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[quote=Anonymous]Ok, I'm a parent but I'm going to answer this as someone who manages people out in the "real world" and has spent a lot of my career training and mentoring recent graduates.

I think the best way to prepare students for the actual working world is to teach them simply to be accountable for themselves, their time, and their work. The truth is that in the working world, it's rare that you will receive an arbitrary hard deadline for a project that is assigned to you and you alone. Most work is about process, and young people need to learn time management and communication.

So I think the best way to do this is to be flexible on deadlines but to demand that students communicate clearly. As I tell people who work for me, if you reach out to me ahead of time to let me know you are running behind, that shows me that you value my time and understand that you are responsible for your work. Then we can talk about adjusting a deadline and I might even be able to offer some insight or support that will help you get there. If, on the other hand, you wait until the 11th hour and then ask for an extension without giving me any explanation or context, I'll be frustrated with your immaturity.

So I would recommend taking a similar approach. I would not be super strict with deadlines, which are almost always more flexible than you think (I would also build some natural buffers into your deadlines, because that's how I handle it at work). But I would talk to your students about what it means to be accountable and to respect others' time. Expect them to reach out to you with issues before they become huge problems, and to communicate with you about any issues that could impact a deadline. That's probably the best preparation you could give them. I think being super strict about deadlines could actually make kids less mature once they are in the workplace, because it tends to make them really anxious and afraid of failure. I want the people who work for me to know failure is often part of the process and the more important thing is how you handle it. That's more productive in the end.[/quote]

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