Game of Scones: Taking a Final Exam in London

Haverford has spoiled me. Spoiled me in the sense that my finals and most of my exams are self-scheduled, unlimited time, and open book. I take most of my tests on my bed and listen to music as I do them. Well, this is the OPPOSITE how anything is done in the UK. So, as I have been talking a lot recently about- I had my first final today and it was a life changing experience. I will recount it here for you:

There are two exam times. 10:30 AM and 2:30 PM. I had the 2:30 PM slot, which is awful since you have to wait all day. You don’t want to do work or study, so you are forced to wait and worry. One thing that is different from home is that the exams are run by an operation that is separate from the university. All the exams are in buildings that are spread around London. There is a building right near Westminster Abbey and mine was at ‘The Troxy,’ which is in West London.

I had to take the DLR tube to get there, which is an overground train. It was around a 30-minute train ride and I ended up in a place that reminded me of Girard Avenue in West Philly. After a short 5-minute walk, we ended up at ‘The Troxy.’ You can check out the site here.

Since we weren’t allowed to enter the building until a certain time before the exam, there were just hundreds of stressed students standing outside studying frantically. Zach and I on the other hand brought no notes with us and were just fooling around, distracting the other kids. As they shot us dirty looks the whole time, we found other Americans who were just waiting to get the exam over with.

Once we were allowed into the Troxy, we were ushered into the makeshift ‘study room.’ Before I go on more about this place, let me explain what the Troxy is. Here is a blurb about the building:

“Troxy is London’s most versatile venue, able to accommodate anything from a live concert for 2,661 to a corporate dinner for up to 1,200 guests. Fashion shows, beauty pageants, indoor sport, award shows, conferences, exhibitions, film shoots and weddings – the scope of events is endless.”

So, what was ‘the study room’ was actually a bar and dance floor with seats and coat racks in it. Instead of being stressed and studying outside, all the KCL students now became stressed and studied inside. Finally, they let us into the actual testing room. When I say testing room, I mean to say ‘arena’ or ‘dance floor.’ The interior of the building is a weird disco/techno themed with pink and purple flowers bedazzling the place. One of the major things, as I was told by my flatmates, was to have my seat number. I was seat #537. Well, it took me around 5 minutes to actually find my place since there were a total of 1,200 seats. I WAS TAKING AN EXAM WITH 1200 OTHER STUDENTS. All of us were taking different exams with different allotted times. It was a hot mess.

I finally found my seat and got myself situated. Let me get into now about the security of this place. First off, they basically had bouncers outside regulating the sidewalks and how we entered the building. We were then informed we could bring almost nothing into the actual testing room. The only thing allowed into the room was pens, pencils, phone IF off, and our ID card. All of this HAD to be kept in a plastic bag. If you forgot a plastic bag, they were selling them for 50p in the lobby. All other bags and jackets were to be put in the ‘study room’ until the end of the exam. When at your testing seat, you ID had to be on the table for the people to check, which they did regularly. Throughout my three-hour exam, there were hundreds of proctors pacing up and down the aisles checking our IDs and making sure we didn’t cheat. They were obnoxious colored vests and almost seemed to hit you as they walked by.

The Troxy when you first walk in. Looks like the entrance to a theatre, right?

A dance floor in an exam room? Yep, the whole floor was lined with desks.

The last thing I want to do: Take an exam with 1,200 other people.

So, as the time for our exam came, a man on a loudspeaker told us the directions of the testing arena and said ‘start.’ At that moment you heard 1,200 students rip open their booklet and vigorously start writing. I took my merry little time looking over each question and answering them.

One thing I have come to learn about exams in the UK is that they are all essay based. No matter the class, you WILL be writing at least 2 essays. Which is ridiculous since I am taking a science class and none of this can be written in essay format. Fine, there were like 30 multiple choice questions, but it was only 15% of the final finals grade. Half of the questions were insulting to my intelligence. Like “What is the color of the sky?!” and the other ones were beyond impossible to answer. “What percentage of Europeans have HSV and HIV and can do 40 pushups?!” Those MCQ were either like a statistic or date that would only be possible to answer if you had photographic memory. Basically, they make it hard for you to fail and impossible for you to get an A.

Then I moved onto the essays. I had to choose 3 out of the 6 provided. It was recommended that it would take around 50 minutes per essay. Well, after I wrote an essay in 20 minutes, I realized that I would finish this exam….way too early.

I should also mention that you could not leave the exam room (even to pee) for the first 75 minutes and you couldn’t leave the room when you had 15 minutes left. Don’t ask me the logistics behind this. What I should also mention is that even though my exam was 3 hours, some people only had a 2 hr or 1.5 hr exam. So while I was writing, masses of people would just get up and leave. This was probably the worst and most stressful environment one could ever be in while taking a final. It is seriously dumb.

We were given an exam booklet and I filled all the pages, so once I ran out of room and had like 40 minutes left, I just went back and revised. The exam was three hours and seriously could have been done in two. Since I knew I had so much time, I wrote slowly and clearly.

Also, I do not understand how three essays properly represent what I learned this semester. I studied so much freaking information and unlike a normal test that tests complete comprehension; I was expected to write full in depth answers on just 3 subjects. Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. Moreover, for some people there final exam is 100% OF THEIR GRADE. That ONE test determines their grade. Those essays they write in those 3 hours depicts ‘everything they have learned in a term.’ Excuse my French- but that is bullshit. There is ZERO incentive to go to class if you have no homework or participation grade. You can teach yourself the information and just ace the final test. Also, while all the exams are essay form- the teachers put up ‘past exams’ with ‘past exam questions.’ What people have come to realize is that the same exam questions are asked every year SO PEOPLE JUST MEMORIZE THE ANSWER TO THOSE 3 OR SO QUESTIONS AND STUDY NOTHING ELSE. THAT IS JUST DUMB. Why even study?! Why learn?! You just memorize facts for 2 days and you are good to go. This system MAKES NO SENSE. ZERO SENSE.

So while I was taking my exam and being treated like a criminal by the proctors, I successfully finished my first exam. I laughed the whole way through since I could not really believe that all I had done this term was accumulated into 3 simple questions that could have been written off of wikipedia. While this was just one exam, I predict the next two to be similar. At least they will only be 1.5 hours…

Oh, let me not forget how I had to hand in my final exam. When the time was called and we stopped writing, we had to tie all the PAGES UP WITH A STRING. Like a third world country, WE TIED OUR EXAM UP WITH STRING. DOES THIS MAKE SENSE?!?!

I can now cross "taking a final exam in a disco/techno theater with 1,200 other students" off my bucket list.

After my exam, I talked to the English students in my class and they complained that the exam was so difficult. I will never say that an ‘exam was easy,’ but I would never go as far as saying this exam was that difficult. Please…I wasn’t certain if had taken the same exam when I was talking to them.

I took the tube back to my dorm and let me just explain what the tube is like in the heat. It is an oven. I was dripping sweat and I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. I felt so bad for the men in suits. I felt faint just riding on it for 30 minutes. It was unbearable. There is zero ventilation and this is just one reason WHY I AM SO HAPPY I WILL NOT BE HERE FOR THE OLYMPICS.

For dinner, I celebrated being done with one exam by going to an American diner with my English friend, Tom. Since I have been studying I haven’t ventured into the actual main heart of the city for almost a month. It was so nice to walk to Waterloo, see Big Ben, walk down Strand, pass Trafalgar Square, walk into Leicester Square, and into Soho. I got to see London again and it was so refreshing. When we came back, we made sure to walk along the South Bank of the Thames. It was lined with pub goers and businessmen. The weather is so nice I can’t even handle it.

While I gave myself the night off tonight, back to work tomorrow in order to survive through my last two exams! Tissue Pathology and the Physiology of Exercise!

Here are some pictures from my walk tonight: