Favorite student emails

[Caracal]

Two variations on  "I know our final is today, I was just wanting to double check on where it is located."

Fantasy response:  If it was in any room other than our normal classroom it would have been posted in huge font on the CMS and announced so loudly and often in class that only a comatose student would have failed to notice.  Also, the fact that you weren't able to deduce, from the lack of any other instructions, that it is in our normal room is quite useful - it greatly helps me understand your current grade in the course.

My students keep writing to ask when the final is. Perhaps I'm too stubborn on this and should just always post it on Canvas, but I don't make the final schedule, you can find it on the registrar's site, and I even bring up the site and show them the time of the final in class. Do you really have to email me about this?

[Hegemony]

I don't think putting the time of the final conspicuously on the syllabus and on the LMS would be babying the students. 

[Caracal]

I don't think putting the time of the final conspicuously on the syllabus and on the LMS would be babying the students.

No, I suppose it wouldn't. I'm probably being stubborn about the principle of the thing, which is stupid, I know. But, before the first day of class I don't have to write all my students and tell them where and when we are meeting. This seems basically the same. I know, though, I grew up in a world without CMS and students who have grown up in that world expect to find all the course information there.

[marshwiggle]

I don't think putting the time of the final conspicuously on the syllabus and on the LMS would be babying the students.

Here the exam schedule doesn't come out until a few weeks into term, so it would be impossible to put it on the syllabus before the term begins.

[FishProf]

It's in my syllabus, they ask anyway.

And one class has an online final.  It is available for 10d.  I have one student who keeps asking "Yes, but WHEN is it".

December Eleventy-third, at 3600 h, Antarctic Non-Standard Time.  In Gaelic.

[Biologist_]

"I know that we have a major project due today, but I'm sorry I'll have to miss it. Today is my dog's birthday and my family is throwing him a party and he'll be sad and disappointed if I miss it. Sorry for any inconvenience."

I think the dog should come to my class so I can have cake too.

I wonder if this is an autocorrect error and it was actually the student's dad's birthday? Did you ever get more info on it?

[Prof_Leannán_staire]

The Dog Morphs Into the Computer & Internet

Revised final draft of research paper due last Friday. Email arrives Friday:

"In my house we are having technical difficulties and I don't have enough data on my phone to use as a hot spot. If it's okay with you may I turn it in some time Sunday?"

Permission granted. Sunday arrives, along with this email in the wee hours on Monday:

"Still having technical difficulties to the point that the internet is so slow that the paper has been downloading since 10:00 pm and it is now almost 2:30 am. If it doesn't download fully in the next hour I'm coming to school at 1:00 pm and sending it then."

Monday afternoon:

"Never mind ... I had written out the revision and my computer just deleted my revision and kept the original and I'm just too overwhelmed to redo it because of all the finals I have this week."

The computer ate my homework. Who ate YOUR homework?

[RatGuy]

"I know that we have a major project due today, but I'm sorry I'll have to miss it. Today is my dog's birthday and my family is throwing him a party and he'll be sad and disappointed if I miss it. Sorry for any inconvenience."

I think the dog should come to my class so I can have cake too.

I wonder if this is an autocorrect error and it was actually the student's dad's birthday? Did you ever get more info on it?

No, not that it mattered. When I informed the student that the departmental policy doesn't differentiate between excused and unexcused absences, he then said, "well, I have a group project due in [whatever class] that day." I told him that it didn't matter, an absence is an absence. Then the day of the project he emails me that he has a concussion. Bottom line: student signed up to present on the last day for presentations, and then didn't want to come that day.

[downer]

The student who sends in work 2 months late starts getting concerned when I don't reply to their email within 4 hours.

[KiUlv]

The student who sends in work 2 months late starts getting concerned when I don't reply to their email within 4 hours.

YES!!! I had this student, too!

[downer]

I seem to be getting more emails from students who say that, while their final grade is X, they are very close to getting X+, and can  I give them extra credit or just round up. They often add some reason why it would be good for them if I was so charitable or a tale of woe about why they deserve it.

This, despite statements in the syllabus about no extra credit, no rounding up of final grades.

I would like to change my policy:

Final Grades: You can submit a request to raise your grade because it would help you. Such a request will cost you 0.5% of your grade. If your request is sufficiently moving, I will bump up your final grade.

[AvidReader]

Final Grades: You can submit a request to raise your grade because it would help you. Such a request will cost you 0.5% of your grade. If your request is sufficiently moving, I will bump up your final grade.

I wish!

AR.

[Aster]

Final Grades: You can submit a request to raise your grade because it would help you. Such a request will cost you 0.5% of your grade. If your request is sufficiently moving, I will bump up your final grade.

Maybe add the detail that the grade bump will be no more than 0.5% of the grade.

I would then love to see how many students make requests. The results would make for a great educational research article.

[Caracal]

Final Grades: You can submit a request to raise your grade because it would help you. Such a request will cost you 0.5% of your grade. If your request is sufficiently moving, I will bump up your final grade.

I wish!

AR.

The ones I get of late are students who say they need an A in this course, presumably because their other grades are so bad that they will end up on academic probation. Obviously the point of my courses is to give you that grade bump to make up for your failures elsewhere

[dr_codex]

Final Grades: You can submit a request to raise your grade because it would help you. Such a request will cost you 0.5% of your grade. If your request is sufficiently moving, I will bump up your final grade.

Maybe add the detail that the grade bump will be no more than 0.5% of the grade.

I would then love to see how many students make requests. The results would make for a great educational research article.

My prediction to Downer's idea: A flood of requests. It indicates that you are open to persuasion, and, as long as a student knows that a 0.5% penalty won't drop them down into the next grade category, what do they have to lose?

Aster's amendment would probably reduce the flow, since it would only be relevant for the tranche of students near the next grade category. But I'm guessing that it would still produce more responses than anybody wants.

I do know of Comp classes that have, as a final assignment, "Argue for your grade". The point, of course, is to have students demonstrate all of their persuasive writing skills in a cause that has stakes. I've always been astonished at the time and care students -- otherwise demonstrating very little time and care in my courses -- will pour into grade appeals.

Happy break, all.