What is the best way to deal with not being able to submit due to IT Issue?

[hamburger]

Those who are complaining are the ones who have been copying, cheating and leaving the classroom right away after taking attendance. Yes, in my class, most students just drop by, take attendance and say good bye to me every week. It is kind of an insult to me. Now, these people are complaining that they cannot do the assignments nor take the tests due to IT issues.

We had two tests this week. Again, a few students complained that they had IT/network issues even administrator already told them that the college could loan a laptop to students and that they could access Blackboard via their phone. Accessing Blackboard and taking MC tests via cellphone is common among students. They just take advantage of the situation and play dumb. There are also students who
demand me
to change the format of the tests and give them more time. I believe that giving a minute per easy MC question is reasonable.
It is like either they know the answer right away or not. If they have studied, most questions could be answered in 10 seconds and the ones that require simple computations would require no more than 20 seconds. They want more time so that they can cheat. One student demanded me to give six times more time!

Everyday I just get several emails about their made-up issues! A student who demanded me to delete one question in the middle of a test in the past asked me the deadline for submission of the final project. I have already posted the announcement several times and also in the course syllabus. Students in my college just treat the professors like their PA. They also like to negotiate and demand professors to drop exam questions that they consider to be unfair, useless, etc.

[Caracal]

Those who are complaining are the ones who have been copying, cheating and leaving the classroom right away after taking attendance. Yes, in my class, most students just drop by, take attendance and say good bye to me every week. It is kind of an insult to me. Now, these people are complaining that they cannot do the assignments nor take the tests due to IT issues.

Perhaps, but I've had to extend several deadlines on quizzes because it was taking days to upload stuff. I switched platforms and it is working better now, but the point is that even if students do have normally reliable internet connections and a computer, everything is overloaded. I'm just trying to be flexible. If some students are taking advantage of the situation, that's on their conscience. I don't want being a jerk to someone when they are dealing with circumstances outside of their control to be on mine.

[Ruralguy]

Just give the extra time. Its not going to hurt anyone.  As Caracal said, everyone's having unexpected problems now.

Its probably only a month of dealing with this (in terms of students anyway).

[hamburger]

Just give the extra time. Its not going to hurt anyone.  As Caracal said, everyone's having unexpected problems now.

Its probably only a month of dealing with this (in terms of students anyway).

Yes.

I remember that at the job interview, an administrator told me that some people left after teaching in this college for one semester. There were also people who left in the middle of the semester and it is OK.

[apostrophe]

Those who are complaining are the ones who have been copying, cheating and leaving the classroom right away after taking attendance. Yes, in my class, most students just drop by, take attendance and say good bye to me every week. It is kind of an insult to me. Now, these people are complaining that they cannot do the assignments nor take the tests due to IT issues.

Just going to say that I can see this is a hard situation. Disrespectful students can make the job hard and adding a crisis doesn't make that any easier. It's bound to make it worse. I will chime in with those who have suggested various ways to make the term easier for you. That should be your goal. When you resume classroom teaching, you can also remember to change a few things to reduce your frustration, e.g., change the way you take attendance (at the end of class perhaps). Good luck.

[hamburger]

Those who are complaining are the ones who have been copying, cheating and leaving the classroom right away after taking attendance. Yes, in my class, most students just drop by, take attendance and say good bye to me every week. It is kind of an insult to me. Now, these people are complaining that they cannot do the assignments nor take the tests due to IT issues.

Just going to say that I can see this is a hard situation. Disrespectful students can make the job hard and adding a crisis doesn't make that any easier. It's bound to make it worse. I will chime in with those who have suggested various ways to make the term easier for you. That should be your goal. When you resume classroom teaching, you can also remember to change a few things to reduce your frustration, e.g., change the way you take attendance (at the end of class perhaps). Good luck.

Thanks.

For the last two assignments, I opened Blackboard three days before the deadline for them to submit. Zero! Zero! student submitted to Blackboard by the deadline! A few sent their work to my email account after the deadline. A few sent me excuse. Now, a student asked when they are going to get the marks for the assignments. Are they kidding me? I already told them to submit to Blackboard by the deadline multiple times or their work would not be marked. They did not listen and they expected me to give them some marks.

Except for one question which I already answered in person in the lab before the outbreak, none of the tones of emails I have been getting is about the contents of the course materials!

[Aster]

This sounds like the class from hell. Count each day as one less day with these monsters.

[Ruralguy]

At this point, either hold the line or just let the do what they want. Its hardly going to matter.
But get out. My students can really run the whole spectrum from Ivy material down to what you are mentioning, but dominated by the mushy middle....mostly polite folks wanting to do the work, and sometimes semi-interested, but not very talented and often frustrated.

[hamburger]

Less than two more weeks to go.

At the beginning of a review session, they asked if I would provide them questions and answers to be asked in the test. I said no.  A student sent me an email again asking the same question. She said that it would help her greatly to study for the test!

In the past, they told me that they came to the evening class because they heard that it is easier than daytime classes. They also told me that they have to work in the day time and they are too busy and tired to study. By paying the tuition, they expect to cheat all the way through and get high marks with almost zero effort. I heard that some of them even borrowed money or take lessons without even having their tuition sorted out.

[hamburger]

This sounds like the class from hell. Count each day as one less day with these monsters.

I had an even worse class before.

For the current class, in the labs, I have seen them passing usb memory stick to each other. They just ran the programs written by somebody else to show that they did the work! Two labs before everything moved online, I noticed that some of them did not even know how to use the programs supposed to be written by themselves! In the next lab, all of them made the same mistake of not doing the first part. When I pointed that out, they started sending messages via their phone or left the lab immediately to contact somebody. Then, it came to my attention that the majority of them just cheated.

[polly_mer]

How's that job search going?  Any good leads for doing literally anything else?

[apostrophe]

This sounds like the class from hell. Count each day as one less day with these monsters.

I had an even worse class before.

For the current class, in the labs, I have seen them passing usb memory stick to each other. They just ran the programs written by somebody else to show that they did the work! Two labs before everything moved online, I noticed that some of them did not even know how to use the programs supposed to be written by themselves! In the next lab, all of them made the same mistake of not doing the first part. When I pointed that out, they started sending messages via their phone or left the lab immediately to contact somebody. Then, it came to my attention that the majority of them just cheated.

Agreed with Aster. Most of these students have demonstrated to you that they don't want to learn anything. What can you do besides enact every possible policy to make it easier for yourself?

[the_geneticist]

Give lots of time for the online assignments (time limit to take and days to do it), be clear and about the deadline, and record the consequences of their choices.
I tell students that if they have IT issues, to take a picture of the screen to document it, and then submit a help ticket with our campus IT folks.  It's in the syllabus, on the course website, and I'll email it to them if asked.  Tell them you are sorry to hear about their IT issues and to please contact the IT folks for help.
Students with documented issues get more time or excused. 

[hamburger]

I gave them 30 minutes to complete a MC quiz. It only had two simple questions. Anybody who attended the class should be able to answer them right away in one minute. An average joe could also look up the answers from the lecture notes and got a perfect score. Yet, only half the class got a perfect score and four failures! Some of them have taken the same course 2-3 times already.

These people don't deserve an education nor a second chance. Yet, the school accepted them for money and makes the professors suffer.

[downer]

Yet, the school accepted them for money and makes the professors suffer.

No. You are choosing to suffer.

https://medium.com/mind-cafe/a-stoics-guide-to-suffering-well-963ecd3fcb9c