u/Double-Set9624

Hi everyone,

I am a Psychology student finishing my 2nd year. I recently finished an introductory research course which I took to gain some research experience this past semester. During this course however, the principal investigator of the lab that I was in was on leave. He only came back in the beginning of April. As a result, my supervisor was his PhD student who was also managing 8 or 9 other students including me.

The way I was assessed was that 25% of my grade would be a participation grade (i.e. lab meeting attendance, collecting data, etc...), 25% would be for my outline to my introduction of my write-up and 50% would be the final write-up itself.

The PhD student had put pressure on me to collect data and telling me how the PI was "hoping" to collect 40 participants in 6 weeks (when it took me 6 weeks to do 26 participants). In the end I collected 28 participants instead and got a total of 54 participants tested (each participant was an hour). This caused me burn-out and resulted in me leaving a lot of the report stuff till after I finished participants. Moreover, I collected more data in this semester than any other student in the lab (all of which were in 3rd year and above, including a thesis student).

Additionally, the supervisor in charge gave me the results to work on the data a few days before the start of exam season and asked that I finish the report a week after my exams were done.

In the end, despite my hard work, I got an A instead of an A+ which is what I initially set out to get. The reasoning was—according to the PI—that an A+ is reserved for students who exceeded expectations and had been "thoughtful." An "A" is for students who met expectations. The PI said that he was "unlikely" to change any grades.

I have a meeting with the PI for this Tuesday and was wondering what I should highlight/mention to him?

TL;DR: I worked really hard for a research lab I was in collecting a lot of participants. I get an A instead of an A+ and was told that I basically "met" expectations. I will meet with the prof who gave me this grade and would like to know how I can best increase my grade to an A+.

Hi everyone,

I am a Psychology student in Canada finishing my 2nd year. I recently finished an introductory research course which I took to gain some research experience this past semester. During this course however, the principal investigator of the lab that I was in was on medical leave. He only came back in the beginning of April. As a result, my supervisor was his PhD student who was also managing 8 or 9 other students including me.

The way I was assessed was that 25% of my grade would be a participation grade (i.e. lab meeting attendance, collecting data, etc...), 25% would be for my outline to my introduction of my write-up and 50% would be the final write-up itself.

The PhD student had put pressure on me to collect data and telling me how the PI was "hoping" to collect 40 participants in 6 weeks (when it took me 6 weeks to do 26 participants). In the end I collected 28 participants instead and got a total of 54 participants tested (each participant was an hour). This caused me burn-out and resulted in me leaving a lot of the report stuff till after I finished participants. Moreover, I collected more data in this semester than any other student in the lab (all of which were in 3rd year and above, including a thesis student).

Additionally, the supervisor in charge gave me the results to work on the data a few days before the start of exam season and asked that I finish the report a week after my exams were done.

In the end, despite my hard work, I got an A instead of an A+ which is what I initially set out to get. The reasoning was—according to the PI—that an A+ is reserved for students who exceeded expectations and had been "thoughtful." An "A" is for students who met expectations. The PI said that he was "unlikely" to change any grades.

I have a meeting with the PI for this Tuesday and was wondering what I should highlight/mention to him?

TL;DR: I worked really hard for a research lab I was in collecting a lot of participants. I get an A instead of an A+ and was told that I basically "met" expectations. I will meet with the prof who gave me this grade and would like to know how I can best increase my grade to an A+