Perhaps doing the assignment improves the student's understanding of the course material, which the professor thinks is a good thing, but it's possible to pass the course with only a mediocre understanding of the material?
> but it's possible to pass the course with only a mediocre understanding of the material
probably this.
the most time-efficient strategy for studying that I found in college was simply retyping all the bullets from the powerpoints 2-3 times. I didn't understand what I was writing, but I basically trained myself to be a "chinese room" for test questions. I got As on all the tests for classes I didn't care about this way.
