Spring Time Students

[RedRoseSpiral]

I was gonna say. One semester in college, I had something assigned on a Friday due the next Monday and I didn't do it considering my dad almost died over the weekend. I didn't go to class that day, either, and not thinking straight, didn't call the prof (this was before e-mail). Got to class Wednesday and told her what happened. By then, I had the assignment done. She wouldn't take it and her attitude was pretty much "suck it up".

I had the "suck it up" part happen to me today. -_-

I'm taking an online class and since my school switched to a new company to host their website there have been bugs galore. For some reason one of them caused my assignment to be sent to the wrong email address. It still got to the teacher but she refuses to take assignments that are sent to that email instead of the one sent through the blackboard for the class (why I have no idea).

I went to turn in my essay two days ago and noticed that I hadn't gotten a confirmation email from her that she had the assignment so I checked the grade sheet and there was a zero for the previous unit. I emailed her about it. She swears up and down that she emailed me about the "problem" (I've checked all my email addresses to see if it got rooted to the wrong one and its not there) and is refusing to let me resubmit the assignment or grade the one she received. Today I was pretty much told to suck it up and the email was soooooo condescending. Pissed me off. I'm out 70 points for this and will probably only get a B in the class instead of the A I deserve.

[AccountingDrone]

yes, the special snowflakes of today can't seem to grasp the concept of time management, hard due dates and what research is; i doubt i could handle these types as a teacher-i'd be reporting too many of them or 'suggesting' they take a preparation class instead of the current one, since it seems to be beyond their current skill levels.

argh.

I have to appreciate the ability you teachers have to tolerate these snowflake students ... I am afraid I would be up on the [handicapped accessible] tower with a gun pretty fast

I have to attribute it to all the lower school admins who just pass everybody along until they graduate, and determine that marking papers in red will hurt the delicate psyches ... We certainly didnt get psychological counseling if the class hamster died when I was in school [hell in kindergarden a bunch of us saw a kid get hit and smeared along the street by a bus and they didn't do anything except keep us in at recess so the fire department could hose the blood off the street]

[ralerin]

yes, the special snowflakes of today can't seem to grasp the concept of time management, hard due dates and what research is; i doubt i could handle these types as a teacher-i'd be reporting too many of them or 'suggesting' they take a preparation class instead of the current one, since it seems to be beyond their current skill levels.

argh.

EXACTLY why I'm not becoming a teacher even though everyone seems to think I am-I have no patience and tolerance for this sort of thing.

On the flip side-I'm surprised I survived this long without committing murder: the 11 paper semester I had a couple years ago, along with this semester's online class with 15 overall papers in all my classes (5 papers plus the chapbook, journal submission, editorial board review and writer's notebook just for that online class alone; everything else had 1-2 papers/presentations/outlines/other crap). Does that make me a special snowflake if during my online class mid review I called the essays an additional burden?

I am going to EARN my whatever cum laude this year.

[ThanosIsKing]

I had the "suck it up" part happen to me today. -_-

I'm taking an online class and since my school switched to a new company to host their website there have been bugs galore. For some reason one of them caused my assignment to be sent to the wrong email address. It still got to the teacher but she refuses to take assignments that are sent to that email instead of the one sent through the blackboard for the class (why I have no idea).

I went to turn in my essay two days ago and noticed that I hadn't gotten a confirmation email from her that she had the assignment so I checked the grade sheet and there was a zero for the previous unit. I emailed her about it. She swears up and down that she emailed me about the "problem" (I've checked all my email addresses to see if it got rooted to the wrong one and its not there) and is refusing to let me resubmit the assignment or grade the one she received. Today I was pretty much told to suck it up and the email was soooooo condescending. Pissed me off. I'm out 70 points for this and will probably only get a B in the class instead of the A I deserve.

Are you going to my college? I swear, I've had the same exact thing happen to me. College originally wanted to switch companies over Spring Break, but for some reason couldn't get the workers cleared until last week. So all of last week the whole web site was down: blackboard, e-mail, calendar, the works. Wreaked havoc with everybody. Apparently, the professors were hit the worst, since some of them STILL don't have access to their e-mail.

This also provides some truly -worthy moments, with students constantly bitching about not having access to their old e-mails. Except that the first thing that I did was look around the site for some way to import them, and it took me a couple of minutes, tops. But no, you'd rather whine about loosing all your important Facebook-update-reminders and gossip e-mails between your friends!

Still, I'm lucky that my professors were a lot better than yours and actually pushed forward the due dates of several assignments.

I am going to EARN my whatever cum laude this year.

Ditto. Only school is the LAST place I'd want that distinction.

[Julesy]

Maybe this wasn't a good idea
The Real World

I try to point out how the work we do applies to the "real world" (a phrase I hate). But sometimes, the real reason we are doing something is so students can just practice their writing skills.

Me: So, this assignment is kind of weird, but kind of fun. You might not create a formalized document like this on the job, but you might be asked to do something similar. For example, at my husband's job [real world example of this assignment].

Student: But when would we use this in the real world???

Sometimes they really seem to have celery in their ears, don't they?

[Magpie]

I had an instructor kill the "how would we use this" question in a calculus course. He explained the sort of complex simulation that might require the math he was teaching us. Our brains hurt enough after that that we didn't have the energy to ask questions.

[RedRoseSpiral]

Are you going to my college? I swear, I've had the same exact thing happen to me. College originally wanted to switch companies over Spring Break, but for some reason couldn't get the workers cleared until last week. So all of last week the whole web site was down: blackboard, e-mail, calendar, the works. Wreaked havoc with everybody. Apparently, the professors were hit the worst, since some of them STILL don't have access to their e-mail.

This also provides some truly -worthy moments, with students constantly bitching about not having access to their old e-mails. Except that the first thing that I did was look around the site for some way to import them, and it took me a couple of minutes, tops. But no, you'd rather whine about loosing all your important Facebook-update-reminders and gossip e-mails between your friends!

Still, I'm lucky that my professors were a lot better than yours and actually pushed forward the due dates of several assignments.

Oh that's the sad thing. My school switched servers over two years ago and there are still bugs that haven't been fixed. At this point most of the instructors don't give a shit because they're tired of dealing with it. I'm taking another online class with this instructor next semester and I'm just going to snail mail her my assignments and hope I have less bugs with the Post Office. -_-

[Sapphire Silk]

Oh I love this! I'll file this away.

Me, too. I have the same problem in my class

I had the "suck it up" part happen to me today. -_-

I'm taking an online class and since my school switched to a new company to host their website there have been bugs galore. For some reason one of them caused my assignment to be sent to the wrong email address. It still got to the teacher but she refuses to take assignments that are sent to that email instead of the one sent through the blackboard for the class (why I have no idea).

<snip>

Ouch.

I have two emails where I teach: the main one used by the campus, and the one set up in the student email server. I always tell my students, at the beginning of the semester, NEVER to email me through the student server because I don't even check my mailbox, and NEVER to email work to me there (because I never check it). I don't really have a choice about this; the mailbox size is so small, that it fills up too quickly, and students end up with late work, or not being able to email key questions and get timely answers. They have to use my main campus email account.

We went to Moodle recently, and a lot of those woes went away; I can post an online assignment, and the students upload the work directly to Moodle, rather than emailing it to me. Best part is, Moodle tells me exactly how late they are, and I can grade it online in a snap.

[ThanosIsKing]

Oh that's the sad thing. My school switched servers over two years ago and there are still bugs that haven't been fixed. At this point most of the instructors don't give a shit because they're tired of dealing with it. I'm taking another online class with this instructor next semester and I'm just going to snail mail her my assignments and hope I have less bugs with the Post Office. -_-

A better suggestion might be to skip the post office and just visit her in her office and hand her a hard copy of your assignments. I have yet to encounter a college professor who teaches only online classes. There's no worrying with any e-mail or post office snafus, and it might get her to let up a little on her online submission policies.

[Sapphire Silk]

A better suggestion might be to skip the post office and just visit her in her office and hand her a hard copy of your assignments. I have yet to encounter a college professor who teaches only online classes. There's no worrying with any e-mail or post office snafus, and it might get her to let up a little on her online submission policies.

We have profs that only teach online at my school.

My policy, given to the students at the start of the semester, is online assignments will not be accepted as a hard copy unless under extraordinary circumstances, ie the server crashes for a prolonged period of time the day the assignment is due (happened recently, I accepted one assignment late as a result . . . online).

[Exaspera]

EXACTLY why I'm not becoming a teacher even though everyone seems to think I am-I have no patience and tolerance for this sort of thing.

What's cool about teaching college is that I can strongly encourage them to drop.

[EvilEmpryss]

A better suggestion might be to skip the post office and just visit her in her office and hand her a hard copy of your assignments. I have yet to encounter a college professor who teaches only online classes. There's no worrying with any e-mail or post office snafus, and it might get her to let up a little on her online submission policies.

My hubby attends an online university... ALL the instructors teach only online, they have no physical offices, live all over the US, and the only time something is mailed to them is if the file will be too big (such as video interviews sent on DVDs). If the internet is down at home, I've gone so far as to drive to a Mickey D's or Panera Bread to send files from my iPod. It's getting hard to come up with excuses in a wireless age.

Now, when he had a campus-based prof and our printer really *did* break, he brought the file to the prof on a stick drive to prove that he had finished it. Fortunately, the prof accepted the drive as the on-time assignment.

As for those students with the annoying habit of asking "How will this help me in the real world?", I have one answer that I have taught my children:

It will help you pass this class.

If they need clarification, feel free to add: Passing this class will help you pass this school term. Passing this term will help you graduate. Graduating will help you get that mega-money job you're dreaming of.

You can continue on, but the truth is that the information you are presenting them sometimes has no other purpose than to be memorized and regurgitated in the appropriate time and fashion as dictated by the syllabus. If they don't like it, they are of course free to take a different course.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Maybe this wasn't a good idea

In this class, students complete several (that is, 7) assignments centered on the same topic. Due to the wording put in by the course designers, I do not have the power to approve or deny topics (I wish I could!). However having taught this course several times, I try to steer people away from bad topics....

Student: I want my topic to be [something that will work, but barely, let's say tractors]

Me: Student, I'm not sure that topic will work. How will you use this topic in the upcoming persuasive paper?

Student: Why do you keep picking on me? I want to write about tractors!

Me: Student, you can write about what you wish, I just want you to consider how this topic will work for all of the upcoming assignments.

A week after the first big paper

Student: Uh, Miss Fatale, I had a hard time with this topic and I don't know how I'm going to use it for all of the assignments, like the persuasive paper.

Me:

For the persuasive paper, he can try arguing that tractors are sexy.

[RedRoseSpiral]

A better suggestion might be to skip the post office and just visit her in her office and hand her a hard copy of your assignments. I have yet to encounter a college professor who teaches only online classes. There's no worrying with any e-mail or post office snafus, and it might get her to let up a little on her online submission policies.

I go to community college that has a wide area of coverage. I've only been to the main campus a total of 4 times because it's over an hour away from where I live. All of my classes are either online or at the satellite campus which is only 10-15 minutes away depending on traffic. It's not possible to get up there 4-5 times a semester to hand in some papers, turn around and go back home especially when I don't have a car and would be depending on my father for this. Neither of us have the money for the gas this would take. So it's either email or snail mail for me.

What I'm going to do is put something on my evaluation of her about this. She won't get to see it until after grades are in and my name will be hidden in case a teacher wants to seek revenge for a bad evaluation.

[Sapphire Silk]

I go to community college that has a wide area of coverage. I've only been to the main campus a total of 4 times because it's over an hour away from where I live. All of my classes are either online or at the satellite campus which is only 10-15 minutes away depending on traffic. It's not possible to get up there 4-5 times a semester to hand in some papers, turn around and go back home especially when I don't have a car and would be depending on my father for this. Neither of us have the money for the gas this would take. So it's either email or snail mail for me.

What I'm going to do is put something on my evaluation of her about this. She won't get to see it until after grades are in and my name will be hidden in case a teacher wants to seek revenge for a bad evaluation.

Write it very carefully if you want it to be taken seriously. When I get my comments at the end of a semester, I can usually tell who wrote it, even though grades are already in, and the name is hidden. I can also spot comments that are sour grapes.

Include suggestions to make handing in papers easier, don't just complain.