Straighterline won't allow me to fail?

[StoicJ]

Sucks, but it happens 

[BrianFallon]

Did you do the six minute assignment yet? Or are you still trying to go about it "your way?"

You want the credit - you do the work the class requires. Easy peasy.

[StoicJ]

Why be snarky about it? I see tons of complaints in here about institutions setting policy but then adding terms arbitrarily, or not enforcing policy consistently. Sometimes we can get around it or call people out, and situations get corrected. Sometimes not. And sometimes folks just want to vent. 

"In the time it took you to bitch about it, you could have..."
Not really. I can be just 100 words short on a paper, but it might take a LOT longer to write those last 100 words than the first 100. How good does that filler need to be? The guy/gal here said they tried to add filler and still got rejected. If you did 3 minutes, and the requirement was 30 minutes, would it take you just 27 minutes of work to finish out the assignment?

I just don't understand the need people seem to have to jump on someone's back for venting. Not in a forum like this, anyway.

[Thorne]

Why be snarky about it? I see tons of complaints in here about institutions setting policy but then adding terms arbitrarily, or not enforcing policy consistently. Sometimes we can get around it or call people out, and situations get corrected. Sometimes not. And sometimes folks just want to vent. 

"In the time it took you to bitch about it, you could have..."
Not really. I can be just 100 words short on a paper, but it might take a LOT longer to write those last 100 words than the first 100. How good does that filler need to be? The guy/gal here said they tried to add filler and still got rejected. If you did 3 minutes, and the requirement was 30 minutes, would it take you just 27 minutes of work to finish out the assignment?

I just don't understand the need people seem to have to jump on someone's back for venting. Not in a forum like this, anyway.

That's a bit exaggerated (3 to 30 minutes), but I get your point.

To everyone saying, "You do what's required to pass the class," OP did, like I pointed out in my analysis of StraighterLine's own rules. 

Now, adding the filler to 6 minutes and getting rejected is utter BS. I'm willing to accept that maybe they have hidden policies about formatting where if you don't meet the default parameters of time/length then they won't accept it, but if OP did a 6 minute presentation, they need to grade his paper and stop hiding behind "administrative policy."

[rpmranger]

I went through the same issue. The policies are asinine for a pass/fail course and this doesn't happen at a real University, but you can't do anything about it. It's like arguing with a brick wall. You just waste your time.

In my Physics Lab, there were 9 labs to submit and 9 quizzes. The lowest scored lab and quiz is not counted (so only 8 Labs and 8 quizzes apply to your final grade). I had 17/18 assignments completed and 96% total score so it was impossible to fail. I could submit the final lab, get a zero and it would be not counted anyway. I attempted to just answer a few questions and submit it (since these labs for a 1 cr course are a ridiculous workload and an all day calculus affair). Well, my account got flagged and I had to contact them, argue that it wouldn't even count, and end up having to re-submit the completed one—even though it would be dropped and not applied to my final grade anyway.

This was quite frustrating because this Lab took me 5 hours to complete, with all the photo evidence included. It then got scored and of course dropped and uncounted, then they cleared the flag. Course complete. Stupid, but it is what it is. So glad this was my last alternative credit I will ever have to take!

[Lacedonia4]

Sometimes I wonder if they themselves at SL can't get around some computer parameters and just let their software do the grading instead. There should never be a total substitute for humans in education.

Understand the frustration.

I haven't encountered this problem yet as I am annoyingly particular at completing all tasks regardless of whether it is counted or not, but that is just me. But yes, the humans that work there should recognize the ridiculousness of it all and allow students to just submit their work as it is.

[sambam0812]

Man what are you talking about with this. Complete the 6minute assignment and move on, or do the class at a real school. Youve wasted more time than that on this thread.

Well, it’s been a week and I *still* don’t have six minutes. Not for lack of trying—-the speech went from 4 decent (8+ sentences) paragraphs to 7; I’ve slowed down my speaking to what I consider a glacial pace; still at 5:05. At this point I’m more or less bullet pointing facts which sounds horrible—-personally, I’d  rather fail something because it was too short, then because it was crap.

[LongRoad]

Have you thrown in some stats? Maybe added something about COVID19 and your issue?

When I was in Toastmasters you had to critique speeches. Sometimes the speeches seemed to be perfect. How do you critique those? I learned to just say, "When you spoke about "X," I wondered if you'd considered "Y?" Just add another aspect.

Good luck. For speeches, shutting me up would be the problem!

[sambam0812]

Have you thrown in some stats? Maybe added something about COVID19 and your issue?

When I was in Toastmasters you had to critique speeches. Sometimes the speeches seemed to be perfect. How do you critique those? I learned to just say, "When you spoke about "X," I wondered if you'd considered "Y?" Just add another aspect.

Good luck. For speeches, shutting me up would be the problem!

Oh I can talk about *interesting* things, LOL. My writing? Favorite music? Dog training? I could easily do a 30 minute presentation complete with an interactive PowerPoint. However, I’ve found Gen Ed requirements don’t like you to be creative and actually express yourself, they just want to make sure you can tick boxes.

On the bright side, after like 5 days of working on it and then 5 more days of putting it off because we were at EOM aaand EOY  at work, I finally submitted the updated speech, didn’t change my outline at all , and got a 93.