Topic: Bang Your Head on Your Desk - the thread of teaching despair!

[Langue_doc]

Primary source listed by Stu:

Steinbeck, John. The Chrysanthemums. Erscheinungsort nicht ermittelbar: Verlag nicht ermittelbar, 1938. Print.

Language used in this course: English
Language used in the modules, readings, videos, handouts, websites, and assignments: English
Are we using German in this course: No

All Stu had to do was to cite the PDF version of the story Stu downloaded from Canvas; Stu obviously didn't buy the textbook so couldn't follow the directions to look up this information on page x as directed (used books cost less than $10). Stu's shortcuts will be Stu's downfall.

Headbang, headbang, headbang!

[quasihumanist]

Unfortunately, they have previously been taught to do word problems by finding the key words and using them to guess at what the problem meant.

That's incredibly stupid. At least a decade ago, when I was doing tutorials, I noticed that some textbooks are already including spurious information in problems to deal with this kind of approach. Just trying to find a formula with the "right" quantities in it won't work if you don't realize which quantities are necessary and which ones aren't. A pox on the high school teachers and/or eduwonks who "taught" students this idiotic approach.

It is incredibly stupid, but when you have students who are functionally illiterate and your job is to raise their scores on a standardized test by a couple points, this is the strategy that works.

And - complain all you want about the standardized tests - but before them, there were lots of poorly resourced schools where the students learned absolutely nothing, and, with the standardized tests, the students now actually learn not enough, but not absolutely nothing either.

[marshwiggle]

Unfortunately, they have previously been taught to do word problems by finding the key words and using them to guess at what the problem meant.

That's incredibly stupid. At least a decade ago, when I was doing tutorials, I noticed that some textbooks are already including spurious information in problems to deal with this kind of approach. Just trying to find a formula with the "right" quantities in it won't work if you don't realize which quantities are necessary and which ones aren't. A pox on the high school teachers and/or eduwonks who "taught" students this idiotic approach.

It is incredibly stupid, but when you have students who are functionally illiterate and your job is to raise their scores on a standardized test by a couple points, this is the strategy that works.

And - complain all you want about the standardized tests - but before them, there were lots of poorly resourced schools where the students learned absolutely nothing, and, with the standardized tests, the students now actually learn not enough, but not absolutely nothing either.

FWIW, I'm not against standardized tests. One of the legitimate uses for standardized tests is to be able to identify how *schools are doing, and without the ability of individual teachers or administrators to fudge the grades.


(* Schools in lower SES regions typically don't do as well as schools in higher SES regions, for many reasons. David Johnson used census data to correlate Ontario test scores with SES, so that schools could be evaluated relative to their SES. So, some schools in high SES areas do much worse than expected, and some schools in low SES areas do much better than expected. Those schools that do much better than expected are desirable, and those that do much worse than expected should be avoided.)

[OneMoreYear]

On Friday late afternoon, I'm chatting with our (fabulous) administrative assistant (who now has the work of 3 people) when a lost student wanders in looking for his professor for his summer course which starts Monday.

Professor is not in the building. Lost student says that he wants to tell his professor that he will need remote access to the course because of a conflict with his work schedule.  Administrative assistant says that in-person courses are no longer required to have virtual access (BECAUSE WE ARE BACK TO NORMAL, PER ADMINSTRATION).  Lost student replies "Well, he'll have to give me remote access or I'll be 45 minutes late to every class, and he'll just have to deal with it" and walks out.

Alrighty then.  Good luck with that.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

On Friday late afternoon, I'm chatting with our (fabulous) administrative assistant (who now has the work of 3 people) when a lost student wanders in looking for his professor for his summer course which starts Monday.

Professor is not in the building. Lost student says that he wants to tell his professor that he will need remote access to the course because of a conflict with his work schedule.  Administrative assistant says that in-person courses are no longer required to have virtual access (BECAUSE WE ARE BACK TO NORMAL, PER ADMINSTRATION).  Lost student replies "Well, he'll have to give me remote access or I'll be 45 minutes late to every class, and he'll just have to deal with it" and walks out.

Alrighty then.  Good luck with that.

Wtf? Entitled much? Damn. Well, we are in the service industry.

[RatGuy]

Student who never came to class or accessed the LMS emailed me today asking for an incomplete. He claims that he has "severe anxiety" and "couldn't get out of bed" and "I know the semester is already over." I told him that's not what Incompletes are for.

But I'll say this -- I have 108 students across 4 classes, and the ones who failed are the ones who either ghosted or had shoddy attendance. Maybe 4 or 5 Fs in that batch of 108. All of them have requested a change to their final grades because they have some sort of anxiety (or, as they say "mental health reasons"). I'm not one who puts stock in the theory that COVID year ruined students, but maybe there's something to that.

[marshwiggle]

Student who never came to class or accessed the LMS emailed me today asking for an incomplete. He claims that he has "severe anxiety" and "couldn't get out of bed" and "I know the semester is already over." I told him that's not what Incompletes are for.

But I'll say this -- I have 108 students across 4 classes, and the ones who failed are the ones who either ghosted or had shoddy attendance. Maybe 4 or 5 Fs in that batch of 108. All of them have requested a change to their final grades because they have some sort of anxiety (or, as they say "mental health reasons"). I'm not one who puts stock in the theory that COVID year ruined students, but maybe there's something to that.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to try to use it to game the system.

[ergative]

Student who never came to class or accessed the LMS emailed me today asking for an incomplete. He claims that he has "severe anxiety" and "couldn't get out of bed" and "I know the semester is already over." I told him that's not what Incompletes are for.

But I'll say this -- I have 108 students across 4 classes, and the ones who failed are the ones who either ghosted or had shoddy attendance. Maybe 4 or 5 Fs in that batch of 108. All of them have requested a change to their final grades because they have some sort of anxiety (or, as they say "mental health reasons"). I'm not one who puts stock in the theory that COVID year ruined students, but maybe there's something to that.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to try to use it to game the system.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to feel comfortable asking for accommodations they otherwise wouldn't otherwise have the nerve to request.

[Caracal]

Student who never came to class or accessed the LMS emailed me today asking for an incomplete. He claims that he has "severe anxiety" and "couldn't get out of bed" and "I know the semester is already over." I told him that's not what Incompletes are for.

But I'll say this -- I have 108 students across 4 classes, and the ones who failed are the ones who either ghosted or had shoddy attendance. Maybe 4 or 5 Fs in that batch of 108. All of them have requested a change to their final grades because they have some sort of anxiety (or, as they say "mental health reasons"). I'm not one who puts stock in the theory that COVID year ruined students, but maybe there's something to that.

I'm sure that many of the students who fail because of ghosting the class are having a tough time. People I know who did that in college were usually going through something. They either just got overwhelmed and quit trying, or they couldn't balance school with other stressors in their life, or they had other priorities but couldn't be honest with themselves and decide to either refocus or withdraw. Usually stuff like that is linked to anxiety or depression.

I try to make sure I'm giving the same sort of accommodations and flexibility to students with mental health issues as those with physical issues. The problem is that we can't really do anything for students who aren't communicating with us and trying to keep up throughout the semester. That's often really difficult for students struggling with anxiety or depression because the same things keeping them from doing the work are also keeping them from communicating with us.

Sometimes people probably just need to get to a crisis point to take action with mental health problems. Failing a semester of classes can make a student realize that they need to do something. That might be going to therapy and/or getting appropriate medication, but it could also be deciding they need to take some time away from school, or whatever.

[marshwiggle]

I try to make sure I'm giving the same sort of accommodations and flexibility to students with mental health issues as those with physical issues.

This is why it's far better to have course policies like "2 lowest assignments get dropped" that apply to everyone so that instructors aren't in the position of having to try and evaluate the legitimacy and the severity of every issue that may come up. Any sort of judgement calls are going to lead to potential unfairness.

[Puget]

Student who never came to class or accessed the LMS emailed me today asking for an incomplete. He claims that he has "severe anxiety" and "couldn't get out of bed" and "I know the semester is already over." I told him that's not what Incompletes are for.

But I'll say this -- I have 108 students across 4 classes, and the ones who failed are the ones who either ghosted or had shoddy attendance. Maybe 4 or 5 Fs in that batch of 108. All of them have requested a change to their final grades because they have some sort of anxiety (or, as they say "mental health reasons"). I'm not one who puts stock in the theory that COVID year ruined students, but maybe there's something to that.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to try to use it to game the system.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to feel comfortable asking for accommodations they otherwise wouldn't otherwise have the nerve to request.

I'm all for supporting student mental health, but an incomplete is not a reasonable accommodation if they have ghosted the whole semester. They cannot make up a whole semester for work after the fact. The compassionate option for these cases is to let them withdraw from the semester up through the last day of finals, which is what we do at my institution-- yes, they've wasted a semester of tuition, but that way it doesn't kill their GPA-- it is as if the classes never existed.

[marshwiggle]

Student who never came to class or accessed the LMS emailed me today asking for an incomplete. He claims that he has "severe anxiety" and "couldn't get out of bed" and "I know the semester is already over." I told him that's not what Incompletes are for.

But I'll say this -- I have 108 students across 4 classes, and the ones who failed are the ones who either ghosted or had shoddy attendance. Maybe 4 or 5 Fs in that batch of 108. All of them have requested a change to their final grades because they have some sort of anxiety (or, as they say "mental health reasons"). I'm not one who puts stock in the theory that COVID year ruined students, but maybe there's something to that.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to try to use it to game the system.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to feel comfortable asking for accommodations they otherwise wouldn't otherwise have the nerve to request.

I'm all for supporting student mental health, but an incomplete is not a reasonable accommodation if they have ghosted the whole semester. They cannot make up a whole semester for work after the fact. The compassionate option for these cases is to let them withdraw from the semester up through the last day of finals, which is what we do at my institution-- yes, they've wasted a semester of tuition, but that way it doesn't kill their GPA-- it is as if the classes never existed.

And presumably in that case, it's done at the institutional level, rather than by an individual instructor, which is the appropriate place since a problems like that will affect all of a student's courses.

[Puget]

Student who never came to class or accessed the LMS emailed me today asking for an incomplete. He claims that he has "severe anxiety" and "couldn't get out of bed" and "I know the semester is already over." I told him that's not what Incompletes are for.

But I'll say this -- I have 108 students across 4 classes, and the ones who failed are the ones who either ghosted or had shoddy attendance. Maybe 4 or 5 Fs in that batch of 108. All of them have requested a change to their final grades because they have some sort of anxiety (or, as they say "mental health reasons"). I'm not one who puts stock in the theory that COVID year ruined students, but maybe there's something to that.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to try to use it to game the system.

Or maybe they've all just heard enough talk about that to feel comfortable asking for accommodations they otherwise wouldn't otherwise have the nerve to request.

I'm all for supporting student mental health, but an incomplete is not a reasonable accommodation if they have ghosted the whole semester. They cannot make up a whole semester for work after the fact. The compassionate option for these cases is to let them withdraw from the semester up through the last day of finals, which is what we do at my institution-- yes, they've wasted a semester of tuition, but that way it doesn't kill their GPA-- it is as if the classes never existed.

And presumably in that case, it's done at the institutional level, rather than by an individual instructor, which is the appropriate place since a problems like that will affect all of a student's courses.

Correct, it goes through their staff advisor in academic services. The staff advisors are mostly great, and will work with the instructor and student when a student is struggling. Just emailed one today about a student who has totally ghosted their term paper and isn't responding to my messages.

[dr_evil]

This is why it's far better to have course policies like "2 lowest assignments get dropped" that apply to everyone so that instructors aren't in the position of having to try and evaluate the legitimacy and the severity of every issue that may come up. Any sort of judgement calls are going to lead to potential unfairness.

What seems more common (although it could just be my perception) is that students want make-ups for the assignments where I do drop the lowest. They'll say they had <some good reason>, so I'll respond, "Don't worry about it. That's why I drop a score." and they answer that they should still get a make-up.

As for the students that ghost most of the term - yep, send them to the office that handles late withdrawals. Incompletes aren't reasonable for those who miss half the term.

[ergative]

This is why it's far better to have course policies like "2 lowest assignments get dropped" that apply to everyone so that instructors aren't in the position of having to try and evaluate the legitimacy and the severity of every issue that may come up. Any sort of judgement calls are going to lead to potential unfairness.

What seems more common (although it could just be my perception) is that students want make-ups for the assignments where I do drop the lowest. They'll say they had <some good reason>, so I'll respond, "Don't worry about it. That's why I drop a score." and they answer that they should still get a make-up.

Yes, I ran into this too at my old institution. The students felt wildly entitled there. My current institution is less grade-grubby, although I did get a grade complaint just today from a student who didn't like the grade they got on their essay that was returned a month ago.