Kyra: This week we continue our series on things we’d like schools to do differently, by tackling the infamous, greatly over-utilized group project. I was in about third grade when I learned to loath these learning experiences. For anxious, studious kids like me, the term “group project” is easily decoded to mean “one-person project that is more burdensome than a usual one-person project and requires giving credit to three other people who didn’t share in that burden at all.”

Throughout my school career, when teachers assign group projects, they divide the groups in such a way as to “even the score” among students. For me, that’s always meant being coupled with the girl who comes to class twice a month or the guy who is too stoned to be of any assistance. If someone complains, the teacher explains that, in the “real world,” people collaborate, so we need to get used to it. Call me an optimist, but I like to believe that if I work hard and study enough, I can collaborate in that “real world” with people who care enough to show up and do their jobs.

Dr. Wes Crenshaw and Kyra Haas

Unfortunately, the remedies I foresee go against the very reasons some teachers have group projects in the first place. They include:

Grade each student individually. Too often one group member must complete another’s incomplete assignment the night before it’s due. Grading each student individually makes it more difficult for teachers to inflate the grades of a failing student by averaging her grade in with the group’s.

Let kids choose groups. Of course this raises the issue of exclusion; however, in the “real world,” people who don’t work hard or who try to piggyback off others’ accomplishments often find themselves excluded.

Listen. Not every student who voices his concerns about a project does so to get out of work or harm the grade of another. By assigning group projects so that one person ends up haphazardly balancing the work of three or four on his shoulders, teachers crush the innate spirit of true collaboration and make kids groan the moment they hear a teacher say, “Time for a group project.”

Wes: Well, now we know how to really get Kyra going. But her points are all well taken. I’ve heard them hundreds of times over the years from students from grade school to college.

There’s a good reason that the book “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking” (Susan Cain, 2013) was a New York Times bestseller and has been in the top-100 books on Amazon for two years now. In fact, I first heard about it from a student at Kyra’s high school who was sick and tired of being dumped into group projects.

Half the population falls on the introverted side of the bell curve, though most do fine with group work. However, research shows that for those who lean toward the more introverted side of the spectrum, the best, most productive way to get things done is just as Kyra suggests, by themselves. For some reason, we’ve gotten so attached to group work–not only in schools but in business, too–that we’ve deprived those people of their right to be left alone.

I suspect (but cannot prove) this has a lot to do with who ascends to the top of business and education and thus who sets the agenda: extroverted people. They learn best in groups, so they naturally assume everyone will do likewise.

Unfortunately, having been out of school since 1994, I’ve learned Kyra’s optimism about group cohesion in the workforce is probably unfounded. Those of us out here in the alleged “real world” have long since given up the notion that everyone will contribute according to his or her abilities and take according to his or her needs. That’s why most equal partnerships fail in just a few years and many businesses are pulling away from the “solution team” approach.

Schools should do likewise. While a good study or work group can make (or break) you, those are synergistic enterprises, not socially engineered gatherings. We all work better when we can choose how we work, and, in this regard, schools are behind the curve in expecting kids to get much out of group projects.

Wes Crenshaw, Ph.D., ABPP, is author of “I Always Want to Be Where I’m Not: Successful Living with ADD & ADHD.” Learn about his writing and practice at dr-wes.com. Kyra Haas is a Free State High School senior who blogs at justfreakinghaasome.wordpress.com. Send your confidential 200-word question to ask@dr-wes.com. Double Take opinions and advice are not a substitute for psychological services.