Not pulling her weight

[AnUnhappyStudent]

I am a mature student at uni. We have to do a group presentation tomorrow and have been meeting as a group for the last couple of months to work on it. One of the group has really taken the piss.
Turned up to about a third of the meetings, not delivered on her stuff, not letting us know when she is not attending meetings but then turning up to the one session we had with tutor
I raised it with the group and it was agreed that we would mail her and say if she didn't get her finger out we were going to ask for her to be removed as she will be graded on something she hasn't contribute to.

Today we are meeting up for a run through and its been arranged weeks. Just had an email from her to say that her uncle is seriously ill and she will need to leave early! I don't believe it for a minute. We have had various stories of ill relatives and just serms like its another excuse. But I could be wrong.
Anyway we have to submit a record of how we worked as a group this can involve meeting notes, action logs and emails. If I include the email we sent her then it will be really obvious that she was not a team player but would it reflect badly on me for dobbing her in as it were?? And what if uncle is really ill? I would feel awful

[AnUnhappyStudent]

Sorry AIBU to drop her in it???

[DartmoorDoughnut]

YANBU

[fuzzywuzzy]

I would. If her uncle's sick she needs to inform the tutor and get an extension and do the work later.

May sound hard but I hated doing all the legwork/research/write ups and the lazy people getting credit for my work at uni.

[Mothervulva]

Include it. She can explain herself to the uni if she needs to.

[saladsmoothie]

Hmm. Its a tricky one. In an ideal world, of course she shouldn't get away with this. But unless things have changed a whole lot since i was at uni, being unable to work well as a team reflects badly on you even if the reality is that it isn't your fault.

[Bluntness100]

Has her not attending been detrimental to the group and the end result? I can't understand if she has done some damage to you all or if you are just pissed off she will get credit for work she didn't do?

[FlossieFrog]

As long as you stick to the facts YANBU. Put attendees /absences on the meeting notes, identify responsibility for agreed roles and actions etc. If she has issues with attendance (genuine family illness or otherwise) she should be discussing this with her personal tutor.

[Bluntness100]

I'd also agree with salad that it will also reflect badly on the rest of the team.

[britnay]

This is what I hated about university. There is ALWAYS one who does bugger all and rides on the work done by everyone else.

[Iamastonished]

Flossie has some good suggestions. DD nearly failed her Citizenship GCSE last year because they had to work in pairs for coursework. The other girl didn't complete her coursework and managed to lose a letter from the prime minister. DD got a D for her coursework, but managed to ace the exam and ended up with a B.

[DuggeeHugs]

YANBU minutes and attendance logs will show her continual absence and your email will show that, as a group, the rest of you're picking up the slack in order to deliver on your brief.

[stuckinthehouse]

Welcome to the world of group projects!

Just be professionally honest with the tutor.

[luckylucky24]

We had one like this at uni and he got a better mark than me for doing bugger all! We raised it with the tutor but she wasn't interested.
YANBU

[Trifleorbust]

What goes around comes around. She may be having a hard time at the moment for reasons you don't know anything about. Yes, if you don't dob her in she will get the credit for your work, but even if that happens you lose nothing. One day you may be the person needing someone to cut them some slack.

[roundaboutthetown]

Why have you not raised it with the tutor before?

[marabounuts]

I would. I had a similar situation when I was at uni. I spoke to our tutor and explained that I wasn't happy for her getting the credit when only two out of three do the work. He spoke to her and she had to repeat the course in the end.

it's a bit late now, but in the future, U would raise it with the tutor at a much earlier stage, not just in the very end.

[fourteenlittleducks]

I would give her the benefit of the doubt and let it go. It's annoying but happens. How much does the presentation count to your overall grade?

In the workplace you will have to cope with team members who don't pull their weight. You need to address it early, not wait until the presentation is due.

When I was at uni I missed a lot of presentation prep sessions due to illness but the group did their best to support me.

[shinynewusername]

What goes around comes around. She may be having a hard time at the moment for reasons you don't know anything about. Yes, if you don't dob her in she will get the credit for your work, but even if that happens you lose nothing. One day you may be the person needing someone to cut them some slack

Fuck that for a game of soldiers. There is a massive difference between needing some slack because of difficult circumstances and repeatedly taking the piss, like this lass.

[Trifleorbust]

shinynewusername:

Really? Well, perhaps I am just willing to give someone the benefit of the doubt for a bit longer than you.

[AlternativeTentacle]

Anyway we have to submit a record of how we worked as a group this can involve meeting notes, action logs and emails.

We. This is not your own decision to make. You need to be truthful about it all, all of you. Make sure your meeting notes accurately record all the work done by the appropriate people.

And - If she hasn't delivered her stuff, then don't allocate her any of the presentation.

[Mummyoflittledragon]

I would. But in a professional and non judgmental way. You could just state x has not been around to perticipate in meetings as much as required and her input to the project as a result was reduced. That is enough perhaps. But if you wish to say more, I'd say she has periodically informed us of certain difficulties and illnesses of family members as the reason behind her failing to turn up. It is unfortunate that she has not been around much as she may otherwise have been a valuable team member.

[roundaboutthetown]

I would not cut someone slack if they did not have the courtesy to keep the group informed. This woman has just not bothered to turn up half the time and has mostly not bothered to tell anyone whether or not she will be there. The point of a record log and a tutor is that this is recorded properly, along with how you dealt with it. She failed throughout and should repeat at another time or just fail it, and you should have alerted the tutor sooner. If she wanted a bit of slack cutting, a bit more explanation than an ill uncle was required. Is she his carer or something? Who is normally so close to their Uncle that they would risk failing their university course for him?

[Mummyoflittledragon]

Perticipate - is there such a word and where's autocorrect when you need it??

[Brokenbiscuit]

I feel your pain, OP. I did a Master's degree a while ago, and a couple of modules were assessed through group assignments. I hated them. There was one guy in my group for two of these assignments, and he contributed sweet FA to either. It did make me cross that the rest of us did all of the work and he walked away with the credit. However, I decided to let it go in the end - his mark wasn't an accurate reflection of his effort, but at the end of the day, it didn't really take anything away from mine, and if the university was going to award him with a degree that he didn't really deserve, then that was their problem.

Group assignments are very different from the kind of teamwork that you do in work, ime, and universities ought to realise that. In a work situation, the roles are generally more clearly defined and there is a manager to deal with any underperformance. However, group assignments are very popular these days so I think you probably just have to suck it up!