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i blame this headache on my students.
here's a student we'll call imelda. imelda came to the first meeting of my (optional extra-hour-of-credit) discussion section, the first tuesday, but then dropped out. still in the lecture course, but she's gone from the roster of the discussion. no problem. it's not for everyone.
imelda's paper was the weakest out of the 48 i saw on the first assignment. i have no doubt it was also weaker than the three i didn't see, from the graduate students, whose papers i don't grade (which is a good thing, because each of them is a classmate of mine in one of my classes this semester). the work was sloppy, confused, and incomplete. she messed up things we'd been over in class multiple times. i don't know if she's ever been in to see the professor in his office hours, but she's certainly never come to see me.
there's another assignment due next wednesday, and this one's longer and tougher -- so i'm scheduling extra office hours in case people want to come talk about it. my normal office hours are monday 2-3 and tuesday 1-2, and with the thing due at 11 on wednesday those aren't the most helpful times for a student to meet me if they want to meet me and then get some real work done. so i send an e-mail to the whole class (not just my discussion kids) saying there will be extra office hours, 12-1 thursday and friday, in addition to my regular office hours monday and tuesday. or by appointment.
imelda sends me an e-mail: can she meet with me on tuesday at 2:15?
[head. desk. recover.]
child, you need to check with someone to make sure you're on the right track more than 21 hours in advance of handing this sucker in, if your first assignment is any indicator of how your work is going to be. plus, no, you can't meet me at 2:15 on tuesday, because i'll be in class then. graduate students also go to class sometimes. how about 2:00 on monday?
we'll see if i hear back from her.
and then there's abelard, a kid who came to the first, second and third meetings of my tuesday discussion section (there's also a monday one, but they're all okay), handed in the first assignment for that section, but then wasn't there the next week to get it back; wasn't there the following week to hand in the next assignment; wasn't there this week to hand in the next one after that. didn't hand in the first assignment in lecture; wasn't there the day i handed them back. (in lecture, he doesn't take attendance regularly -- but abelard hasn't been there any time attendance has been taken.)
i suspect that what's happened is, abelard has withdrawn from the course. (the drop deadline is long past.) trouble is, neither the professor nor i has signed any document confirming that he's withdrawn, and his name keeps appearing on the class roll -- which means that as far as the registrar is concerned, he hasn't withdrawn. neither of us accepts late assignments; the professor makes four or five assignments and then counts the final as two, and i give a 20-point assignment each week, so young abelard is now 60 points in the hole with me (he got a 19.5 on his first assignment, so he won't have zero out of a possible 200 at the end of the semester, at least), and 1/6 or 1/5 in the hole with the professor. boy's going to end up with No Grade, which is going to magically transform into an F after some period of time. and i regret that, but it's in no way my responsibility to track him down and tell him if he intends to withdraw he'd better do it before it turns into a withdraw-failing. (i did ask in discussion this week if anybody knew him, since i hadn't seen him in three weeks and was wondering if we were going to see him again. nobody did.)
imelda's paper was the weakest out of the 48 i saw on the first assignment. i have no doubt it was also weaker than the three i didn't see, from the graduate students, whose papers i don't grade (which is a good thing, because each of them is a classmate of mine in one of my classes this semester). the work was sloppy, confused, and incomplete. she messed up things we'd been over in class multiple times. i don't know if she's ever been in to see the professor in his office hours, but she's certainly never come to see me.
there's another assignment due next wednesday, and this one's longer and tougher -- so i'm scheduling extra office hours in case people want to come talk about it. my normal office hours are monday 2-3 and tuesday 1-2, and with the thing due at 11 on wednesday those aren't the most helpful times for a student to meet me if they want to meet me and then get some real work done. so i send an e-mail to the whole class (not just my discussion kids) saying there will be extra office hours, 12-1 thursday and friday, in addition to my regular office hours monday and tuesday. or by appointment.
imelda sends me an e-mail: can she meet with me on tuesday at 2:15?
[head. desk. recover.]
child, you need to check with someone to make sure you're on the right track more than 21 hours in advance of handing this sucker in, if your first assignment is any indicator of how your work is going to be. plus, no, you can't meet me at 2:15 on tuesday, because i'll be in class then. graduate students also go to class sometimes. how about 2:00 on monday?
we'll see if i hear back from her.
and then there's abelard, a kid who came to the first, second and third meetings of my tuesday discussion section (there's also a monday one, but they're all okay), handed in the first assignment for that section, but then wasn't there the next week to get it back; wasn't there the following week to hand in the next assignment; wasn't there this week to hand in the next one after that. didn't hand in the first assignment in lecture; wasn't there the day i handed them back. (in lecture, he doesn't take attendance regularly -- but abelard hasn't been there any time attendance has been taken.)
i suspect that what's happened is, abelard has withdrawn from the course. (the drop deadline is long past.) trouble is, neither the professor nor i has signed any document confirming that he's withdrawn, and his name keeps appearing on the class roll -- which means that as far as the registrar is concerned, he hasn't withdrawn. neither of us accepts late assignments; the professor makes four or five assignments and then counts the final as two, and i give a 20-point assignment each week, so young abelard is now 60 points in the hole with me (he got a 19.5 on his first assignment, so he won't have zero out of a possible 200 at the end of the semester, at least), and 1/6 or 1/5 in the hole with the professor. boy's going to end up with No Grade, which is going to magically transform into an F after some period of time. and i regret that, but it's in no way my responsibility to track him down and tell him if he intends to withdraw he'd better do it before it turns into a withdraw-failing. (i did ask in discussion this week if anybody knew him, since i hadn't seen him in three weeks and was wondering if we were going to see him again. nobody did.)
no subject
yeah, we obviously don't function like that here. it was more like you described when i was in edinburgh (1997-98), but not a lot -- there was still homework and quizzes during the term. which seems (well, it would seem to me, wouldn't it) like a good thing; i mean, if students were supposed to be entirely self-taught, why go to the university in the first place? there's got to be some benefit to being taught -- like, actually making contact -- with people who Know The Stuff already. it is true that a lot of american universities go a little far in the other direction, with the hand-holding and whatnot. but, you know, some of us don't go that far -- hence the fact that it's not my department if abelard files the forms to withdraw or not. i mean, i'm sorry to see a kid shoot himself in the foot, but i'm not here to keep him from doing it. :-)
graduate school here is more like you describe, but again, not completely -- there's work to be handed in throughout the semester, though there aren't usually exams (except the occasional midterm). you're on your own for writing your papers, though, and the paper topics (= essay titles) aren't given to you -- you come up with your own.