Procrastinating until very last moments to take online exams

[the_geneticist]

I had a student who raised holy hell that I wouldn't honor his accommodations for quizzes he took before he gave me the letter and who, ultimately, NEVER used the extra time he was granted for the remainder of the semester.   He got 1.5x for time, but never used any of the extra time.  I guess that made sense inasmuch as he could fail the quizzes in 5-6 minutes with high consistency.  Why waste the extra time?

He tried to finagle a Pass b/c he didn't get his accommodations from the get-go.  That appeal foundered on the rocks when it was shown his grades before and after accommodations were either the same, or worse when he had the accommodations.

ADA or not, you still have to learn the material.

Our disability resource folks make it clear to the students that the letters are NOT retroactive.  But it's the resource office who sends out the letters, not the students.
Kind of depressing that the student was consistently doing that poorly.  Clearly the time limit was not the limiting factor.

[arcturus]

Question: If 20% of the students in my online class think that taking the exam between 11pm - midnight is the optimum time (out of 48 possible hours), are we perhaps doing students a disservice by making them take in-class exams during daytime hours? Is it possible that college students actually perform better closer to midnight? Maybe we should restructure the entire classroom schedule, so that we run from 8pm to 6am instead of 8am to 6pm? This would allow everyone to sleep in!!!

[kaysixteen]

Adolescents do do better at hours much later than older and even middle aged adults do.   And almost no professors really want to teach 8am courses, at least not those under 60+.

[smallcleanrat]

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/chronotype

Many people do feel more alert and better able to concentrate late at night.

Late night can also be a good time for avoiding distraction if you are working when other people you share space with are sleeping.

[cathwen]

Late night might be the optimum time for many students.  Most of mine also choose to take quizzes close to the deadline. 

I don't worry about it.  They take it, or they don't take it.  I give no makeups or extensions, but I do allow two drops.  Whether they take it early or late is not my concern. 

[Aster]

I don't worry about it.  They take it, or they don't take it.  I give no makeups or extensions, but I do allow two drops.  Whether they take it early or late is not my concern.

You are my hero.

[FishProf]

And almost no professors really want to teach 8am courses, at least not those under 60+.

Hmmm.  I guess that makes me special.

Or you're over-generalizing.

Hard to say which.

[the_geneticist]

I'd teach an 8:00am, especially if the choice is either 8:00am or any time after 3:00pm.
Evening classes are the bane of my existence.  I'm tired, the students are tired, and I hate getting home after dark.

[EdnaMode]

I'd teach an 8:00am, especially if the choice is either 8:00am or any time after 3:00pm.
Evening classes are the bane of my existence.  I'm tired, the students are tired, and I hate getting home after dark.

Me too. Most semesters I start at 8 AM and am usually done with teaching by 2:00, some semesters I have a lab that goes until 3:30, but any later than that I don't really like. I despise night classes - don't like teaching them, didn't like taking them as a student. Oddly enough, my 8 AM classes often fill up before my later ones do.

[apl68]

Question: If 20% of the students in my online class think that taking the exam between 11pm - midnight is the optimum time (out of 48 possible hours), are we perhaps doing students a disservice by making them take in-class exams during daytime hours? Is it possible that college students actually perform better closer to midnight? Maybe we should restructure the entire classroom schedule, so that we run from 8pm to 6am instead of 8am to 6pm? This would allow everyone to sleep in!!!

No!  American adolescents perform poorly in the morning in studies for culturally-determined reasons (They're allowed to stay up all night staring at screens, instead of getting a good, consistent night's sleep), not because an inability to function in the morning is an eternal fact of adolescent biology.  Their habits have already been catered to more than enough.  College needs to be a time when they are made to buckle down and start accepting the sort of real-world discipline that they will face in the workplace.  Stuff like this is a part of why employers complain so much about the quality of the recent graduates that they hire.

[downer]

One place I taught at had 8pm-11pm classes. Occasionally I'd be around after 9pm and I'd see students leaving the classrooms very early on. With their coats -- not just for a break. It tends to be that students who take night classes have full time jobs. They are older and rarely are they nightbirds. Night classes also tend to be once a week, and 2-3 hours long, which is too much.

I did teach a 7am class one semester. That didn't go well with 18 year olds.

I have been making my online discussion work due at 8pm recently. Sometimes I will accept late work but with a penalty.

[Liquidambar]

And almost no professors really want to teach 8am courses, at least not those under 60+.

Hmmm.  I guess that makes me special.

Or you're over-generalizing.

Hard to say which.

In my department, the only people who want to teach 8 AM classes are a couple of retirees who adjunct for us.  On the other hand, we have a couple younger people who are night owls and like to teach in the late afternoon or early evening.  Everyone else seems to prefer the 9 AM to 3 PM window.  It's still anecdata, but it seems consistent with kay's statement.

[OneMoreYear]

When I was teaching as a grad student, one semester I had 3 sections of a class recitation: Tuesdays at 10, Thursdays at 7:30am, and Fridays at 4:30pm. When I got my schedule, I thought I was being punished. The biggest surprise was my 7:30am class, which was full of athletes, who had worked out, showered, eaten breakfast and arrived at class ready to engage. The discussions were lively, and I always left that section energized to go get stuff done in the lab.  The Friday afternoon class, well, the students and I agreed to survive it together.

Currently, I don't teach any classes before 8:30am. We do teach evening classes here (5-8pm), but I haven't been asked to do it recently. As a student, I took 6-9pm courses, but that was when I was typically staying up to 3 in the morning, so 6pm was the middle of my day.

[Caracal]

I'd teach an 8:00am, especially if the choice is either 8:00am or any time after 3:00pm.
Evening classes are the bane of my existence.  I'm tired, the students are tired, and I hate getting home after dark.

Yeah, I used to hate morning classes and not mind teaching at night. Now that I have a kid and am old, I'm up at 6 anyway so early classes are fine.

A few years ago, I taught a 2.5 hour class starting at 630, something I used to do most semesters. It was awful, I just couldn't bring any enthusiasm at all.

[fishbrains]

7:00 a.m. classes are good because by the time I wake up, the class is over.

[ahem, cough, cough]