Creepy silence

[apl68]

Summer students are so very, um... interesting.

Many are taking a summer class because they flunked it in an earlier term. These redo students tend to not do very well. Most of the ones that will pass the course, will pass just barely.

Many are taking a summer class because "I need it for my degree but it's stupid so this is the fastest way to pound it out and get it over with". These "pound it out" students tend to not do very well. They're in a hurry. They resent that they need this class for their degree. They don't want to be in this class and they often let you and everyone else know it.

Many are taking a summer class because they have been told that summer classes are easier than regular term classes. These students tend to lack motivation.

Many are taking a summer class because they forgot something in their degree plan and this is their last chance if they want to graduate on time. These students tend to *really* lack motivation. They already have a foot out the door.

Many are taking a summer class because they're top notch high school students who want to start early. This group is wonderful. Most of these "proto-freshmen" are the best academic performers.

So look on the bright side. Summer school is halfway over! Regular term classes are just two months away!

Nice taxonomy of summer students.  To which I'd add non-traditional student working on a professional degree.  May or may not really want to be taking that particular class, but probably very motivated to do a good job and finish.

[the_geneticist]

Summer students are so very, um... interesting.

Many are taking a summer class because they flunked it in an earlier term. These redo students tend to not do very well. Most of the ones that will pass the course, will pass just barely.

Many are taking a summer class because "I need it for my degree but it's stupid so this is the fastest way to pound it out and get it over with". These "pound it out" students tend to not do very well. They're in a hurry. They resent that they need this class for their degree. They don't want to be in this class and they often let you and everyone else know it.

Many are taking a summer class because they have been told that summer classes are easier than regular term classes. These students tend to lack motivation.

Many are taking a summer class because they forgot something in their degree plan and this is their last chance if they want to graduate on time. These students tend to *really* lack motivation. They already have a foot out the door.

Many are taking a summer class because they're top notch high school students who want to start early. This group is wonderful. Most of these "proto-freshmen" are the best academic performers.

So look on the bright side. Summer school is halfway over! Regular term classes are just two months away!

Nice taxonomy of summer students.  To which I'd add non-traditional student working on a professional degree.  May or may not really want to be taking that particular class, but probably very motivated to do a good job and finish.

I would also add in the brand, spanking new category of I withdrew from the class in Spring and now I'm terrified I won't graduate on time.  These are students who were struggling with the mess of the pandemic and not doing well in class.  I'll wait and see how they do.  I think some will be great, others will still have the same stresses as Spring.

[Baldwinschild]

Why do you think there will be a confrontation meltdown?  My students never react badly to being told that certain things are to prevent cheating. They basically say "Oh yeah, that makes sense."  They certainly would never say "We insist that you make cheating possible!" I think when you send the email, you're likely to hear no response at all, which will just be the students saying to themselves, "Oh yeah, that makes sense." There will be no pushback or ill will. Take it from someone who's done this many times.

I think when a student gets angry enough to send an email asking why I set up the exam to prevent her from cheating, she is beyond reason and looking for a fight.  The message her email conveyed is precisely, "We insist that you make cheating possible."  I think students who cheat get anxious and volatile when they suspect the prof knows but isn't saying anything.  She's angry.  She wants me to say "because plagiarism" so she can say "how dare you?" 
That's why I see a confrontation coming.  But I am also sick of them and tired.  So maybe I'm overthinking things. 

[the_geneticist]

Why do you think there will be a confrontation meltdown?  My students never react badly to being told that certain things are to prevent cheating. They basically say "Oh yeah, that makes sense."  They certainly would never say "We insist that you make cheating possible!" I think when you send the email, you're likely to hear no response at all, which will just be the students saying to themselves, "Oh yeah, that makes sense." There will be no pushback or ill will. Take it from someone who's done this many times.

I think when a student gets angry enough to send an email asking why I set up the exam to prevent her from cheating, she is beyond reason and looking for a fight.  The message her email conveyed is precisely, "We insist that you make cheating possible."  I think students who cheat get anxious and volatile when they suspect the prof knows but isn't saying anything.  She's angry.  She wants me to say "because plagiarism" so she can say "how dare you?" 
That's why I see a confrontation coming.  But I am also sick of them and tired.  So maybe I'm overthinking things.

Well, they didn't directly ask that you allow cheating.  They asked why you can't give them more time & allow backtracking.  So, my question for you is why aren't you doing these things? 

If you are limiting the time because the point of the quiz is that it's to gauge student understanding of the readings to ensure they are ready to discuss, then it's reasonable to limit the time.  Tell them the pedagogical reasoning.

If you are using the "prevent backtracking" feature simply because you are asking all of the students the same questions, you need to write more questions & give each student a subset.  Or write questions that ask for an opinion or prediction or drawing so they can't just use someone else's answers.

You don't have to answer their email today.  Don't say "because plagiarism". 

[Baldwinschild]

Why do you think there will be a confrontation meltdown?  My students never react badly to being told that certain things are to prevent cheating. They basically say "Oh yeah, that makes sense."  They certainly would never say "We insist that you make cheating possible!" I think when you send the email, you're likely to hear no response at all, which will just be the students saying to themselves, "Oh yeah, that makes sense." There will be no pushback or ill will. Take it from someone who's done this many times.

I think when a student gets angry enough to send an email asking why I set up the exam to prevent her from cheating, she is beyond reason and looking for a fight.  The message her email conveyed is precisely, "We insist that you make cheating possible."  I think students who cheat get anxious and volatile when they suspect the prof knows but isn't saying anything.  She's angry.  She wants me to say "because plagiarism" so she can say "how dare you?" 
That's why I see a confrontation coming.  But I am also sick of them and tired.  So maybe I'm overthinking things.

Well, they didn't directly ask that you allow cheating.  They asked why you can't give them more time & allow backtracking.  So, my question for you is why aren't you doing these things?

If you are limiting the time because the point of the quiz is that it's to gauge student understanding of the readings to ensure they are ready to discuss, then it's reasonable to limit the time.  Tell them the pedagogical reasoning.

If you are using the "prevent backtracking" feature simply because you are asking all of the students the same questions, you need to write more questions & give each student a subset.  Or write questions that ask for an opinion or prediction or drawing so they can't just use someone else's answers.

You don't have to answer their email today.  Don't say "because plagiarism".

She isn't asking for more time.  She is asking why I disabled backtracking.  The quizzes are timed because they are simple ten-question post-reading quizzes.  They have 75 minutes to answer ten questions about a text they just read.  If they have unlimited time to take the quiz, they may not feel the need to read the text;  they could just look for the answers.  Most students spend about 20-25 minutes on those, and they score high grades.  I've not had any complaints about the time limits on quizzes until this semester.  The students who complained were told the pedagogical reason. 

I disabled backtracking to prevent them from cheating.  I am not going to "write more questions" or "give each student a subset."  I want them to answer the same questions.  It is not unreasonable to expect the students to answer the same questions.  I am not going to do more work to stop them from cheating.  Why should I do that?  I rewrote the exam, added "hints," added extra-credit questions, and added some multiple choice questions. I disabled the backtracking, and she couldn't go back to answer a question.  She will survive.   



   

[clean]

I disabled backtracking to prevent them from cheating.  I am not going to "write more questions" or "give each student a subset."  I want them to answer the same questions.  It is not unreasonable to expect the students to answer the same questions.  I am not going to do more work to stop them from cheating.  Why should I do that?  I rewrote the exam, added "hints," added extra-credit questions, and added some multiple choice questions. I disabled the backtracking, and she couldn't go back to answer a question.  She will survive.   

I agree

[Hegemony]

I think "Why doesn't it allow backtracking?" is a perfectly reasonable question, and could easily be asked by a student who doesn't intend to cheat. Some students race through a test, making sure they get to all the questions before the time expires, and then when they find they have a lot of time left over, they want to use that time to go back and double-check their answers. That's a reasonable and understandable strategy. Why don't you allow it? Because, unfortunately, that would open the door to cheating.

What I'm noticing is that you (OP) put the most hostile interpretation on every set of eventualities here.  You assume the student must be asking the question in a hostile, accusatory manner, and that if you dare to send the candid answer, the student will take in personally (as you are doing with the student's question) and respond aggressively.

The occasional hostile student pops up, but my experience is that the vast majority are innocuous, maybe confused, maybe sly, but not angry or confrontational.  And if the occasional angry or confrontational student does pop up, you just ignore the emotion and answer calmly and it all dissipates. 

I had a student who got all hot and bothered last term because I said I would not change the class format to conform to his wishes. After the second round of this, I suggested calmly that he might want to find a different class that did things the way he wanted.  He wrote me an angry email saying "I do not appreciate the tone of your reply. You are disrespectful and I deserve an apology!" Etc. etc. I ignored all of this and said, "Dear Student, The bottom line is that the class will continue as it has been designed. Whether you choose to take it as is or to find a class in your preferred format is up to you. Best wishes, Dr. Hegemony." And lo and behold, he stayed in the class, did just fine, never wrote a hostile word again, end of story.

OP, if you don't mind my saying, you are catastrophizing in all these scenarios. The students are not aggressive, they will be fine with a candid explanation (in fact a good deal more fine than if you avoid or prevaricate), and if one or two of them did have a flash of temper, no biggie. It just sits there and they get over it and nothing explodes and your job is not imperiled and you just hold the line calmly and the class continues and end of.

I do always recommend a system that randomly chooses questions from a question bank, though. That frustrates any attempts to cheat much more thoroughly.

[polly_mer]

The occasional hostile student pops up, but my experience is that the vast majority are innocuous, maybe confused, maybe sly, but not angry or confrontational.  And if the occasional angry or confrontational student does pop up, you just ignore the emotion and answer calmly and it all dissipates. 

Again, local culture matters.

I've been places with many hostile students and I've been places where a hostile student is very rare.

I've also been places where students will just quietly stop coming to a class when overwhelmed and places where students will start down the complaint path at every freakin' turn.

The question then is what the administration does.  I've not been anywhere that the administration caves, but I definitely wouldn't work again at a couple places where hostile overwhelmed students at full volume was not rare.

[the_geneticist]

I disabled backtracking to prevent them from cheating.  I am not going to "write more questions" or "give each student a subset."  I want them to answer the same questions.  It is not unreasonable to expect the students to answer the same questions.  I am not going to do more work to stop them from cheating.  Why should I do that?  I rewrote the exam, added "hints," added extra-credit questions, and added some multiple choice questions. I disabled the backtracking, and she couldn't go back to answer a question.  She will survive.   

You can always tell students that you want their individual responses & thoughts in their answers.  Use Turnitin or other software to compare answers & flag ones that are identical.  (This is assuming these are short-answer/essay questions and not simple multiple choice or True/False)

[mleok]

Anyway, I would say it is wonderful that you care, but as my spouse told me, I should not have to "care more about the class for them than they do."

Yes, I think this is the key to keeping our sanity, don't be more invested in the sucess of your students than they are.

[Baldwinschild]

I think "Why doesn't it allow backtracking?" is a perfectly reasonable question, and could easily be asked by a student who doesn't intend to cheat. Some students race through a test, making sure they get to all the questions before the time expires, and then when they find they have a lot of time left over, they want to use that time to go back and double-check their answers. That's a reasonable and understandable strategy. Why don't you allow it? Because, unfortunately, that would open the door to cheating.

What I'm noticing is that you (OP) put the most hostile interpretation on every set of eventualities here.  You assume the student must be asking the question in a hostile, accusatory manner, and that if you dare to send the candid answer, the student will take in personally (as you are doing with the student's question) and respond aggressively.

The occasional hostile student pops up, but my experience is that the vast majority are innocuous, maybe confused, maybe sly, but not angry or confrontational.  And if the occasional angry or confrontational student does pop up, you just ignore the emotion and answer calmly and it all dissipates. 

I had a student who got all hot and bothered last term because I said I would not change the class format to conform to his wishes. After the second round of this, I suggested calmly that he might want to find a different class that did things the way he wanted.  He wrote me an angry email saying "I do not appreciate the tone of your reply. You are disrespectful and I deserve an apology!" Etc. etc. I ignored all of this and said, "Dear Student, The bottom line is that the class will continue as it has been designed. Whether you choose to take it as is or to find a class in your preferred format is up to you. Best wishes, Dr. Hegemony." And lo and behold, he stayed in the class, did just fine, never wrote a hostile word again, end of story.

OP, if you don't mind my saying, you are catastrophizing in all these scenarios. The students are not aggressive, they will be fine with a candid explanation (in fact a good deal more fine than if you avoid or prevaricate), and if one or two of them did have a flash of temper, no biggie. It just sits there and they get over it and nothing explodes and your job is not imperiled and you just hold the line calmly and the class continues and end of.

I do always recommend a system that randomly chooses questions from a question bank, though. That frustrates any attempts to cheat much more thoroughly.

That isn't what she asked, and it isn't an innocent question.  But I take the point you've been trying to make throughout the thread about the way I am handling this.  There is no need to engage in catastrophic thinking.  I think Mamselle made this point as well.  I need to remember that I control my response to the situation, so how they respond does not matter.  I am not going to make additional changes to the coursework, and I am not going to accept plagiarism.  I disabled the backtracking to keep them from sharing questions and because some questions reveal the answers to others.  So, I needed to be direct about that.  This reminds me of something my mom used to say:  "If you are ashamed, don't do it; if you do it, don't be ashamed."  If I do something, I need to own it.   

I am not going to use a test bank; I want them to answer the same questions.  The tests are fine.  If they want to improve their scores, they can read in advance and take advantage of the supplementary materials I've posted.  If they want to plagiarize or cheat, they can do that as well.  If I catch it, I will deal with it.  But I don't want to keep going down the rabbit hole.  I have policies for dealing with plagiarism.  I need to rely on those to manage cheating, not the assignments. 

I sent my rewritten response yesterday, by the way.  So, that part is done.  Thank you for your help and patience.  My apologies for getting so caught up in the fear of confrontation that I could not hear you all clearly. 
   

[Baldwinschild]

I disabled backtracking to prevent them from cheating.  I am not going to "write more questions" or "give each student a subset."  I want them to answer the same questions.  It is not unreasonable to expect the students to answer the same questions.  I am not going to do more work to stop them from cheating.  Why should I do that?  I rewrote the exam, added "hints," added extra-credit questions, and added some multiple choice questions. I disabled the backtracking, and she couldn't go back to answer a question.  She will survive.   

You can always tell students that you want their individual responses & thoughts in their answers.  Use Turnitin or other software to compare answers & flag ones that are identical.  (This is assuming these are short-answer/essay questions and not simple multiple choice or True/False)

Thank you for this suggestion.  I am writing up their final exam today.  I will add some questions like this.  This is going to be helpful for those students who are enjoying the readings and want to share their thoughts about them. 

[arcturus]

I would be very careful how you phrase "individual responses and thoughts" as not all thoughts are applicable to your class. If phrased loosely, you could end up in grading disputes, as the student could argue that their answer of "The reading reminded me of a trip I took in 7th grade and so I am going to write about how wonderful it was to be able to buy junk food at the gas station during that trip." was a genuine individual response and thought, and therefore is worthy of full credit, regardless of what reading material was assigned.

I would recommend an "academic integrity pledge" on the first page along the lines of "I am aware of [University]'s policy on academic integrity and affirm that the following responses are written and completed without outside assistance beyond that which is noted below." Below, you list the open-note (and any other materials) policy. The clock starts when they open this page, and the exam cannot be advanced until they sign/click a button, etc.  This has the advantage of reminding students of the rules immediately before they start the exam and will at least nudge the conscious of those planning on cheating.

[Baldwinschild]

I would be very careful how you phrase "individual responses and thoughts" as not all thoughts are applicable to your class. If phrased loosely, you could end up in grading disputes, as the student could argue that their answer of "The reading reminded me of a trip I took in 7th grade and so I am going to write about how wonderful it was to be able to buy junk food at the gas station during that trip." was a genuine individual response and thought, and therefore is worthy of full credit, regardless of what reading material was assigned.

I would recommend an "academic integrity pledge" on the first page along the lines of "I am aware of [University]'s policy on academic integrity and affirm that the following responses are written and completed without outside assistance beyond that which is noted below." Below, you list the open-note (and any other materials) policy. The clock starts when they open this page, and the exam cannot be advanced until they sign/click a button, etc.  This has the advantage of reminding students of the rules immediately before they start the exam and will at least nudge the conscious of those planning on cheating.

Yes, this is always the problem with such questions, especially in a lit-based course with a heavy history component.  The academic conduct statement idea is brilliant.  I have been adding a reminder about academic integrity to the quiz intros, but they breeze over those anyway.  I love your idea.  The accountability factor is more immediate.  Thank you again.  This is second lifeline you've thrown me. 

Thank you all for taking the time to help me through this.  I will be sure to keep you updated if anything interesting happens.  I gave the students a "mini-summer break" to recover from the exam.  Fingers crossed, all will be smooth sailing from here.