As another school year starts up, I begin to feel that familiar tightening in my gut and I begin to worry about one thing – grades. But, despite this feeling, I find I can still take solace in the class syllabus. Every class has one, and both the assignments and their worth toward my overall grade are laid out for me. My only job, previously, has been to make the most of those percentages.

But, one of my classes threw off this familiar formula.

My classmates and I opened the syllabus and, though we found assignments listed, there were no grade percentages for what the assignments were worth in the grand scheme of the class. The professor explained that we would be figuring those out ourselves, with the definition of familiar letter grades, but without telling us how much of that grade would be determined by what we did in class. The professor even went so far as to say that we could add in our own additional assignments – presentations over our readings or questions for discussions – then left us to discuss amongst ourselves.

We didn’t expect to be there for an hour and a half. It seemed like an idea that was simple enough at first, but we eventually reached the conclusion that we all have different strengths and ideas about what we would want to do with our grade. Some wanted more to depend on written work, while others wanted discussion to decide their grade.

It was exhilarating and exhausting, and, at the end of the night, a little terrifying to be given so much freedom. Our professor did not agree with the cookie-cutter state of education, dolling out percentages as if everyone worked the same.

By giving us this option, we were asked not only to consider our strengths and make use of them, but this allowed us to create the class into more of what we want or need it to be. How many times has one student lost sleep over having to do a presentation worth 20 percen of their grade, while another, more outgoing and comfortable student has pulled it all together with barely a blink? How many times has one knocked out a 10-page essay with flying colors, while another, with weaker writing skills has had to pull all-nighters to achieve the all-important grade?

While the freedom was overwhelming in the beginning, it was to our benefit to make sure we got the most out of the course.

Students should be allowed to choose the worth of their assignments. This way, we can work to our strengths to produce higher-quality work and have a greater say in how we learn, what we need and what we want to learn. It’s our education, after all, so we should be given a say in how we learn.