In the absence of internal motivation, students will still study for exams, but will put little additional effort into a course.

So an absolutely brutal means of motivating these students is to give 10 exams and keep only the lowest 2 (or drop the lowest and keep the next two up).

They would study because every exam would count. They couldn’t afford to slip up.

It’s the sort of thing that I wish I didn’t even have to think about. In an ideal world, all students would be motivated…