You owe it to them not to assume that they're just being irresponsible whiners and troublemakers.
When a student tells me "you work for me, I pay your salary"... well, it's not exactly a stretch to assume he's being a troublemaker and whiner.
Nowhere did I say anything about assuming students are bad from the start, or not giving them an opportunity to express their opinions. I do, however, require that they listen to my instructions in the classroom. If they are concerned about something I say or do while teaching, I would encourage them to approach me to speak about it - outside of class. There is no reason to disrupt the class and adversely affect all of the other students when it can be handled much more effectively in a one-on-one discussion.
Plus, it's a simple matter of respect - if a student raises his hand and says "hey, I think you forgot the minus sign on equation 5" that's fine. If he stands up in front of the rest of the students and says "I don't think you're doing a good job of teaching this" - that is disrespectful. It's common courtesy to address concerns like this in private - to bring it up in public shows nothing more than a desire to embarass someone.
But if a student is in college, chances are (a) they want to be there, and (b) they already have a reasonable idea of what they need to do to learn (laziness notwithstanding)
Bahahahaha right back at you. I have had second year students who don't even know what major they are going to choose yet. Frankly, our high schools are so piss poor at teaching learning skills that I spend more of my time teaching my students how to learn than a specific topic. Many, many, MANY students are in college simply because "it's what you're supposed to do" or "my parents said so".
Well, I'm thankful that I work at a school where they don't seem to have lost the vision. Or maybe it's because I'm in a very fundamental scientific field and not in some big money hot topic. Also, as many others pointed out, my salary is not, in reality, paid by my students, but is paid primarily from goverment grants which support my research. Student tuitions at this particular school tend to be used primarily for infrastructure - the buildings and millions of dollars worth of landscaping, and the massive staff it takes to support these things. In the research fields, most teachers here get a large chunk of their salaries from grants, and not tuition.
I want to be perfectly clear about one thing - I was not an "asshole" to my student. A student crossed the line and I had him removed from my class. I didnt berate him or treat him like crap; I calmly told him to remove himself from my classroom. Many students thanked me for doing so. I had plenty of witnesses that I was completely rational and justified in my actions.
People seem to be assuming I am some arrogant power hungry egomaniac who relishes my removal of my student. In fact, it upset me so much that I lost sleep over it. However, if I am to be an effective teacher, it is absolutely critical that I have the ability to maintain what I consider to be a proper learning environment within my classroom. The only way to do so is to be in control of said classroom.
It's a fair assumption to make, when the opposite is the exception rather than the rule.
It seems you're only seeing it from one side. I've seen it from both sides, at three different Universities, and in fact see it from both sides right now as I both teach and am a graduate student. In my experience, it's FAR from the exception to the rule, and students try to pull disruptive crap all the time. You may have had bad experiences at your school, but I can assure you that the teachers have to suffer through a lot of abuse too. However, a teacher's responsibility is not to any one student, but to ALL the students - the only way a professor has any hope of fufilling that responsibility is if he has control over what occurs within the walls of his classroom.
Trust me, grad school isn't any better! But, I don't have to do my advisor's laundry or clean up after his dog. Both wouldn't be hard to imagine as duties of an apprentice.
Sounds like you got a nasty comination - a shitty teacher, and an even worse beaurocracy. Been there, done that. Unfortunately, there are a LOT of bad teachers, and a LOT of badly run programs. However, if you take away the things that make teaching practical and possible, like a professor's control over his classroom, you're going to drive away the few remaining decent professors you have left.
This brings up another point that chafes my ass as a lower-level educator who's had policy forced upon me.
Mandatory attendance. Unless you're in a lab or roundtable discussion, mandatory attendence is completely idiotic. If someone knows a subject, and just wants the degree, they should have EVERY RIGHT to enroll in the class, and show up for nothing but the exams. If they ace the exams, they've proven they know the material and deserve the degree. Forcing attendance on people is so high school it makes me want to throw up.
That said, I believe those who have done so have every right to choose to use mandatory attendance. If they run the class, it's their decision. When I am running a lecture, you can be damn sure I won't require students to sign in.
If a professor is genuinely doing things wrong, then the type of drive you spoke about will indeed be sucessful. Indeed, when I was an undergrad I petitioned to get sweeping policy changes implemented - but the fundamental point here was, the majority of good professors AGREED with me, that the changes were needed.
The school backed me up with this student 100%. You want to know why? Because the kid was a spoiled jackass who deserved to fail a class and learn a lesson about respect. That's not me being pompous, it's me putting a stupid kid in his place.
You know NOTHING about what the student's complaint was. You know nothing about the way I was treated. Yet you assume I was a pompous and self absorbed asshole because I removed a student who not only questioned my authority, but disrupted my classroom and negatively affected the learning experiences of the other twenty people in the room. Be careful when you make assumptions about things you don't know, you might find you come across as the self centered, pompous one.
The room is only big enough for one leader - maybe it should be the one who's teaching? Just a thought.
My ego? Get a grip - most professors' salaries are pathetic compared to what they could make in industry. You don't go into academia because of ego, you either do it because you love research for the sake of knowledge, or you love teaching. I happen to love both.
However, I cannot do my job when some obnoxious nineteen year old is trying to run my class. If he knew what the hell he was doing, he wouldn't need to be in my class in the first place.
What are you going to do if ALL of your students take that stance?
Leave the university, and if it continues happening at other schools, leave education in general. The second I lose control of my classroom, I'll go into industry and triple my salary.
I teach because I love sharing knowledge and educating people. I know how to teach. Most of my students barely know how to learn. The second they are able to dictate policy in my class is the second I stop running the class.
Most skilled educators would do the same - if students tried to "unionize" and run their universities, our education system would be even shittier than it is now. Education is not a business, and students are not customers - it's a fundamental pillar of our society, where those who have knowledge pass it on to those who do not. Try to take away the money, and we'll end up going back to the days of unpaid apprenticeships, where the student practically begs to be taught, and lives like a slave for years while learning.
And how exactly does standardization of degrees, along with making credits transferrable across borders, make a student suddenly gain the right to dictate things in a classroom? In fact, from what I've seen, the European education system has a lot more willingness to tell a student "tough shit" if they can't hack it. I doubt that will be changing any time soon, despite the fact that most of europe is going for all the Bologna goodness.
One student will not make or break a university - people don't go to a good school based on how well they like the class... they go based on the quality of education and the jobs they can get afterwards. Every whiney self absorbed jackass who leaves a classroom makes room for one more person who's actually going to appreciate the opportunity and make the best of it. Unless the school is accepting every single person who applies, I doubt they have much to worry about.
AMEN! I've had student try to pull the "I pay your salary, so you work for me" line of bullshit once. Exactly once, because that student was removed from my classroom and had to retake the class with someone else the next term. I don't care if you're at Harvard paying 40 grand a year to go to school, the classroom belongs to the professor. You don't like that professor's rules, take your money and go elsewhere - the school doesn't NEED your self centered, obnoxious ass around anyway.
My past experience is that "trying to transcribe every word rather than thinking and analyzing" is exactly what most teachers want.
That's because most teachers are bad teachers.
For that matter, most students in the US system are bad students. The way many lectures SHOULD work (especially in the sciences) is, you read the relevant section of the text before class, and then keep the text open while the teacher lectures and fills in the gaps in your understanding. In my experience TAing in the US, very few students have the discipline to actually prepare for lecture
Holy run-on confusing sentence with garbled wording and random nonsensical DRM reference with strange out of place parenthesis (that just serve to confuse the sentence even more) in the middle of the already long and mangled run-on, batman!
EXACTLY - if sellers were willing to actually TRUST the people who purchase their music, instead of forcing DRM down their throats, this wouldn't be an issue. Apple's DRM is slightly less obtrusive than others out there, but DRM sucks, period. ANYONE could sell mp3s or non-drm'ed AAC files and they would play on the ipod just fine. The only music I've EVER purchased in digital format was from the band Manowar, which sells un-drm'ed mp3s directly from its website.
What rock have you been hiding under? Intel macs have no BIOS, they use EFI. Windows XP doesn't support EFI. Therefore, the technical challenge has been getting windows XP to boot on a machine with EFI. Even Vista is supposedly going to lack EFI support.
Slashdot Mirror
You owe it to them not to assume that they're just being irresponsible whiners and troublemakers.
When a student tells me "you work for me, I pay your salary"... well, it's not exactly a stretch to assume he's being a troublemaker and whiner.
Nowhere did I say anything about assuming students are bad from the start, or not giving them an opportunity to express their opinions. I do, however, require that they listen to my instructions in the classroom. If they are concerned about something I say or do while teaching, I would encourage them to approach me to speak about it - outside of class. There is no reason to disrupt the class and adversely affect all of the other students when it can be handled much more effectively in a one-on-one discussion.
Plus, it's a simple matter of respect - if a student raises his hand and says "hey, I think you forgot the minus sign on equation 5" that's fine. If he stands up in front of the rest of the students and says "I don't think you're doing a good job of teaching this" - that is disrespectful. It's common courtesy to address concerns like this in private - to bring it up in public shows nothing more than a desire to embarass someone.
But if a student is in college, chances are (a) they want to be there, and (b) they already have a reasonable idea of what they need to do to learn (laziness notwithstanding)
Bahahahaha right back at you. I have had second year students who don't even know what major they are going to choose yet. Frankly, our high schools are so piss poor at teaching learning skills that I spend more of my time teaching my students how to learn than a specific topic. Many, many, MANY students are in college simply because "it's what you're supposed to do" or "my parents said so".
Well, I'm thankful that I work at a school where they don't seem to have lost the vision. Or maybe it's because I'm in a very fundamental scientific field and not in some big money hot topic. Also, as many others pointed out, my salary is not, in reality, paid by my students, but is paid primarily from goverment grants which support my research. Student tuitions at this particular school tend to be used primarily for infrastructure - the buildings and millions of dollars worth of landscaping, and the massive staff it takes to support these things. In the research fields, most teachers here get a large chunk of their salaries from grants, and not tuition.
I want to be perfectly clear about one thing - I was not an "asshole" to my student. A student crossed the line and I had him removed from my class. I didnt berate him or treat him like crap; I calmly told him to remove himself from my classroom. Many students thanked me for doing so. I had plenty of witnesses that I was completely rational and justified in my actions.
People seem to be assuming I am some arrogant power hungry egomaniac who relishes my removal of my student. In fact, it upset me so much that I lost sleep over it. However, if I am to be an effective teacher, it is absolutely critical that I have the ability to maintain what I consider to be a proper learning environment within my classroom. The only way to do so is to be in control of said classroom.
It's a fair assumption to make, when the opposite is the exception rather than the rule.
It seems you're only seeing it from one side. I've seen it from both sides, at three different Universities, and in fact see it from both sides right now as I both teach and am a graduate student. In my experience, it's FAR from the exception to the rule, and students try to pull disruptive crap all the time. You may have had bad experiences at your school, but I can assure you that the teachers have to suffer through a lot of abuse too. However, a teacher's responsibility is not to any one student, but to ALL the students - the only way a professor has any hope of fufilling that responsibility is if he has control over what occurs within the walls of his classroom.
Trust me, grad school isn't any better! But, I don't have to do my advisor's laundry or clean up after his dog. Both wouldn't be hard to imagine as duties of an apprentice.
Sounds like you got a nasty comination - a shitty teacher, and an even worse beaurocracy. Been there, done that. Unfortunately, there are a LOT of bad teachers, and a LOT of badly run programs. However, if you take away the things that make teaching practical and possible, like a professor's control over his classroom, you're going to drive away the few remaining decent professors you have left.
This brings up another point that chafes my ass as a lower-level educator who's had policy forced upon me.
Mandatory attendance. Unless you're in a lab or roundtable discussion, mandatory attendence is completely idiotic. If someone knows a subject, and just wants the degree, they should have EVERY RIGHT to enroll in the class, and show up for nothing but the exams. If they ace the exams, they've proven they know the material and deserve the degree. Forcing attendance on people is so high school it makes me want to throw up.
That said, I believe those who have done so have every right to choose to use mandatory attendance. If they run the class, it's their decision. When I am running a lecture, you can be damn sure I won't require students to sign in.
You teach because you can't do asshole.
I hate to respond to a troll, but this kind of disrespect for educators is EXACTLY why our education system is so incredibly shitty.
If a professor is genuinely doing things wrong, then the type of drive you spoke about will indeed be sucessful. Indeed, when I was an undergrad I petitioned to get sweeping policy changes implemented - but the fundamental point here was, the majority of good professors AGREED with me, that the changes were needed.
The school backed me up with this student 100%. You want to know why? Because the kid was a spoiled jackass who deserved to fail a class and learn a lesson about respect. That's not me being pompous, it's me putting a stupid kid in his place.
You know NOTHING about what the student's complaint was. You know nothing about the way I was treated. Yet you assume I was a pompous and self absorbed asshole because I removed a student who not only questioned my authority, but disrupted my classroom and negatively affected the learning experiences of the other twenty people in the room. Be careful when you make assumptions about things you don't know, you might find you come across as the self centered, pompous one.
The room is only big enough for one leader - maybe it should be the one who's teaching? Just a thought.
My ego? Get a grip - most professors' salaries are pathetic compared to what they could make in industry. You don't go into academia because of ego, you either do it because you love research for the sake of knowledge, or you love teaching. I happen to love both.
However, I cannot do my job when some obnoxious nineteen year old is trying to run my class. If he knew what the hell he was doing, he wouldn't need to be in my class in the first place.
What are you going to do if ALL of your students take that stance?
Leave the university, and if it continues happening at other schools, leave education in general. The second I lose control of my classroom, I'll go into industry and triple my salary.
I teach because I love sharing knowledge and educating people. I know how to teach. Most of my students barely know how to learn. The second they are able to dictate policy in my class is the second I stop running the class.
Most skilled educators would do the same - if students tried to "unionize" and run their universities, our education system would be even shittier than it is now. Education is not a business, and students are not customers - it's a fundamental pillar of our society, where those who have knowledge pass it on to those who do not. Try to take away the money, and we'll end up going back to the days of unpaid apprenticeships, where the student practically begs to be taught, and lives like a slave for years while learning.
And how exactly does standardization of degrees, along with making credits transferrable across borders, make a student suddenly gain the right to dictate things in a classroom? In fact, from what I've seen, the European education system has a lot more willingness to tell a student "tough shit" if they can't hack it. I doubt that will be changing any time soon, despite the fact that most of europe is going for all the Bologna goodness.
One student will not make or break a university - people don't go to a good school based on how well they like the class... they go based on the quality of education and the jobs they can get afterwards. Every whiney self absorbed jackass who leaves a classroom makes room for one more person who's actually going to appreciate the opportunity and make the best of it. Unless the school is accepting every single person who applies, I doubt they have much to worry about.
AMEN! I've had student try to pull the "I pay your salary, so you work for me" line of bullshit once. Exactly once, because that student was removed from my classroom and had to retake the class with someone else the next term. I don't care if you're at Harvard paying 40 grand a year to go to school, the classroom belongs to the professor. You don't like that professor's rules, take your money and go elsewhere - the school doesn't NEED your self centered, obnoxious ass around anyway.
My past experience is that "trying to transcribe every word rather than thinking and analyzing" is exactly what most teachers want.
That's because most teachers are bad teachers.
For that matter, most students in the US system are bad students. The way many lectures SHOULD work (especially in the sciences) is, you read the relevant section of the text before class, and then keep the text open while the teacher lectures and fills in the gaps in your understanding. In my experience TAing in the US, very few students have the discipline to actually prepare for lecture
I was going to say the exact same thing...
I think this might possibly be the shittiest article I've EVER read on slashdot.
And I was here during the Jon Katz years *shudder*
Holy run-on confusing sentence with garbled wording and random nonsensical DRM reference with strange out of place parenthesis (that just serve to confuse the sentence even more) in the middle of the already long and mangled run-on, batman!
The killers? hmm...
Somebody told me, that you had a handheld, that looked like a Newton, that I had in february of last year...
I'm sorry, it's early and wouldn't leave my head. Will it be stoning, or am I to be drawn and quartered?
I have a setting in my account preferences to enable or disable tags, but I don't see them anywhere on the site. Tried this in camino and safari.
Yeah, because, you know... no one ever uses a headset on an xbox or playstation.
Got a link? For, you know... educational purposes...
Wait, let me get this straight...
someone... surrendered... to the FRENCH?
I suddenly feel like selling all my Apple hardware... and taking a shower.
EXACTLY - if sellers were willing to actually TRUST the people who purchase their music, instead of forcing DRM down their throats, this wouldn't be an issue. Apple's DRM is slightly less obtrusive than others out there, but DRM sucks, period. ANYONE could sell mp3s or non-drm'ed AAC files and they would play on the ipod just fine. The only music I've EVER purchased in digital format was from the band Manowar, which sells un-drm'ed mp3s directly from its website.
What rock have you been hiding under? Intel macs have no BIOS, they use EFI. Windows XP doesn't support EFI. Therefore, the technical challenge has been getting windows XP to boot on a machine with EFI. Even Vista is supposedly going to lack EFI support.
Ever heard of humor? Just checking.
... by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 13, @09:07AM (#14906906)
All I can say is 'wait 'til monday.'
Heh, now that's funny.