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Scientific study on procrastination delayed

University student announces that her study on procrastination has been delayed for the foreseeable future

“I will be following the academic progress of several students as they complete English writing assignments,” said Suárez in April.
“I will be following the academic progress of several students as they complete English writing assignments,” said Suárez in April.

Yesterday afternoon first-year student Camila Cohen Suárez, whose major remains undecided, announced that her study on procrastination in relation to student writing has been delayed with no notable date in which the project would recommence. During a meeting over Zoom, which Suárez joined 10 minutes late, she indicated that originally a memo was to be sent out to her peers and study participants on the discontinuation of the study. Nevertheless, she had conveniently “forgotten” her laptop in Brown Library in the morning and had only just remembered to retrieve it around noon.

During the meeting, Suárez detailed that after running into several obstacles both “on part of the study’s subjects” and other matters that were “no fault of her own,” she had decided to delay her project and restart the collection of data “later.” After initially announcing the project in March 2020 while still in high school, the now first-year student assured individuals involved that the study would be a thorough investigation of how procrastination impacts the students’ writing samples and their ability to meet deadlines. 

“I will be following the academic progress of several students as they complete English writing assignments,” Suárez said in April. “Probably by asking them to note details about when they work on their projects and when they are due. Something like that, I’m not sure.”

However, just six months later, Suárez now blames the delay of the study on the data collection process. According to her observations, taken on the Notes app of her cellphone, most participants simply ignored instructions and failed to fill out the data entry documentation on time. In some instances, participants included the group that was instructed to manage their time — Group A — and the group instructed to make no changes to their habits — Group Insert Text Here — never received documents to fill out or was even informed it was in the study. Third-year Viola Lasa claimed that she had only heard that she was a member of the Group Insert Text Here after yesterday's virtual meeting. 

“Honestly I completely forgot I was in this study after filling out the application,” Lasa said while actively writing her final project for SPAN 2010, which was due later that day. “I only realized I was in it after seeing that Suárez lady talking on Zoom.” 

When I reached out to Suárez for a comment on the procedures for communication between study participants and those conducting the study, the email address she had given out during the virtual meeting bounced back as non-existent.  

Unfortunately, this is not the first time one of Suárez’s studies, and all her academic assignments in general, has gone sideways publicly. On social media, Suárez documented the completion of her science fair project in 2017 just 48 hours before it was due in class. Throughout a set of Instagram stories, Suárez expressed via photo and video documentation a descent into self-proclaimed “madness” and “panic” while rushing to cover several grass-filled containers with sand, gravel and pieces of cork in some attempt to display the impact of stormwater runoff.

Now in September 2020, Suárez declared that she plans to “do better the next time.” After following her study process for the last several months, one can conclude that Suárez herself has become an example of her own study, and we can only hope that she learns from her mistakes at some point in her academic career at the University. 

Camila Cohen Suárez is a Humor columnist for The Cavalier Daily. She can be reached at humor@cavalierdaily.com

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