Haha. Overheard on the last day of class this past quarter in my American Lit Course, as we’re submitting our final papers– Stupid procrastinating bitch: “Teacher, can I pleeeze have an extension on the final papers? (The ones that are 25% of our final grade) I had X, Y and Z happen to me and I couldn’t do it…blah blah blah.”
**Instructor: **“No.”
**SPB, taken aback: **“What do you mean, no?”
**Instructor: **“Well, you’ve had over two weeks to complete this assignment, have known about it all quarter as it was laid out in the syllabus, and have had ample time to come to me and work out a soultion/extension based on your circumstances. However, this is the last day of class, and all your classmates have managed to finish on time, presumably while also dealing with X, Y and Z. They are not receiving an extension, so neither are you.” SPB:sputtering
**Instructor, now my hero: **“Enjoy your Spring Break.”
Some other students in my class shared a few other courses with her, and turns out she pulled the same shit in those as well. What really gets me is that she was shocked, shocked when her bullshit story didn’t win her an extension (or sympathy). Welcome to the real world, :wally
Since I am required to note attendance (by NY state), I’m thinking of revising my attendance policy, as follows:
I will take attendance every day at the very start of class.
If you get here after I call the roll, I’ll cross off your absence, but what will remain of course is the notation that you were late.
Attendance and lateness does NOT figure into your final grade in a negative way, BUT
missing quizzes, in-class writing, peer-editing sessions, class discussions, etc will of course count as negatives, AND
if you need extra credit at the term’s end, the discussion will begin with my looking up your attendance and lateness record. If you were here and on time over 95% of the class meetings, I can cut you a little slack. If not, then not.
If I put this or something like it on the syllabus, who’d still have a problem with my taking attendance?
While I can see how this might become frustrating, I remember plenty of profs who had an “I do not offer extra credit” disclaimer in their syllabus.
For the record, I was a dedicated class skipper. I’d attend probably once a week, with the exception being my art classes and editing classes, because they were heavy on in-class activities. I never asked for extra credit from any prof, let alone one who had stated up front they didn’t offer it.
I’m with caphis on this one, let 'em sink or swim on their own. There’s a lot of kids in college who really shouldn’t be there, IMO. This would weed them out quite nicely.
on preview, I think that’s a very fair policy **prr **
I think that’s a very fair policy if those in class activities are scheduled or announced in advance, so the student knows what they’d be missing on any particular day.
Well, the discussions would be pretty much every class, and the in-class writing tends to derive from the class discussions, making them hard to schedule in advance. I.e., if our discussion has half the class thinking one way and the other half not, I might ask them to summarize the other side’s position in a paragraph or two. If they’re all pretty agreeing, I might skip the writing exercise and get a juimp on the next day’s topic, or open the floor for questions about their upcoming paper. Or I’ll show a film in class, leaving a half-hour to introduce the film while waiting for the VCR to show up (the Ed. Media people are often late)–if the VCR shows up on time, I’ll use the half-hour for a discussion or a few paragraphs of analysis. I don’t see how I can structure the class in advance to assure people when a discussion or a writing exercise is going to be offered.
Am I supposed to hold their hands, wipe their noses and clean their tushies too?
The class meets once a week. He added in the second week and received a syllabus at that time. Perhaps he chose not to read it. Perhaps he lost it. I don’t know. He never asked for another one. Back to the college catalog we go: ** It is the student’s responsibility to know the attendance policies in the class.** Perhaps he made some assumptions. That wasn’t such a good idea.
And why in the holy hell did he wait until March to mention his religious duties? The class started in January. If he had said something earlier, I would have told him that he had created a scheduling conflict for himself. He never mentioned the
If he’s so convinced that there is an immunity policy protecting him, then he needs to bring it in. And again, why did he wait until March to say anything about it? Assumptions, assumptions.
If this guy claims to be ready to transfer, then he’s obviously been in college for a while. Don’t you think that by now he would have learned a thing or two about the way things operate? That’s what makes me suspect that he’s pulled this stuff in the past and gotten away with it.
As for his writing, well, I have a number of good writers–some better than he is. But they don’t demand favors, and I don’t treat them any differently than anyone else.
Creative_Munster: English.
Many students these days are coddled at home, then in K-12 and want the coddling to continue in college. It’s a nasty wake-up call for them.
No, he didn’t receive a syllabus at the start of the semester, he was a late adder and missed out on the first day of class which likely could have covered such topics. Knowing this, I think it would be reasonable to at least tell a student to look at their syllabus if they started showing up late on a consistent basis and it was in the syllabus that this would effectively lower their grade.
Given that this student may come from a major such as engineering where attendance is not at all on a premium, I don’t think it’s reasonable to simply assume that this person will be fully knowledgable of this department’s set of rules.
For example, what if, clearly stated in the syllabus, at the top of the page in 60 point font, “Failure to wear green shirts to class will result in a 10 point grade penalty for each offense.” As in this case, the student adds-into the class one week class, and shows up in a red shirt. And why shouldn’t he? In the last five semesters of his University career in the engineering department, nobody gives a damn about whether he shows up in a red, green, blue, orange, or yellow shirt because that would be a stupid, pointless rule. For the next six weeks the student shows up in every color but green and ends up with a D+ at the mid-term. Thinking that he has been doing A work the entire term he’s understandably upset and perhaps even gives (horror of horrors) some DIRTY LOOKS!!! Why should the prof come whining onto the SDMB about all these stupid undergrads when a simple comment about the syllabus or about the shirt policy itself could have averted this issue?
Yes, she can set the rules that way if she wants, but there’s really nothing to be gained by the way she dealt with the situation.
My college didn’t have any attendance policy. I don’t recall taking any classes that had one either. Yes, I did skip a few, but I wasn’t nearly as bad as some students who would miss a month at a time and then show up for the last few weeks before exams.
A lot of those students were pains in the ass. They’d ask questions that were answered in previous classes. They’d start up discussions we’d already had. They’d monopolize the professors’ office hours in their last ditch frenzy to make up a month of work.
Sure, good professors could avoid letting those students become disruptive, and it is the professor’s responsibility to do so. However, not all my professors were good at that. For those of us stuck with one not assertive or skilled enough to avoid having a class hijacked by some panicky class skipper, an attendance policy has benefits.
Irrelevant and mis-leading. There was no law by government or policy by the school mandating that our favorite OP do grading based on attendance.
This is absolutely true. Teachers should have tests, quizzes, peer reviews, and any number of other things that are required and are done in class. And these things should affect the grade.
But… that’s very different from mandating that someone be in the class room every day to hear lectures or whatever the teacher decides to do that day.
Absolutely. A student should know ahead of time when work will be required, both in class and out, and if they have a problem with that they should not take the class.
But again… That’s different from mandating that someone show up every day not to do an assignment, not to take a test, but for the exclusive purpose of marvelling at you, their most prized mentor.
Absolutely. Students who show up more are statistically more likely to do better for a couple reasons. a) because they are more interested in the material, and b) because they will actually learn something when they’re there.
But just because the student who spends more time in class is likely to learn more does not mean that a given student who does not spend time in class will not learn what’s required. Many students don’t need every lecture to learn the material.
But more importantly: if a student doesn’t learn the material, there is a consequence, a bad grade. It’s a students responsiblity to learn the material. Going to class is not what should be graded. Learning the material is.
a) I’ve never heard of a school having one of their selling points being “we grade on whether your child shows up at class or not”.
b) I don’t think 1 person in 10 could name a school that actually has such a policy.
c) If such a thing were true, I wouldn’t use it as criteria in choosing a school for my child.
All of which means that this is not a valid point. I can tell you which schools I’d like to send my child to, and why. Academically excellent schools make it a point to be known as academically excellent. Schools that offer excellent programs in various areas make it a point to be known as such. If this point you’re making were actually true, schools would make it a point to brag that they grade based on attendance, and parents would seek out such schools.
Keeping attendence and grading on it are two different things.
This is good. But again, different from the topic at hand.
And by the way, for those that don’t regularly read my spoutings, I’m someone who’s pretty consistently on the side of the establishment. If you have a student who disrupts your class, I’m on your side. If you have a student who doesn’t do his assignments or try his best, I’m on your side.
But knocking a student’s grade because he was late for class is petty. And petty for the express and sole purpose of the teacher exerting dominance in her little fiefdom. And that’s just wrong.
Another idiot who apparently is too thick to understand that attendance is not required simply to boost the teacher’s ego or to listen to a lecture.
If you’d paid the least bit of attention to what’s been going on in this thread, you would know that attendance is generally not mandatory for large lecture classes, even in the humanities.
And when attendance is required, it is generally not merely a procedural thing designed to make sure students are where they should be. It is also a key part of the academic requirements; not just a means to an end, but a significant reason in and of itself.
I can’t believe that some people’s concept of education is so narrow and thickheaded that they believe intellectual performance should only be measured things like tests. You say that
Well, news flash for you dickhead: in many, and probably most, humanities classes, regular participation in class discussion is included among the “number of other things that are required and are done is class.” In some classes this part of the student’s performance is worth 10, 20 even 40 percent of the final grade. That is why attendance is mandatory; not just so the student can listen to the teacher talk, but because the student should make his or her own contribution to every lesson.
You can continue to try and convince yourself that teachers only set attendance policies to suit their own egos, but you’re full of shit.
That’s one I find annoying, too – the “late-term-extra-credit” request. For my classes, it typically comes from students who didn’t DO one or more of their previous assignments. And they are hoping for an extra credit assignment to make up for it. And I give a few extra credit opportunities already ON the existing assignments (usually a chance for a few bonus points, for extra features in a programming assignment) and on tests. But no full extra credit assignments. I’m not interested in adding that much to MY workload – having to create a brand new assignment for one person, to make up for the program that they didn’t bother to write earlier in the term.
On another note, regarding the whiny ones… I’ve found that “trying to be nice”, like with deadlines, has backfired on me before. One term I had an assignment that would be due the last day of classes (before exam week), and I decided to be “nice” and give them a few extra days – told them they could turn it in on the Tuesday of exam week if they wanted. Two students went to my department chair and complained, “He’s making us do homework during exam week!!!”
Well, I explained that it was “extra time” to the chair. But no more “extra time” from me…
How is this relevant? If there is regular class discussion, then an easy solution would be to take points off for not participating in that class discussion.
On the other hand, if, as was the case in a few of my gen ed classes, there is no class participation, why should one have extra points taken off of the grade they earned based on their assignments?
I can’t really come to a conclusion about the student mentioned in the OP, because I don’t know if he really thought the school would care about his religious responsibilities. If he did, and especially since this seems to be a gen ed class which probably has nothing to do with his major, I can see why he would be upset. On the other hand, he could be making it up as far as I know.
Because, much as this might surprise you, actually being in the classroom is a necessary condition for participating in class discussion.
But this wasn’t one of your gen ed classes.
Well, if he really thought the school was going to allow him to miss a sizeable portion of the class every week, then he’s stupid. And if he can’t schedule his classes around his extra-curricular activities, then he’s disorganized or a bit thick.
And so what if the class has nothing to do with his major? Universities require Gen Ed and other non-major classes for a reason, and the reason is not simply to give whining simpletons something to complain about.
What you apparently fail to understand is that not only is participation graded, but it is, in many instances, a required part of the course. Failing to complete a required part of the course, in some schools and departments, is grounds for failing the whole course.
For example, the final exam might only be worth 25% of your grade, but missing the final exam does not just reduce your maximum possible grade by 25%. Missing the final exam means you cannot pass the course because you have failed to complete a key requirement of the course. Same for class participation (hence attendance), at least in some courses.
I’ve got a solution for those who complain about compulsory attendance, and who believe they are just as well served by reading their books at home. Why don’t you just go and get the books, read them, and thne go tell you prospective employer that you’ve done the work?
Which part of it is so hard for you to understand?
“If there is regular class discussion, then an easy solution would be to take points off for not participating in that class discussion.”
Your responses indicate that while you have read this, you are far from having comprehended its simple meaning.
I love being put in the position of arguing that I’m not an pretentious asshole.
Students practice speaking Spanish in my class. I am not a pedant. I rarely pontificate, and when I do it’s on bizarre trivia like why the preterite is so irregular, and how the ‘ñ’ developed. You don’t come to class, you don’t get to speak or hear Spanish, and while there are those that are just interested in a reading knowledge (like me and my Latin and French) a lot of my students hope to travel, to communicate with the Spanish-speaking members of the community, and to use their Spanish to help them get the job they want. And since most of them can’t conjugate the imperfect subjunctive off the top of their head, class provides a space to practice and learn, with me to help. The class is not passive; they talk and ask questions, and as I frequently remind them, talking is great, since it means you don’t have to listen to me go over the information they need. I personally don’t really like straight lecturing - it’s really boring. If I do need to go into an extended monologue (~5 min or so), I will try to get them to contribute what they know about a subject, and build off of it.
My students receive a grade on attendance (they get so many absences, then it starts counting, and they can use those absences for whatever they damn well please without justification to me, and I tell them so) and participation (do you actually raise your hand on occasion or just sit and do the crossword?). Is it picky? Hell yes. It is not easy to get an ‘A’ in my class - you have to do the homework, come to class, contribute, write papers, etc. Like most any other class, having knowledge isn’t enough; you also have to comply with the rules, which aren’t necessarily a complimentary fit for every student. I understand that; I’ve had brilliant friends who earned stinky grades in classes that required attendance, participation, etc.
But I’m definitely of the school that your education is your priority: I will do my best to help you learn, but ultimately, it is yours to guide as you best see fit. Not everyone learns in a regimented class system - so, you work around it. I took summer school classes at the community college to knock out my math requirement - it had a much more leinient system, and as long as I passed the class, it fulfilled the requirement. You search out the professors that work and teach in ways you can understand, and you take classes with them. And when you get the prof that’s so smart he can’t communicate anymore, you look to your peers and section leaders to help you through, and have a good stiff drink-and-bitch session after the test.
All of this is on my syllabus, my webpage, and will be repeated time and again during the class. If you come to class, make an effort to do your work (not the same as doing it perfectly), and ask me questions, I will bend over backwards for you - meet with you one-on-one, give you extra practice, lend you other material I’ve found helpful, etc. But if you want to sit in the corner and glower, make no effort to speak Spanish and never ask for any help, that’s fine, too. It’s your choice, and when you realize its consequences (about now in the semester), you’re on your own.
A side note - didn’t viva say her class meets once a week for several hours? In that case, missing a class is like missing a whole week, and that’s a lot of material to cover.
Oh yeah, I DON’T get paid by tuition either, so stop saying that all instructors do.
In hindsight, I regret the “marvelling at you, their most prized mentor” comment. Sorry about that.
The value of being in class is clear, especially your class and your subject where the environment is active. Learning to speak Spanish can never be done exclusively by reading a book or even listening to a lecture; active participation is required.
But that doesn’t invalidate my point. Just because students could get enormous value from being at your class doesn’t mean they should be knocked if they show up late. If students take your oral examinations or other active assignments and pass them, they shouldn’t be knocked because they were tardy.
Grading based on participation is a gray area for me. I see the value of encouraging participation for the class in general (a more active class will be one where more is learned). But getting bonus points just for raising your hand is akin to getting an automatic C just for showing up to take a test.
I was with you up until the “brilliant friends with stinky grades part”. I just don’t see how you can rationalize giving someone a bad grade when you feel they’ve learned the material. It seems so cut and dried to me: you go to school to learn, and you’re graded on how well you learn.
I certainly agree.
That’s good. I don’t feel that was the case in our favorite OP’s situation. In fact, my read is that the “bully” never got a syllabus and the teacher made no effort to get him one or let him know of how he was not living up to her expectations until it was too late for him to remedy.
Now, as she points out, it’s the student’s responsibility to get and understand the rules. I agree with that. I just don’t think the rules were just or in line with what should’ve been the primary goal: delivering high-quality education and judging how well it was internalized.
Yes, but that should be his problem, a problem that’s reflected in a poor grade when he doesn’t do well tests and assignments. If in fact he does do well in his assignments, there shouldn’t be an issue.
Are you volunteer? Good for you if you are; the world can use more of that.
But if you’re paid, I argue that you’re paid to accomplish a specific task, namely deliver a quality service to your charges. If they choose not to drink, it’s their loss.