To the tune of Ohio by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young

A.I. cases and Maxient's down,

We're finally on our own,

It's midterm & I hear the drumming

How much longer can I go?

Gotta try and work around for it, standards are going down

Should'a reported long ago.

What if there's a grade contest, going round and round

How can you teach when they know?

La-la-la-la, la-la-la-la
La-la-la-la, la-la-la
La-la-la-la, la-la-la-la
La-la-la-la, la-la-la

Gotta try and work around for it, standards are going down

Should'a reported long ago.

What if there's a grade contest, going round and round

How can you teach when they know?

A.I. cases and Maxient's down,

We're finally on our own,

It's midterm & I hear the drumming

How much longer can I go?
How much longer can we go? (how)
How much longer can we go? (I said how, I said how)
How much longer can I go? (how much longer?)
How much longer can I go? (why?)

How much longer can I go? (I wanna know why)
How much longer can I go? (You better tell me why)

*repeats*

My question is three parts.

a) Do you find that students tend to expect/recognize that a 75 average/median (or fairly close to it depending on outliers) is the average grade?

b) Do you as teacher tend to expect/recognize that 75 average/median is the average grade

c) What do your classes actually have?

I have been teaching a gen-ed course for years and typically in the past few years, the course average has hovered around 78-80 with a median 82 or so (i.e. a few students always just bomb it). I have found this to be a reasonable distribution.

This semester, the average has dropped a bit to 74 with median of 77 (finishing the last section, so it might move a small bit). Students seem surprised that the average is something less than an A.

Am I just so far behind current grade inflation that I tend to think a 75 is a reasonably expected average?

I am a tenured associate professor, second year at an R1. We still don’t have our spring assignments yet. I find this extremely frustrating and I may resign over it.

I had issues with getting class assignments before classes started year one fall. I almost didn’t take the job because of this. Spring year one was fine. Summer year one they changed my assignment 7 working days before classes started and I had to take a 16 week shell and syllabus and condense it down into 10 weeks. I met with the dean about it and he said oh yes your supervisor said there may be complaints about last minute changes.

This fall starting my second year they gave me an additional class about 3 weeks before classes started. They stated it wasn’t overload because it was co teaching and my supervisor inserted herself into one of my other courses to change my workload and I have to co teach with her. I did all of the prep including adopting new textbooks. I have had to put pressure on her to do her part.

I was making just as much or more adjuncting before I started here, as I work in a high demand field.

This just feels insane.

I manage an open access journal and recently Elsevier has been sending, to all the public-facing email addresses, requests to fill out a form to renew permission to index the content of our journal on their platforms. I am curious if others have received emails like this before.

This is definitely a real email from Elsevier with a legitimate email header, but each time the email has come from a different person, none of which has a LinkedIn profile.

I am confused why they are asking this because our journal has already been indexed on Scopus for a very long time, the email appears to be written by AI, and the email contains completely incorrect information like the name of our institution.

I am currently at an impasse because further requests for clarification are not forthcoming because Elsevier refuses to speak further, or provide the paperwork for review unless we identify the managing editor under a nebulous threat that an unspecified agreement will expire if we do not comply (the reply also does not appear to be written by a human). I refused this because they can simply read the contact page that they scraped.

My field is less trusting of Elsevier because in 2006, Elsevier refused more reasonable open-access terms and caused the entire editorial board of one of the most respected journals to resign and eventually start a new non-profit journal. This is a major reason why we have been adamant that the journal remains completely free, and I can't help but be suspicious that they are after something else in the current era of data harvesting.

My university is pushing me to follow a specific grading rubric that uses a pass, partial, or fail system for assignments. The problem is that partial credit is essentially a failing grade, as it awards only 50% of the points for each metric. As a result, giving a student partial credit feels like failing them on the assignment.

Lately, I’ve been seeing more students do the bare minimum on their assignments, providing little detail, depth, or effort while still technically meeting the requirements. On one hand, giving partial credit feels overly harsh, especially when students have technically met the criteria. On the other hand, it’s difficult to justify giving full credit to work that lacks substance when compared to the higher-quality work submitted by other students. I also know that other instructors have gotten into trouble for handing out full credit too freely.

At the same time, I’m concerned that students will challenge their grades if I assign partial credit. To avoid this, I’ve been manually adjusting points on many assignments to reflect the quality of the work more accurately. However, I was told today to stop doing that because it doesn’t align with the university’s grading policy and creates “false expectations” for students.

At this point, I’m not sure how to proceed. I want to grade students fairly and consistently, but the current system makes it difficult to distinguish between work that technically meets the requirements and work that demonstrates genuine effort, depth, and understanding. I feel stuck between following the grading policy strictly and assigning grades that I believe more accurately reflect the quality of the students’ work. Any advice would be appreciated.

So I'm creating a reading list for next semester and I'm trying to figure out how to do this without violating copyright laws. Could ya'll give me some guidance on this?

I want to assign the entirety of the short stories. I think this piecemeal, excerpt-reading thing we've been doing the past few years is harmful, so I don't want to limit it to specific passages, especially since these stories are already short. But I consider the amount used to be appropriate for educational objectives, as there is pedagogical reasoning for using the entire work.

These works are creative in nature, which I know is a knock against me.

I also do not want my students using laptops in class. I've had to allow them to access the readings online this semester because of Fair Use concerns, and our classroom discussions have been notably worse than in past semesters. I'd like to either be able to print it myself and give them copies or have them print it out at home.

One gray area I've found is if the work is transformed in some way like with lecture material, discussion questions, annotations, etc. inserted. I'd be willing to annotate every text myself and give them copies of that, if it really would allow me to print out the stories. But I'm not sure I'm understanding correctly.

I have done the "fair use checklist" (12 in favor, 5 not in favor) but...I still don't have a clear answer. I'm just really not trying to get sued.

Hello All:

Hoping your midterms all went good and that you had a great fall break if you had one. Well my break was something else, I tell ya.

Ok, so at the start of the term back in August we are asked to make any early alerts regarding students that aren’t logging onto Canvas or submitting assignments. I teach an online communication/Public Speaking class at a private university as an adjunct. I noticed one student who hadn’t logged onto the class or communicated with me. I contacted our success team at the college and they were not able to contact her. A few days later the student contacts me and tells me she is a PSEO student who apparently never gotten an email or letter from the college with login information. According to the Dual Credit person, the student was given that information prior and they showed her and me proof of their communications.

Student emails me in early September and tells me she has now gotten access and she will get caught up on assignments soon. Well that never happened. In the last month and a half she never submitted one assignment and hardly if ever logged onto Canvas. I tried reaching out multiple times with no response from student. I made her aware of her inactivity, grade, and my late work policy. I was as lenient and understanding as I could have been and gave her enough time to complete her assignments which she failed to complete. I probably gave her more time than I should have.

Earlier this month I made another alert regarding the students lack of log ins and the fact that she already had a half a term’s worth of work missing. Student never contacted me and never contacted the success team either. According to them she was refusing to meet with them to discuss her failure and withdrawing. The college was having issues with this student and so was I.

This past weekend the student contacted me and pretty much said that she had assumed she could hand in her work later and thought the class was self paced like her online high school classes were. I gave her a run down on what an online asynchronous college course is, my concerns about her grade, and reiterated my late work policy which I told her about in all my outreaches. I informed her that she has 8 weeks of coursework missing and is at a 5 percent in the class. I suggested she contact her advisor and discuss options, such as withdrawing.

I gave her advisor a heads up about the situation. She mentioned that she and other individuals at the college had tried contacting the student multiple times with no response. She agreed that I was as fair and accommodating as I could be and agreed that the student should withdraw from the class.

The student contacted me again last night and it was clear as day she didn’t even read my email. She said she would be handing in her late work even though I told her she couldn’t and that it wouldn’t be accepted as it was already all overdue. I also told her about what the advisor and I suggested. I was as supportive as I could be in giving her words of encouragement and gave her to resources that could help her. I encouraged her to take the class when she is ready but given that she was so far behind it would not be possible for her to pass the class right now. I contacted the advisor again to keep her in the loop.

Well this morning I got my first parent email ever from her mom. The mom basically told me about all her issues, such as finding out about having Autism, ADHD, and Bipolar, having a mental breakdown last year and her psychiatrist suggested a setting other than high school which is why she is taking online classes, and the changing of medications and what a struggle this has all been. She also had a mental breakdown last spring and had to take a leave from school. I never received any accommodation letter from the student or the school. She does not have any accommodations on file according to the college. Again, this student hasn’t connected with me or the college all term. The mom then demands that I accept and grade all of her work that she has missing. You know what’s funny, she said she isn’t the parent to contact a professor to request accommodations for her kid. Yeah, I am sure this lady has contacted all of her professors.

I didn’t respond to the mom and immediately contacted my chair who was so beyond supportive and contacted me right away. He also reaches out to the Dean, Admissions, Dual-Credit person, and the advisor. He also told me not to contact the parent or do anything. The Dean agreed that a withdraw should happen. The advisor reiterated the struggles with getting ahold of the student. Admissions is going to get in touch with the school and student, well good luck with that.
I’ll admit I am scared to enter in midterm grades that are due Friday for the fear of what her mom or the student will do when they see the inevitable F. I would say I am concerned about my job only because I am worried the student and mom will take it to the extreme, but everyone has been supportive and are backing me up so I know they all have my back. And hey, they admitted to having issues with the student so it makes me feel a little better.

Ugh, I think this has been one of the worst weeks and it has me stressed and losing sleep over this. I am trying to focus on my teaching but it is tough now that I have to deal with this. I am sure the mom and student wonder why I am not contacting them but I am not going to based on my Department Chair’s advice, though I do worry they will continue to harass me. I do read horror stories on here about students coming after professors, I hope nothing happens to me. I teach in other states online so I don’t usually worry about this, however this is a college in the state I live in and is about an hour from where I live. I am a young woman professor in her 30s so I do worry, you hear so much nowadays. We actually had a student in our state try to kill the college professor just recently because he didn’t like school. Yeah, this really happened. Scary stuff.

I have never dealt with this at all and feel a little lost. Have you all ever dealt with a situation like this with a PSEO student or any student? How did you handle it? I am also curious how you all handle parents when they contact you. Any advice?

Thanks all so much for your help. This really has been a nightmare. I pray this situation goes away and gets better but it seems like it is getting worse with the parent involved now. Thanks again everyone.

I teach engineering statistics. Marking their first assignment (worth 9% of their grade), over 1/3 of them clearly used AI, and although I never explicitly said they could/couldn’t, the university regulations state that you must only submit work that you create, and no AI. Simple.

I gave everyone who used AI a 0, and everyone is asking for a resubmission. How would you approach this?

Part of me feels bad, and since this is the first assignment, they deserve some grace and I want to be the nice professor, but part of me thinks that this punishment is the only way they will learn.

My biggest irritation in the classroom over the last couple of years isn't blank stares or students who can't follow simple instructions. It's students getting up and leaving the room just minutes after class starts, then returning after a while.

For no apparent reason, students will stand up and walk out three or five minutes in. They’ll return, after who knows how long. And it doesn't stop there: the walking in and out continues for the entire class. Nobody seems to use the bathroom before class anymore, and nobody seems the least bit embarrassed about it.

So they need to go to the washroom. OK, that’ll be understandable if it is 50 minutes into the class, but just 3 minutes in? Don’t they know that they should visit the restroom between classes? I honestly don’t get it!

It is almost always male students. Like 99%. What made they think they can treat the classroom as a public space, like a supermarket, to come and go at will?

Every time it happens, I feel a wave of anger that takes real willpower to suppress. And I used to blank out for a brief moment before I could recompose myself and continue my lecture. Now I am slightly more used to it. I just don't get it, and it's driving me nuts. The classroom feels so weird with constant comings and goings like that.

Has anyone else noticed this? Why are they doing it? How do you handle it?

Part question, part rant. I bet the answer to this is no, but I’m gonna ask anyway.

Other than having students sit in groups, is there any use in having students sit in different places to get engagement, or to at least cut down on the lack of engagement?

I have a row of guys who sit against the wall and I’m trying to shake them up a bit I guess. Part of me knows that college = ‘the information is here … come get it or not; your consequences.’

My arbitrary groupwork groups have been pretty engaging, but today I don’t really have group work. Sometimes I just have to freaking lecture. 

I want to facilitate what I can, but not be so freaking high school. Maybe it’s an ego thing with me? First time with this population.

Let the slings and fiery arrows begin …

Quick question for those of you with a lot of experience working as professors. I am hired as a remote worker, 100% online, by a for profit college, unfortunately. I travel a lot and have been abroad since September, in different places. I do have a US address and pay taxes in the US, etc. I got a call from HR saying they found out I'm outside the US...since I never made it a secret as nothing in the faculty handbook or employee handbook prohibits remote workers from being at any location. Anyway, my dean is the one who called and asked how long had I been away, if this is long-term, and when I intend to return. I confirmed my US address with HR, and they contacted me today, 2 days later, and thanked me. They then asked if I am available tomorrow to have a quick call. They thanked me for confirming my address.

Any idea what the issue is? I would imagine it may have to do with payroll taxes, in this case I get it, but just wanted to get other potential issues, if any. I am new to all this, have very little experience with these matters especially since it's not in the handbook.

So in addition to readings, I assign films (embedded in Canvas) for my students to watch which are accompanied by short multiple choice quizzes in Canvas - so that they watch them.

I’m not under any illusions that every iteration of my quiz bank questions have been uploaded to Chegg and CourseHero.

However…. On multiple occasions this semester I’ve brought up assigned films in lecture, gotten blank stares, wondered if I had the course schedule wrong (“that was assigned to be completed for this week, right?”) and logged into Canvas mid-lecture to confirm - yep! Majority of the class took the quiz and passed it! For a film that they act as if they have never heard of much less watched.

It’s one thing to google quiz questions instead of watching a film. But the apparent lack of familiarity, coupled with the passing scores leads me to assume that they aren’t even doing that and are using some Agentic browser with access to Canvas?

Should I give up? My admin are barely facing up to the breadth and extent of the cheating crisis. The grudgingly acknowledge that testing center access is a necessity - but they sure as hell don’t want faculty overloading the already limited capacity with “homework” assignments.

I’ve spent the last 20 years padding students’ grades with routine small assignments to encourage a plausible level of familiarity with assigned readings. At the CC level, I’m not sure how well it would go over for me to do what I had to do as an undergrad: two in-class written / essay exams as the whole score.

Short of oral exams there’s not much else to do to maintain an illusion that there is an approximation of rigor.

In honor of Wholesome Wednesday, I'm doing Midterm conferences with students in my Fiction Writing class. We've looked at storytelling elements in books, movies, and TV shows. One student told me this class has caused her to analyze movies now. I was so proud; these kinds of classes did the same thing for me, so now I'm paying it forward.

Do you usually have the whole class outlined? I have a new class where the topic is adjacent to what I usually teach but something I do not know well. I am in work hell and I hate it. Should I have read three textbooks this summer? (I had no time.)

I have been teaching college for 12 years now, and in that time, I have seen a precipitous drop in the literacy and cognitive thinking skills of students. It has gotten to the point where I feel like most students entering college are at like maybe a 5th or 6th grade reading level and many of them are functionally illiterate.

Beyond this, they are mostly incapable of paying attention to anything for more than 5 minutes, disinterested in just about every topic under the sun, and seem to have no knowledge of the world, culture, history, politics, etc.

I keep telling myself that this is probably what older generations said about me. I am an older Millennial, and I can remember the various articles that came out about us when we were entering college. But... I have to say that this feels very different. I no longer feel like I am teaching college courses. I feel like I am teaching middle school classes, and many students still fail these classes.

I am absolutely petrified of the effects of this. I can't imagine how we are going to function as a society with this many uneducated, illiterate people. 75 million people in the USA voted for a convicted felon and adjudicated rapist to be our president. It would have taken like 10 minutes of critical thinking to understand how terrible Trump is, but it seems like most Americans are basically illiterate.

Many people seem to think our current political situation is the terminus of idiocy in this country, but I would say it is just the beginning. Gen Z is getting older and soon they will be more involved in making important decisions for this country. Their cognitive skills are so impoverished, it is difficult to imagine how they will be functional members of our society.

Feel free to ding me if this post isn’t allowed.

Wondering about your benefits universe. Anyone’s uni still doing retirement matching for 403(b)..? At my uni, it’s begun to feel bleaker and bleaker for benefits. Health care costs way up -and- they are cutting their matches to our retirement with the statement “well, everyone else matches even less.” (We are getting 7% matches.)

I was contacted by an accommodations coordinator about a student’s accommodation request for an attendance adjustment agreement. In a nutshell, they’re asking me how many more absences beyond those already given in my syllabus could be reasonably accommodated. I have no idea how to answer that. These are graduate courses btw, so missing one class is like missing a week in an undergraduate course. But it’s kind of like asking “how much of your class doesn’t really matter?” I don’t love that I’m put in the position of gatekeeper for this accommodation to begin with. But I also think that this is not something I can answer without feeling like I’m dismissing the whole point of the class. Does anyone have a formula for this? How have others handled these types of requests?

I teach an intro course. And while the subject matter isn’t (to me) difficult to grasp and is a fun area of study, I still have students that don’t turn anything in. I know from reading here this isn’t a me thing and is a pretty widespread concern.

When I reached out to my program chair on a few questions about lack of participation in a few cases, the response gave me pause. They suggested that instead of having assignments be covered or started in class and then submitted later, I should create assignments students could do solely within the class time.

As I read that advice I couldn’t help but think, “Isn’t that high school or possibly even lower grade level expectations?”

I try to stay away from “sage on the stage,” and work to make the class interactive and engaging - but yeah anyone else hear this? Do you do this?

And for whatever reason is convinced they will pass

I just don’t know what else to do but scream lol

I am teaching 2 courses at the same time with very similar content- one with undergraduate students, and the other "advanced" version of the course with graduate students. In general, I've structured both courses similarly but built in more scaffolding and support for the undergrad course; we also spend more time on foundational concepts and theories in the UG course.

I've noticed something really interesting between the 2 groups. The undergraduate class is far more involved and responsive than the grad group. The UGs ask interesting questions that seem to reflect a real desire to learn and understand the material- not just to know the "right" answer for the test. Class is fun and interactive. Mid-semester feedback was positive regarding in-class activities, assignments, and exams.

The grads, on the other hand, really don't contribute in class (with an exception or 2). They don't ask any questions. Their mid-semester feedback was pretty much the opposite of the UG group. They complained that the things we do in class or in assignments isn't the same as what shows up on the exam. They asked for exam study guides (!) and for there to be reading quizzes to "hold them accountable", otherwise they just (admittedly) don't read the text at all.

I really expected the opposite of what seems to be playing out and find this interesting!

I hate policing my classrooms, but its so damn distracting. I get it, that thirst trap is a billion times more exciting than me! 😭 Yes, I know I should have a no digital device policy, etc., but wondering if anyone has experimented with doing this.

How are we dealing with students not reading directions? Because no matter what I do - read them the directions, tell them to read it when I assign it, put it in large, bold red font at the top of the page - they just won’t. So they ask questions they shouldn’t have to ask, get confused about what they need to do, then blame me. When I tell them to check the directions, I’m being snarky.

This is going to be a LONG year.

Just wondering if anyone else is finding the same pattern.

I am seeing an increase in students “forgetting” it’s a test/exam day. Or emailing me an hour or two before the exam to say “I’m not feeling well so won‘t be present for the test. Can I do it from home or complete it later in the week“? If you’re well enough to write the test from home, why are you not well enough to come in? It’s also a closed book exam so no, you can’t write from home.

I make it very clear that tests can only be rescheduled if someone is absent due to extenuating circumstances and “not feeling well” is not an extenuating circumstance.

I am also seeing an increase in students coming up to me in class to say they forgot something was due and now the LMS module is closed so can I just reopen it so they can submit. What’s the point of due dates then?

I try to be understanding but how can I teach them to be accountable if I just let them not follow rules which are in place for a reason? How does everyone handle this?

I used to be able to do a lot of cool shit in my classes. We made cool shit. We read cool shit. We wrote cool shit. Just a bunch of creative, cool shit. Students don’t want to do cool shit anymore. They want to AI everything or do nothing. I know some will say, “It’s not cool to them, old man.” And that’s the point. If you don’t think making films, performing plays, writing and illustrating graphic novels, telling stories, writing songs, etc. isn’t cool shit, you’re a boring fuck. And if you want AI to do those things for you, you’re a really boring fuck.

Can ya’ll still do cool shit?

This semester I keep having this experience:

I finish teaching a class, and a student comes up to me with anxious and irritated mannerisms as I'm erasing the board and packing up. They say something like "I need to make an appointment to meet with you. Didn't you get my email?" or "Did you see my question about Problem 4 on this week's homework? I emailed you." Usually accompanied by apparent exasperation that I had not yet responded.

Yesterday I was meeting with a Ph.D. student, who did not email me a draft of their prospectus by the agreed upon submission date (or even by 5 min before our meeting when I last checked my inbox), but nevertheless showed up at a meeting scheduled to discuss it and launched into their agenda points requesting specific feedback as though I had read the document and was familiar with details from it. When I mentioned that I hadn't seen the draft yet, he generously offered "that's ok, I know you are busy," as though I had let him down and he was kindly excusing my error.

I get flustered and apologize when I am confronted with an apparent failure to identify and read messages from my students. I find that embarrassing! They accept these apologies and act as though it as an act of beneficence to overlook my rude failure to respond.

Every. time. this has happened this semester I have opened my inbox at the next opportunity and found that the annoyed student emailed me while I was in the room with them looking in their direction and carrying out activities related to their own education within their line of sight. The Ph.D. student emailed me as they sat down and opened their computer at the start of the meeting (without telling me at that moment that they were sending the draft then). The classroom students emailed me at various points while I was at the board with a piece of chalk working through analytical concepts with class participation.

How do they think I would/should have read and responded to their messages while I am making eye contact and conversing with them or their classmates, unaware of the existence of the messages? Can they not see with their own eyes that I am not checking my email in the moments between their silent "send" button presses and their face-to-face follow up? Do they think I will pause class or meetings to check for unexpected messages from them? Why do they not say they sent the message moments before when I admit that I have not seen it and apologize for overlooking it? Why do these little weirdos think it's socially acceptable to behave like this?

My syllabus statements declare that I will respond to emails within 2 business days. And I do. Typically within the day, though I am happy to have some flexibility built into my policy for when I'm traveling or have an especially busy work day. But holy hell is it annoying to be guilted for not instantly seeing, reading, digesting, and responding to messages from people who are in the room with me and can see with their own eyeballs that I'm not monitoring email when they send the message.

This happens at least once a week lately and I can't figure out why it's suddenly such a common student behavior.