Favorite student emails

[OneMoreYear]

Hope you are well! I wanted to let you know that I can't make it to [the basketweaving class] or the final during the week of March 7th. I will be away March 7th-12th for basketball championships in Vegas. I know our final exam is in class that Friday. Would I be able to make up the [presentation] and the exam the following week? There is no way for me to do either in advance.

Please let me know what you think.

What I think is that this is BONKERS.  And that I need proof of travel for you to earn an Incomplete.

Is the student actually playing in the basketball championships? Does the student get to decide they cannot submit things in advance? I would think that your athletic department (if this student is indeed a basketball player) would have policies for this that would not include the student sending an email ending "what do you think?"

[the_geneticist]

Hope you are well! I wanted to let you know that I can't make it to [the basketweaving class] or the final during the week of March 7th. I will be away March 7th-12th for basketball championships in Vegas. I know our final exam is in class that Friday. Would I be able to make up the [presentation] and the exam the following week? There is no way for me to do either in advance.

Please let me know what you think.

What I think is that this is BONKERS.  And that I need proof of travel for you to earn an Incomplete.

Is the student actually playing in the basketball championships? Does the student get to decide they cannot submit things in advance? I would think that your athletic department (if this student is indeed a basketball player) would have policies for this that would not include the student sending an email ending "what do you think?"

The student is a basketball player, but hasn't shown any evidence they they are actually participating in the games.
The policy is that the student is supposed to ask faculty in advance how to complete any missed classes/assignments/etc. This student has been blissfully clueless that missing class =/= being excused from learning the material.

[AmLitHist]

Hey Professor I know you don't accept late work but I was wondering can I go back and do the assignments I haven't done?

So, you want me to do what you just said yourself I don't do? Um. . . . ?

My actual response was,

I think you've answered your own question:  I don't read or grade late submissions.  Of course, going back and answering the questions (and maybe having the Writing Center look over your work with you for their suggestions, if you'd like) wouldn't be a bad idea.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

Hey Professor I know you don't accept late work but I was wondering can I go back and do the assignments I haven't done?

So, you want me to do what you just said yourself I don't do? Um. . . . ?

My actual response was,

I think you've answered your own question:  I don't read or grade late submissions.  Of course, going back and answering the questions (and maybe having the Writing Center look over your work with you for their suggestions, if you'd like) wouldn't be a bad idea.

That was a very nice and neutral way to put it. :)

[the_geneticist]

I hope this message finds you well! I was looking over the questions that I got wrong and wanted to talk to you because I think there may be a possibility that I filled out my bubble sheet wrong that would have caused me to miss a few questions. I do remember on test day that I was confused as to which column to fill out since there were 4 but I just filled out the one all the way to the left since I thought everyone was doing that and figured it would not have made too much of a difference (I had version B though so maybe I was supposed to fill out the second bubble column). Anyways, the questions that I was looking through that stuck out to me were questions: 5, 9, 11, 13, and 15. I have looked over the other incorrect questions and understand that I did indeed get those questions wrong but for these 5 questions I reviewed them and I want to know why I missed these questions since I still believe that the answers that I picked are correct. I may be wrong about all this and I apologize for the trouble if I am, but I just wanted to bring this concern up with you to hear your clarification. Is it possible for us to meet over Zoom tomorrow to discuss this? If so, what time would work best for you?

Very polite, but no you did not fill out the bubble sheet wrong.
And you got all of those questions wrong. 

[Langue_doc]

Stu who "really can't be in danger of failing" ....

Dream response:  "Stu, not only CAN you be, but you ARE."

Then again, my response to students saying that failure is not an option is, "Failure is ALWAYS an option.  It might be one you'd like to avoid, but...."

Yet another email from Stu who can't be in danger of failing with yet another sob story. Stu apparently hasn't bothered to read my comments (when will I learn not to be a softie) on how to submit the missed assignment with a certain percentage docked for a late submission. Needless to say, I bumped this one up the food chain.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

I just got an email from a student saying that stu can't open pdfs. Um, how did you read the syllabus? Did you read the syllabus?

[AmLitHist]

I just got an email from a student saying that stu can't open pdfs. Um, how did you read the syllabus? Did you read the syllabus?

What's a syllabus?

<<ducks and runs>>

[kaysixteen]

That *sounds* like a stupid question, but if asked by a 1st semester freshman, esp one from a 1st-generation college student family,  it really isn't.  Many if not most public hss, and for that matter many private ones, would not have trained their students, even graduating college-bound seniors, with anything resembling 'college 101 know-how'.  Indeed, from my perspective as a person with extensive experience teaching both hss and college, I have long thought that most hss do a lousy job prepping their seniors for college.   I once raised a thread on this issue, maybe 10 years ago, on the Chronicle fora.  Maybe it is time to do it again...

[jerseyjay]

What's a syllabus?

<<ducks and runs>>

To be honest, I am not really sure what the answer is.

When I was in college, the syllabus was usually two (and almost never more than four) pages. It had the the professor's contact information (including, sometimes, that new thing called email), a listing of the readings, and a breakdown of what we were doing each class session. There was also a description of how the grade was compiled.

Now, my syllabus tends to be ten to fifteen pages long and contains more legalese than a cell phone contract. It has information about what to do if you are disabled, a veteran, and whether a nuclear holocaust is a legitimate excuse to miss class. To be honest, I often forget all the stuff that is in my own syllabus, and I am pretty sure nobody in my class reads it. They seem to be designed more for the dean and perhaps the school's legal department.

[Aster]

That *sounds* like a stupid question, but if asked by a 1st semester freshman, esp one from a 1st-generation college student family,  it really isn't.  Many if not most public hss, and for that matter many private ones, would not have trained their students, even graduating college-bound seniors, with anything resembling 'college 101 know-how'.  Indeed, from my perspective as a person with extensive experience teaching both hss and college, I have long thought that most hss do a lousy job prepping their seniors for college.   I once raised a thread on this issue, maybe 10 years ago, on the Chronicle fora.  Maybe it is time to do it again...

Well, in the United States, there is no requirement for high schools to prepare all students for college. High school educations are firstly designed as terminal endpoints for secondary education. You graduate, you're done, and you are now a functional adult that can enter the workforce.

But if you are a high school student with aspirations of succeeding at college, it is highly recommended that you place yourself into that high school's college-prep tier. That tier is where the vast majority of 4-year degree university students are sourced from.

The U.S. secondary school system works differently from that found in most other nations. We have a single-shop high school model, offering different tiers of learning that are somewhat organic to one another. Contrast that to other countries, where there are two kinds of high school equivalents right off the bat, the ones for the people going to university, and the ones for the people going to trade schools. Those students are pretty hard-locked into their career paths early on.

** aw nuts I just noticed the new thread spun off from this. Oopsies ***

[Langue_doc]

Stu who emailed a PDF file instead of uploading a Word file on Canvas

I apologize for any inconvenience this causes with the peer review. Would you be able to reopen the assignment and maybe I could try again?

Stu, this isn't a matter of inconvenience. You would need a magic wand because a PDF file cannot be uploaded let alone read or commented on by your classmates. Channel Yoda--do or not do, there is no try.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

Stu wants to make up the past three weeks of labs because stu didn't realize that stu didn't 'save' them. I see two incomplete labs, but the third was not even attempted. Sigh...

Oh, and stu also blamed the weather. Wtf?

[arcturus]

Stu wants to make up the past three weeks of labs because stu didn't realize that stu didn't 'save' them. I see two incomplete labs, but the third was not even attempted. Sigh...

Oh, and stu also blamed the weather. Wtf?

Regarding the weather....

Whether it was too hot or too cold, everyone knows that "physics" behaves differently in the extremes.

[the_geneticist]

For historic reasons, my lab class has the final exam on the last Friday of classes.  Why? I don't know, but it's a logistics nightmare for in-person since they only give a 50-minute time slot in a room that would barely fit all of the students.
Instead, I've made the exam online & give the students 8:00am-11:59pm to choose when to take it.

This is the 3rd email from students who apparently cannot tell time.

My name is [student] and I am enrolled in [Basketweaving]. I wanted to ask if the final requires the whole 3 hours. I am worried because the final is on [day] from 8-AM -12PM. I have [other class] lecture at 9 AM and a [yet another class] discussion at 11 AM. Will there be a time conflict and if so, what should I do about it? Thank you,

Dear [student],
Thank you for your email. The [Basketweaving] exam is available from 8:00am-11:59pm (one minute until midnight).  Your choice of when during those 16 hours to take the exam.  Once you start, you have 3 hours before the exam automatically submits.