how far you can push the limits is part of learning to function in the real world. There's a middle ground.

Well said. I know it took me many years to appreciate this, and I'm still not very good at bending the rules when appropriate. But at last I appreciate it's okay to do that sometimes.

 

[rootX]

OP:

You can also break the rules but there is certain risk invovled. I agree with the above post that "The best, most effective, people in real life, know which rules can be bent, and which can be broken." You have to think yourself how much risk is invovled and how much you can gain by breaking those rules, and how long you can do this. I don't hesitate to break ones where risk is low and I can gain more.

I mostly finish my exams before the end time but when exam is hard and I have some incomplete questions I don't try to work overtime because it's never been the case that I would have gotten more than 2% if I had gone overtime. I just think of the bell curve :).

 

[Pengwuino]

The best, most effective, people in real life, know which rules can be bent, and which can be broken.

Is this why government employees are the way they are?

 

[BobG]

Why is it acceptable for these "few" to have an unfair advantage over me? What they're doing amounts to cheating plain and simple. I'm competing against a number of these students for entrance into second year programs, and she finds it acceptable to provide them with an unfair advantage? If I was the prof. I would've taken their exams and given them all 0! Because they're cheaters.

I disagree with the punishment. What's the penalty for turning in homework late? The only reason giving a 0 would be seen as acceptable punishment is because turning in an incomplete test is seen as about an equivalent result as turning the test in late. The punishment of not finishing the last problem or two is about equivalent to deducting points for turning the test in late (which would be a more appropriate punishment than giving the student a zero - rule 42 in parenting is don't lay out consequences/punishments you can't see yourself actually enforcing; like grounding your kid until he's 18, for example).

Other than that, you could ask the same question about whether it's fair for a few people to get away with speeding while the majority of us have to manage our time if we want to get to work on time. Of course, that 'few'/'majority' estimate would probably be a little naive. Most people take the attitude that small stuff isn't worth sweating about - and people who speed just a little or people who take just a little extra time really aren't a big enough issue to worry about. The absolute deadline is probably set as much for the time that the resources are available as for any other standard (testing based on availability of resources instead of the course objectives is an undesirable practice, by the way; it's just one of the compromises one has to make with life).

Here's how people feel about deadlines (and authority in general):

The setting is a huge lecture hall (approximately 1000 students) for a Calculus final. Apparently this particular calculus teacher wasn't very well liked. He was one of those guys who would stand at the front of the class and yell out how much time was remaining before the end of a test, a real charmer. Since he was so busy gallivanting around the room making sure that nobody cheated and that everyone was aware of how much time they had left before their failure on the test was complete, he had the students stack the completed tests on the huge podium at the front of the room. This made for quite a mess, remember there were 1000 students in the class.

Anyway, during this particular final, one guy entered the test needing a decent grade to pass the class. His only problem with Calculus was that he did poorly when rushed, and this guy standing in the front of the room barking out how much time was left before the tests had to be handed in didn't help him at all. He figured he wanted to assure himself of a good grade, so he hardly flinched when the professor said, "pencils down and submit your scantron sheets and work to piles at the front of the room."

Five minutes turned into ten, ten into twenty, twenty into forty ... almost an hour after the test was "officially over", our friend finally put down his pencil, gathered up his work, and headed to the front of the hall to submit his final. The whole time, the professor sat at the front of the room, strangely waiting for the student to complete his exam.

"What do you think you're doing?" the professor asked as the student stood in front of him about to put down his exam on one of the neatly stacked piles of exams (the professor had plenty of time to stack the mountain of papers while he waited) It was clear that the professor had waited only to give the student a hard time.

"Turning in my exam," retorted the student confidently. "I'm afraid I have some bad news for you," the professor gloated, "your exam is an hour late. You've FAILED it and, consequently, I'll see you next term when you repeat my course."

The student smiled slyly and asked the professor, "Do you know who I am?"

"What?" replied the professor gruffly, annoyed that the student showed no sign of emotion.

The student rephrased the question mockingly, "Do you know what my name is?"

"NO," snarled the professor.

The student looked the professor dead in the eyes and said slowly, "I didn't think so," as he lifted up one of the stacks half way, shoved his test neatly into the center of the stack, let the stack fall burying his test in the middle, turned around, and walked casually out of the huge lecture hall.

You don't become the hero of a story by enforcing standards. You become the hero of a story by cleverly violating "unreasonable" standards.

 

[Sorry!]

I disagree with the punishment. What's the penalty for turning in homework late? The only reason giving a 0 would be seen as acceptable punishment is because turning in an incomplete test is seen as about an equivalent result as turning the test in late. The punishment of not finishing the last problem or two is about equivalent to deducting points for turning the test in late (which would be a more appropriate punishment than giving the student a zero - rule 42 in parenting is don't lay out consequences/punishments you can't see yourself actually enforcing; like grounding your kid until he's 18, for example).

Other than that, you could ask the same question about whether it's fair for a few people to get away with speeding while the majority of us have to manage our time if we want to get to work on time. Of course, that 'few'/'majority' estimate would probably be a little naive. Most people take the attitude that small stuff isn't worth sweating about - and people who speed just a little or people who take just a little extra time really aren't a big enough issue to worry about. The absolute deadline is probably set as much for the time that the resources are available as for any other standard (testing based on availability of resources instead of the course objectives is an undesirable practice, by the way; it's just one of the compromises one has to make with life).

Here's how people feel about deadlines (and authority in general):



You don't become the hero of a story by enforcing standards. You become the hero of a story by cleverly violating "unreasonable" standards.

Hahaha that movie is great!

I'd have to disagree about the receiving a mark of 0 though. This is completely different submitting an exam and an assignment.

Assignments lose how much per day on average 10% of their mark? Should a person be ablet o sit in the exam class for a full day and lose only 10% of their mark? Taking extra time is tantamount to cheating and cheating in the schools I've gone to always receives a mark of 0.

If you think that the universities should allow students to write their exams with extra time just because they want to then I don't know what to think. My senior year of high-school would probably be more difficult than how you think an university should be run.

 

[drizzle]

...Beyond that, I agree with Pengwuino that those who are desperately struggling beyond the allotted exam time are usually getting pretty lousy scores anyway. I have never had an A student be the last one to leave an exam, but have regularly had that last person lingering get the lowest score. Even when I was a TA and worked for one professor whose only time limit on exams was that the students had to turn in their papers if another class needed to use the room (oh, did I HATE that assignment on exam days), and one student always tried to stay forever...he still got the lowest score even if he sat there for an hour longer than everyone else.

that's an unfair sweeping statement Moonbear
well...you’re partly correct, but for instance, I remember that I never hand in any of my QM exams before time expires…….hell, I never get the final answer, I only get it in the last [STRIKE]min[/STRIKE] second and I never had the time to review my calculations.

When I give exams, I hand them out from the front to the back of the room, and then collect from front to back, so generally, it ends up pretty even if someone in the back is still writing when I take the exams from the front row, since the students in the front row never wait until everyone has their exams to begin (and I'm not going to spend a lot of time doing silly things like sealing the exam book so they can't start).

that's just so fair, I might follow that. thanks for sharing

 

[dotman]

Taking extra time is tantamount to cheating

No it isn't. This is like saying going 48 mph in a 45 mph zone is the same as going 80 mph in that same zone. The actions carry vastly different risks (in terms of bodily injury) and rewards (in terms of time saved).

The potential gain of working an extra 3 minutes on a 50 minute exam, while people are bustling about to put their papers on the desk, is no where near the potential gain of actually cheating-- say, stealing an advance copy of the test and working out the solutions.

It's all a moot point anyways. Frankly, most teachers write their tests such that those extra few minutes aren't going to make any difference anyways. This is why they do not worry so much if a student doesn't slam their pencil down immediately.

 

[Pattonias]

Yours is not the only school that does this. At my school, I've seen teachers have to physically take the test away from a student. The student isn't punished so their isn't any reason for this to discontinue.
At my high school we lost points or failed if we didn't put pencils down when told to do so. As a result, we got really good at time management on a test. I guess this was part of the standardized test conditioning.

I agree with some of the posters above, most students who need the extra time are not doing well anyway. The extra time will mean little to them. If you think that you could actually gain from this time wait, observe the environment, and make a decision. If they don't punish the others, then take the extra time and use it to your advantage.

 

[leroyjenkens]

Well said. I know it took me many years to appreciate this, and I'm still not very good at bending the rules when appropriate. But at last I appreciate it's okay to do that sometimes.

Seems like some people just get away with bending the rules because they're lucky, not because they have some intricate understanding of the world.

No it isn't. This is like saying going 48 mph in a 45 mph zone is the same as going 80 mph in that same zone. The actions carry vastly different risks (in terms of bodily injury) and rewards (in terms of time saved).

The potential gain of working an extra 3 minutes on a 50 minute exam, while people are bustling about to put their papers on the desk, is no where near the potential gain of actually cheating-- say, stealing an advance copy of the test and working out the solutions.

To use your analogy against you, going 48 in a 45 is speeding, just as going 80 in a 45 is speeding. Of course going 80 will get you a stiffer penalty, but just because speeds exist that are higher than 48 doesn't mean that 48 isn't still speeding.

There's different degrees of cheating. Some give you a slight advantage, some give you a huge advantage, but it's still cheating nonetheless and still giving you an advantage that others didn't get.

 

[dotman]

Of course going 80 will get you a stiffer penalty,

Exactly. The idea of getting a zero for working for 3 extra minutes would be equivalent to getting your license suspended for a year and a thousand dollar fine for going 3 miles over the speed limit.

It doesn't happen, because its not fair (and impractical).

still giving you an advantage that others didn't get.

It's worth pointing out that all students were given the opportunity to work a few extra minutes, its just that only a few, apparently, took advantage of it, in this case.

 

[leroyjenkens]

It's worth pointing out that all students were given the opportunity to work a few extra minutes, its just that only a few, apparently, took advantage of it, in this case.

There's no way to know that you do have that opportunity until you take it and then maybe when you do take it, you get caught and punished.
Do you think everyone had that opportunity? What do you think would happen if everyone kept working for a few minutes after the time was up?

 

[Pattonias]

There's no way to know that you do have that opportunity until you take it and then maybe when you do take it, you get caught and punished.
Do you think everyone had that opportunity? What do you think would happen if everyone kept working for a few minutes after the time was up?

Very good point, If the entire class ignored the teacher we would all get written up for insubordination. As long as people are lining up and going through the motions of leaving, the teacher doesn't care that his/her instructions were ignored by a few.

 

[dotman]

Do you think everyone had that opportunity? What do you think would happen if everyone kept working for a few minutes after the time was up?

Just because every single individual can't bend the rules at the same time, doesn't mean each individual in particular didn't have the opportunity to do so.

This is like looking at a room of 1st graders and saying that each and every one of them can, when they grow up, become President of the United States, if they work hard enough. It's perfectly reasonable that at that point in their lives, each one of them has that opportunity, if they work hard. However, clearly they can't -all- become President of the United States, because they're the same age, term limits, etc... but each one certainly has the capability (say).

More succinctly, asking what would happen if everyone kept working is invalid, because everyone did not keep working. But clearly the OP could have, with no ill consequences.

 

[Pattonias]

I think we need to pose this question to the US Congress. Obviously we can't come to any straight answer just "discussing" it so I think we should let our elected officials decide for us.

 

[leroyjenkens]

More succinctly, asking what would happen if everyone kept working is invalid, because everyone did not keep working. But clearly the OP could have, with no ill consequences.

Your original point was that it's not cheating. Well here's a definition of cheating that says that breaking the rules is cheating.
Cheating: to violate rules or regulations.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/cheating

If you're playing poker, is hiding cards up your sleeve not cheating since everyone has the opportunity to do so as well?

You're right that they all, individually, have the same opportunity to break the rules. But that just sounds like you're advocating breaking the rules, because you know not everyone will do so as well, which allows you to get away with it.

 

[dotman]

Your original point was that it's not cheating.

No, it wasn't. My original point was:

That's one way to look at it I suppose. The other way is that you failed to take advantage of an opportunity given to all of the students in the class (to work a few extra minutes).

The best, most effective, people in real life, know which rules can be bent, and which can be broken.

You're right that they all, individually, have the same opportunity to break the rules. But that just sounds like you're advocating breaking the rules, because you know not everyone will do so as well, which allows you to get away with it.

I'm not advocating anything. What I'm saying, and what I said in my original post, is that this is how the real world works, and he'd be better served learning how to deal with it and work with it, than he is by complaining about it to his professor.

What advice would you give the OP in dealing with this situation?

 

[BobG]

There's no way to know that you do have that opportunity until you take it and then maybe when you do take it, you get caught and punished.
Do you think everyone had that opportunity? What do you think would happen if everyone kept working for a few minutes after the time was up?

Absolutely nothing. There's no way a teacher is going to fail an entire class of students for taking too much time on their test. The punishment for the students will be relaxed to something minor, at a minimum, and may even be tossed out completely. The administration will take a serious look at that teacher's ability to control a classroom, though. When a teacher has their entire class rebel, it's usually not the only problem that teacher has had with their students.

On the other hand, if a teacher penalizes every student 5 points for turning their test papers in a few minutes too late, the administration might consider taking a look at that teacher's test to see if the difficulty is appropriate for the amount of time allotted. If the test has a long history of reasonable results, a single 'bad' class won't have a huge impact on anything. Or, a look at the test will result in the test either being made slightly easier or a little more time being allocated for the test.

The difference between the administration looking at one of a teacher's products and the administration looking at that teacher's ability to control a classroom is huge even if the actions were exactly the same. Students can deal with losing a few points, a teacher can deal with having the administration reviewing one of his/her products, etc. Everything is kept at manageable levels. Failing students right off the bat escalates everything to levels where there isn't a single party involved in the situation that can afford to retreat even a bit. There will be huge losers even though there might well be no winners (how long a winning streak in successfully failing every student do you think a teacher will be able to accumulate before they're terminated completely).

 

[Pattonias]

So far, all the teachers I have taken that don't use standard tests have told me that they determine the length of test by taking the test themselves. They work out the problems using the methods they have taught you and then calculate the amount of time they think it would take the average student to take the same test based on past experience.

I always thought this reasonable. Most of my teachers grade on the curve to fill in the gaps. I can say that I have not yet taken a test that I prepared for that I ran out of time on. I have used up all the time on tests that I was ill-prepared for. Judging from the looks on the faces of the people I was sitting next to, when turning in my paper they were falling into one of those two categories as well.

I doubt you will get an answer to your problem in this forum. It is unfair to the students as a whole that some are allowed to take advantage of the stated time limits.

The world is not fair so I guess it could be looked at from the stand point of a life-lesson.

If you are accustomed to finishing on time then I think you will be better prepared in the future. If these individuals get to accustomed to being allowed "extra" time whenever they are ill-prepared, they will probably reap accordingly.

 

[NeoDevin]

Perhaps the best solution would be for the teacher to make it explicit in advance: "Any student who continues writing after the end of the exam has been announced will receive <insert penalty here>." Announce it at the beginning, and have it written on the cover. As long as the penalty is made clear at the beginning, no student will have any cause to complain that it is unfair. Alternately, make it clear that the time limit is flexible, and that any students requiring a few more minutes will be allowed to continue.

 

[Sorry!]

I remember in high school even that you would fail a test if you continued to write. If you were lucky the teacher would deduct marks or come to see what answer your still writing and give you a 0 on that but in a university class the number of students is way to high for that.
The same thing happens in real life situations... If they are giving out free computers until 9 am and you arrive at 9:01 should you get a computer? ...no...
If you have a job interview at 10 and you arrive at 10:03 should you get an interview? ...no... At places I worked I've seen this happen too.

I remember going through high-school thinking wow these guys are hard-asses and they would tell us that they are preparing us for university just doing their job. Apparently they were just being hard-asses because university seems much more relaxed about rules regarding academics than my high school was.

...Imagine that the OP is competing for a second year spot and he gets up and hands his test in ON time everytime. Another student who always answers one extra question or fixes one extra mistake on their test AFTER the given test time receives better grades by .5% (and the extra answers/corrections always are right) the OP followed the rules and maintain ok grades but doesn't make the cut the other person just makes the cut above him.
Is that fair? Sure it could do him good to retake the course anyways since he wasn't doing 'excellent' but that's not the point.

 

[leroyjenkens]

No, it wasn't. My original point was:

Your original point that I responded to was you saying this:

No it isn't.

In response to this:

Taking extra time is tantamount to cheating

You're clearly saying it's not cheating.

I'm not advocating anything. What I'm saying, and what I said in my original post, is that this is how the real world works, and he'd be better served learning how to deal with it and work with it, than he is by complaining about it to his professor.

So the real world works by cheating and since you can't beat it, you should join it?
Hindsight's 20/20. If the professor cracked down after he said something, it would have been best to just complain to the professor.

What advice would you give the OP in dealing with this situation?

I don't know, but next time he tries to take extra time and no one else does, he may get caught and punished. You're not suggesting he gauges whether or not he listens to the teacher based on if a few other students don't, are you?

Absolutely nothing. There's no way a teacher is going to fail an entire class of students for taking too much time on their test. The punishment for the students will be relaxed to something minor, at a minimum, and may even be tossed out completely. The administration will take a serious look at that teacher's ability to control a classroom, though. When a teacher has their entire class rebel, it's usually not the only problem that teacher has had with their students.

Then you should change that from "absolutely nothing" to "maybe something."
If some students aren't listening, then there's still something wrong. It's not like every single student has to rebel before there's a problem.

 

[dotman]

You're clearly saying it's not cheating.

You should look up what the word tantamount means. That said, I have no further desire to debate semantics with you, especially since you have stated that you have no advice to offer, and instead are only arguing with the advice that other people are offering the OP.

 

[leroyjenkens]

You should look up what the word tantamount means.

It means equivalent to. What do I need to look up? You've been saying it's not cheating, and then when I catch you in a discrepancy, you want to play the semantics card.

and instead are only arguing with the advice that other people are offering the OP.

What's wrong with that? Please show me a link to where it says in writing that I'm not supposed to do that.