Work-Life Balance

[lightning]

After teaching for a few years, you will begin to notice the same questions pop up, which will have the same stock answers. Many of the stock answers include a cut-and-paste of assignment instructions, rubrics, or even swaths of the syllabus. Keep these handy. The same thing applies if you are required to give comments on assignments. In the majority of situations, you will find that the same generic answer suffices as a response that satisfies the requirement of looking responsive and engaged.

Regarding email itself, devote your best energy to the most important tasks in your job. The most important tasks in your job are NOT answering emails. Save email communications for the time in the day when your brain is most dead. For me, that is usually around 2:00 PM each day. 2 PM on Fridays is a special day because that is when I handle the emails that require more thought. I also know that when I respond to a complicated email from a sender, with an equally complicated answer, on Friday afternoon, right before the weekend, I increase the chances of not hearing from the sender again. Sometimes, it even ruins their weekend a little bit. Ha ha. It works on administrators and students alike. If you want to be particular evil, do this on the Friday afternoon before spring break.

If the email response requires a lot of thought, tell the sender something along the lines of "Thanks for the email. I will get back to you about this." Then get back to the sender during a time of the day and/or week where your brain is most dead, so you are not expending your best energy. Expending energy on stupid stuff like email is what is most draining about email and makes an otherwise great profession seem like a crap job. So use the energy, which you don't mind wasting, on email.

Manage expectations

You can tell students, in your syllabus and in repeated reminders, that you check email at a certain time each day, and that they can expect a response at that time. Don't think of email as something that you have to monitor all the time. If you cordon off time for email, and don't check email outside of that time, you might find yourself to be more efficient.

Also, and I'm only trying to be helpful when I say this, but if you are one of those people that feels like you accomplished something meaningful when you respond to an email, it can be very easy to fall into the trap of spending too much time on emails, instead of more important things.

[marshwiggle]

Also, and I'm only trying to be helpful when I say this, but if you are one of those people that feels like you accomplished something meaningful when you respond to an email, it can be very easy to fall into the trap of spending too much time on emails, instead of more important things.

If the same person keeps emailing, increase the time to respond each time so that the process decelerates. At some point, most people will start figuring things out for themselves when they know they'll have to wait for an answer.

[Ruralguy]

Emails can be more important. However, I find that sometimes the "best" ones are brief and non-emotional.  I don't mean "I'll get back to you later" type stuff, I just mean meaningful answers that don't go off on tangents  or rants.

[Cheerful]

If the same person keeps emailing, increase the time to respond each time so that the process decelerates. At some point, most people will start figuring things out for themselves when they know they'll have to wait for an answer.

Yes.  With some students (and colleagues), the sooner I reply, the sooner they send yet another email about the original matter or a new one.  I like to keep my inbox under daily control, without many messages waiting for replies, but sometimes it's best not to reply right away.

[Cheerful]

However, I find that sometimes the "best" ones are brief and non-emotional.

For me, almost always, the best emails are brief.  I hate long emails.

[fishbrains]

However, I find that sometimes the "best" ones are brief and non-emotional.

For me, almost always, the best emails are brief.  I hate long emails.

I've noticed something similar as well. The longer the student's email, the shorter my response tends to be. Hmmmm . . .

[the_geneticist]

However, I find that sometimes the "best" ones are brief and non-emotional.

For me, almost always, the best emails are brief.  I hate long emails.

I've noticed something similar as well. The longer the student's email, the shorter my response tends to be. Hmmmm . . .

Me too!  When I see paragraphs of text I know that my answer is going to be something like:
Dear Student,
Thank you for your email.  I am sorry to hear you are sick/considering dropping the class/having trouble with online due dates.  Please fill out the Excused Absence Request/talk with your Academic Advisor/read the syllabus for the policy on late work.
Best,
Dr. Geneticist

[Morden]

Charlotte, It's completely normal to feel overwhelmed when beginning to teach at a new institution; I can't even imagine what it must be like during a pandemic when all of our communication with colleagues and students is mediated through the computer. It will get easier. You just have to try to keep going for now.
To help you keep going, you need to prioritize some space for you, as many posters have noted. I spend a few minutes each morning triaging emails--what has to be answered right away, what can wait until later in the day (I put aside time when I'm usually less productive), and what doesn't need a response at all. That doesn't mean answering all of the student ones immediately; mostly they can wait. (And I teach at a very student focused institution). When I started teaching, I used to mark with a clock on my table. Each essay got a certain amount of time (because honestly students can only process a certain amount of feedback anyways). That helped me get through.
Good luck and take care of yourself.

[Charlotte]

Thank you all so much for your thoughtful responses. You've all had some very good ideas and I'm adding them into my routine today. I feel a lot more optimistic that I will survive this now so thank you!

[AJ_Katz]

Don't answer a student email until at least 90 minutes after it was sent. If I'm answering emails from 9:00-10:00, I only respond to those with time stamp prior to 7:30. The rest wait until my next response period or have delayed response set so they appear to be waiting.

+1 to this.  Use email scheduling...  You might also use email scheduling to answer emails late at night and have them sent in the morning the next day.  This' helps to set "digital boundaries" so that people don't expect you to reply in the evenings or immediately to their questions.

[FishProf]

When I am overwhelmed by email, I take my laptop offline, so I can answer all that I have to deal with at once, and only send them out when I am done.  I log in, send the emails, and then get off.  This stops the water torture effect of getting responses while I am trying to clear my decks.

[polly_mer]

Your school 'requires' you to answer all student emails within 24 hours?   Who imposes this requirement, how is it phrased, and how might it be enforced?

The easy enforcement is students know the rule and cc an administrator with a follow-up email at 24h and five minutes.

The IT department can access email to verify any complaints upon administrator request.

Response time to emails is one of the easiest rules to enforce if the institution really wants to enforce it.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

I'm getting some good ideas from this thread!

I absolutely agree with setting interaction boundaries. Do not engage with students (unless it's an emergency and you're willing to do it) after x o'clock. For me, I stop answering email at 5pm and start up at 9am the next day (except for weekends). It has saved my sanity quite a bit.

[kaysixteen]

I get that the tech allows for easy enforcement of such a policy, but I still wonder what the hell kind of school imposes such a requirement on faculty, which really does convert professors into customer service reps?

[Charlotte]

I get that the tech allows for easy enforcement of such a policy, but I still wonder what the hell kind of school imposes such a requirement on faculty, which really does convert professors into customer service reps?

They want to be very student centered. We are encouraged to be very much like customer service reps. If a student is late on their work, we have to accommodate them. We can't have a "no late work" policy in our class because it's against school policy. I haven't tested this to see how enforced it is by the school.

We are also told to include the 24 hour email deadline in our syllabus so students are aware. They will contact the administration if we are not responsive enough. We have to include the contact information for our boss in the syllabus so students can go directly to them.

It has already been made very clear to me that administration will back the student over the faculty. Our main job is to make the students happy—not teach.

I think that is what is contributing to my frustration. First year teaching and maybe I was a little idealistic but I'm shocked with how terrible the students are and how the school does not seem to care if they actually learn. I can only hope that there are schools out there who still care about teaching and aren't so focused on keeping the customer/student happy.

In hindsight, I also should not have taken classes in addition to teaching. But part of the agreement was for me to take these classes so I'm qualified to teach in that area this summer. I'm already on the schedule and will have just finished my 18 hours in that area before starting to teach in it.

One area that does take a lot of time is giving feedback. There is so much wrong with the assignment! I know they can only process so much but if I skip over something and then later on mention it they argue that I didn't tell them that before!

Of course, most of them don't even read the feedback. But my school does expect detailed, personalized feedback for each student so I have to provide it anyway. I'm working on the copy and paste method some of you have suggested and I think that will definitely help.

Once I build up my collection of feedback and email responses that I can copy and paste, things should be easier. My classes will also be mostly built and I won't be starting from scratch. I'm glad someone suggested only making smaller changes to classes rather than throw them all out because that is exactly what I had planned for next semester! There are so many things going wrong that I want to change that I had planned to start all over but that would be too overwhelming.

I think I will take a day off from work every week too. I'll still have to check my emails, but I can plan to not do any other work on that day. I really need a break from the 24/7. It seems as if I am at work all the time!

Also going to start back with my running which I'm looking forward to. My health has taken a backseat this semester and I need to work on that. I scheduled a doctor's appointment for this week to try and get my migraines under control again.

Next plan is to get spouse on board with helping with the housework more! I'm also looking into those prepared meals that you can just heat up rather than try to cook two meals a day.

Feeling a lot more optimistic after all your advice and encouragement! I do need to remember that my first year would be hard no matter what and with COVID there is even more stress involved. You are all right: next semester will be better so I just have to hang in there for now!