Ghost Students

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

Apologies if there is already a thread on this- I'm too tired to look.

I have three ghost students (never showed up for face-to-face class/never logged in for online class) this semester. I've emailed them personally (they also get auto emails) and left it at that. In previous semesters, the number has been a lot higher, maybe it's low since we're in summer session.

Are you noticing a larger number of ghost students this semester- or has it dropped? What do you do to 'encourage' them to attend class?

[mamselle]

There was a discussion on some otherwise-titled thread a while ago, to which I added then, that there are student loan scams that have this profile...and so absences like yours need to be reported so they can be followed up for that--and other--reasons.

M.

[Caracal]

Apologies if there is already a thread on this- I'm too tired to look.

I have three ghost students (never showed up for face-to-face class/never logged in for online class) this semester. I've emailed them personally (they also get auto emails) and left it at that. In previous semesters, the number has been a lot higher, maybe it's low since we're in summer session.

Are you noticing a larger number of ghost students this semester- or has it dropped? What do you do to 'encourage' them to attend class?

I haven't noticed any change in total ghost students Post pandemic I'm seeing more students who are doing fine in the course and then vanish late in the semester.

[Ruralguy]

We are supposed to report students who have had zero interaction with us (no attendance, no assignments, no contact about why). I haven't needed to do this in years.

[clean]

We have to report the no shows early in the term.

We also have a reporting system that goes to the student advisors for students that are not doing their work. They get a call or some other followup by the advisors.

Finally, I will send a list of such students to the 'head advisor' and ask them to call or otherwise followup to let me know the issues.

I have one student that has taken me 3 times, never participating once!  No idea what he is up to.  I have assigned him the appropriate grade (NA) which indicates that he never showed.  In fact, I assign the NA label to all that have not participated in the first 20 days. (or so).

[Langue_doc]

We are required to report non-attending students. The "never attended" reports are due by either the second or third week of the semester (we get reminders). After that, we are required to report students who have failed to attend physical classes or submit assignments/participate in online classes for a certain number of weeks.

[downer]

I never email "ghost" students.
I do report "never attended" students to the registrar.
One place I teach at seems to be changing it's requirements for what counts as attendance in online courses, to comply with federal regs. Logging on to the LMS is not enough. For years, they were in violation of federal guidelines.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

Yes, I meant to add that we are required to report students to the Registrar who never attend class for financial aid reasons. We are also STRONGLY encouraged to email students who do not attend.

[poiuy]

In the 'before times' I usually had maybe one ghost student every year or so.  But now, since early 2021, it's been 2-3 per class per semester. That's a lot. Our students (in a regional state school) have complicated lives and many have low incomes so they are dealing with a lot. I teach mostly online asynchronous classes.

I have developed a system that involves emailing any student who hasn't participated or has missed assignments. Some of them respond and catch participation. Others still ghost.
Then we have a University system to flag at-risk students 3-4 times a semester and send messages to their advisors. I use that to further lay a paper trail for the ghosts.
Finally, if by the drop-add deadline the student is still a ghost, I drop them from the class. This protects their GPA from an F.
I put this into my Syllabus.
The financial aid office sometimes contacts me to get their last date of participation and I just respond 'never attended'.

I do wonder what was going on with them, but then I reflect that they are facing complications I cannot know. Hopefully they can take the classes in the future when they are able.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

One of my ghost students responded! Stu will be in class this week (wasn't last week because of 'personal issues' which could be anything).

[Mobius]

There was a discussion on some otherwise-titled thread a while ago, to which I added then, that there are student loan scams that have this profile...and so absences like yours need to be reported so they can be followed up for that--and other--reasons.

M.

Yes, and some are those who steal identities to enroll and try to collect student aid. Others are students who figured out how to game the system for a term or two until they fail to make adequate progress and get cut off. Yet another group are perpetually struggling students who enroll because they are part of some rehabilitation program (noticed this with a few students with a history of severe mental illness), but no show. This group is rare and I only know about them because I hear about them after the fact when an advisor contacts me after they get dropped for non-attendance or participation in online courses.

[jerseyjay]

I teach at essentially an open-admissions public university. In my more than ten years' teaching here, I have always had ghost students. I do think that the pandemic has made this problem worse, but it existed before.

There was one student who signed up for  three or four of my classes over some years whom I never actually saw. Some of this is due to the fact that students are not automatically dropped if they do not attend, so some students probably do not have any intention of taking the class. Since I need to assign a grade to each student on my roster, even if they haven't shown up for one class, I advise everybody to actually withdraw from a class if they don't want to stay in.

There are also students who start the class and then disappear. This happens regularly in my senior thesis class, but also in most of my other classes. One student disappeared from my senior thesis class three weeks into the Fall 2021 semester, signed up for an upper-level course last semester, explaining she had family problems, and then disappeared from that one about a month into the semester. I don't doubt she had real issues (most of our students due, between work, family, and a pandemic and recession), but the end result is she has (at least) two Fs on her transcript.

Then there are students who try to game the system. Like many universities, somewhere around a month into the semester we are supposed to report to the registrar's office all students who have not attended or contributed to the class at least once. It is very common for students to come to class just before the deadline, and then, nothing. In early March 2020, one student came to class in the fourth week, begged for me to let him continue the course, and then, once the lockdown began, disappeared again.

I also have student who take the course, do well, and then disappear late into the course. A while ago, I had a student who was doing great, and missed the final exam. He explained he had some psychological problem with final exams; I offered to let him make up the exam, but he insisted in retaking the entire course. He was earning an A this time too, until he missed the final exam for the second time. (This was more than ten years ago, so I cannot remember all the details, but I think I referred him to our disabilities office, but I have no idea if he went.) This semester I had several students withdraw from the course about a month away from the end, and several were doing well.

I do not reach out to ghost students specifically, but after a few weeks of the semester, I email all the students who are doing poorly, including urging those who do not want to continue in the course to formally withdraw. A bit later there is the non-attendance warning that the registrar's office sends out. And a bit later there are midterm grades.

[FishProf]

I just sent an announcement to my summer class letting them know there are only 3 weeks left.

One student, who is on track to pass, thanked me.
One student, who is not on track, but has dome SOME of the coursework, emailed to promise to do better.

aaaaaand, the ghost student, who did the syllabus quiz, and NOTHING ELSE, has emailed demanding a f2f meeting to discuss why he is being treated unfairly in the course.

The online course. 
The asynchronous one. 
The one with all the material available on day one.

Treated unfairly.

I wish he had stayed a ghost.

[Langue_doc]

Needless to say, response to Ghost Student's email is cc'd to chair and Stu's advisor, documenting missing assignments. I usually attach a copy of Stu's grades (Canvas shows the list of assignments, including the missed ones). Canvas also shows how much time Stu has spent online.

[Dismal]

Schedule the appointment, but do you really think the ghost will show up?