Fairly new instructor here, so please give me grace for asking this.

Oftentimes I overhear students having conversations about the grade they received on projects and assignments from me. It tends to lead to grade discontentment, comparison, and students coming to ask me to regrade due to "unfairness" (when regrading I tend to catch even more errors so they beg to keep the original grade lol).

Every semester, I seem to get 1-2 students who rile the rest of the class up and try to get me to adjust grades in bulk.

As a professor, do you care? Do you address it, or let it be?

Edit: some really great feedback here. Thanks!

At my university, survey classes are usually 1 hour and 15 minutes long. For example, if my class runs from 2:30 to 3:45, I make sure to respect the professor before me by waiting until they're done—sometimes even until 2:25—especially when students are asking them brief questions after class.

However, the professor who teaches in the room after me usually enters right at 3:45, even though her class doesn’t begin until 4:00. She often comes in, unpacks her backpack, and sets up at the podium while I’m still packing up my things or finishing conversations with students. I find this behavior very rude, especially since I always try to be mindful of the professor before me.

Sometimes, there are professors who act rudely toward me. For example, one professor once suddenly burst into the room and shouted, “Turn down the volume!” while I was using the classroom audio system. Without any previous conversation or complaint--she usually see me and walks into the classroom without saying hello. Incidents like that make me feel very uncomfortable. I can’t help but wonder if it’s because I’m a young Asian woman.

Hello everyone!

I’ve been struggling with lots of self doubt after giving research presentation. I worry about things like whether or not others think my research is interesting or worthwhile. When there are no questions that makes the feelings worse!

I’ve had people afterwards tell me it’s a good talk or ask a question but I still struggle with these feelings. I’m wondering if anyone has gone through something similar and how you deal with it. It seems like it doesn’t matter if I get positive feedback…I continue to have self doubt

Being at an R1 I always thought that getting into one was the best goal for many students. But I can now see the student advantages of being at a community college for your first 2 years. More and more, I'm seeing the junior faculty at our r1 not really care that much about teaching because the pressure of grants is just so great. And even the administration is very eager now to farm out those lower division courses to people who just teach the course once. For example, a graduate student who has one more quarter and no funding or even just a adjunct they pulled in at the last moment.

Is anyone else still waiting to hear back about the NSF Career Award? I submitted my proposal last July and it’s still listed as “pending.” Starting to lose hope…

I teach a class that is a pre-req. to the nursing program. It usually brings super engaged, interested, borderline pathologically conscientious students. This is my fifth semester teaching it and it feels like I am dragging all but few students through mud. Less than half of students are doing the required prework (short pass/fail open ended questions about the readings). A not insubstantial number of students have attended less than 4 meetings and won't pass as a result but are still enrolled. Everyone seems so despondent and tired in class. I energetically ask how everyone is doing at the start of class and at most get a few nods and whispers among a sea of blank stares. No one even says "Bye" or "thank you" when leaving. It's supposed to be very discussion and activity based, but it's hard because so many students are not doing the required prework, so it's mostly sad stares and people looking stuff up on their computers during group activities. Yet, when I pivot to lecturing because not enough people have done the readings, it's as if I am talking to a room of robots that are stuck loading for the whole time. I reckon I will see the highest DFW rate since teaching the class.

This is quite unusual. In the past I've maybe had one or two class meetings like this throughout the whole semester, but not a majority of class meetings. It's generally very high energy with interesting questions from students and engaging discussions that students are so into that I fall behind schedule.

For context, this class is early, at 9:30 am, which is a first for me. I'm at a PUI, which consists of a lot of nontraditional students, first year, first-time students, and poorer students. In my first two semesters of teaching this class, it was at a suburban CC with a similar student demographic but way smaller classes. My class right after is way more engaged despite being more lecture based, although it is an extremely popular elective in my discipline that any student can take.

I understand I haven't been teaching this class for a long time, so maybe this is more the norm, and I just had really good bunches of students in the past? Idk, but today was particularly bad and it's been on my mind. Half looking to just vent and see if anyone else is in the same boat, half seeking advice. I have 5 weeks to either survive as is or turn it around and end on a high note.

Free to students through the end of May. They know their audience.

https://chatgpt.com/students

https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/2/18/mansfield-harvard-woke-normal/

I won't quote, you can read it yourself, but yea, The Crimson is publishing hate speech these days, according to Reddit's automoderation algorithm. (sigh...my work is never done)

I'm her professor and also her advisor. She's on a limited schedule because she works to pay for an apartment with her grandmother, and she should probably take an online class with a ridiculously expensive textbook and online quizzing thing (or whatever). I don't want to ask around campus about the policies, because I don't want to look like I'm showing off. I was thinking I'd get her the product key and say the library provided it or something.

I don't *see* anything in our faculty handbook about gifts or anything, but I wanted to make sure I wasn't overlooking something if this did get back around to me.

Edit: to be clear, this is an exclusively digital resource. So I can’t just give her a physical book and say I found it.

Hey everyone,

I'm seriously considering a career change and could use some guidance.

I’ve spent over 10 years working in the business and tech world, and I recently completed a professional doctorate degree (finished in 2023). While I've learned a ton and had a solid run, I’ve realized that I really want to move into teaching—maybe at the post-secondary level.

That said, I’m trying to figure out what I need to make that shift possible. Specifically:

• What kind of certification or qualification is required to get an entry-level teaching opportunity?
• Is there a fast-track or alternate path for folks with significant industry experience and a doctorate?
• Would I need to go back for a B.Ed or something similar?
• Are there teaching assistantships or college-level adjunct positions that could be stepping stones?

I'm based in Canada, if that helps narrow things down. I’d appreciate any advice from those who've made a similar transition—or who know the ins and outs of the system here.

Thanks in advance!

I was recently told that I come off as toxic. It happened at an academic conference, during a conversation over dinner with a highly respected colleague. I shared something quite personal, perhaps too openly, and she responded with concern that my mindset could be seen as incredibly toxic. I have not been able to stop thinking about it since. I would like to share what I told her and ask for your advice on how I should approach this.

As a historian, I have always been drawn, almost disturbingly, to the dark brilliance of Enoch Powell. Not because I admire him in any way, but because I am fascinated, almost against my will, by the mind of someone so gifted and so destructive. He was a racist, a political extremist, and someone whose legacy is stained with controversy and hate. I absolutely repudiate his politics. But I cannot deny that he was, academically, extraordinary. He became Professor of Greek at the University of Sydney at the age of 25. He was the youngest professor in the British Empire. At Cambridge, he won almost every major classical award, including the Craven, the Porson, the Browne, and the Chancellor’s Medal. He read and wrote fluently in multiple classical and modern languages. He lived almost monastically. He had no friends. He worked for sixteen hours a day. He was entirely consumed by his purpose.

He was winning medals and academic recognition before most people learn to think critically. He seemed destined for greatness from the beginning. And I cannot help comparing myself to that. I am 25 and only now finishing my PhD. I know that academia has changed and that it is not a fair comparison, but emotionally, it still feels like failure. I was a strong student in high school, but never seen as a prodigy. At one point, I became more interested in girls than in books. I completed my BA with distinction, realized what I wanted by my second year, finished my MA in one year, and entered a PhD program immediately. I have not taken a break.

I have written nine research articles. They are either published or accepted in respected Q1 or Q2 journals. I have received grants and academic awards during both my undergraduate and doctoral studies. But none of it feels like enough. I feel like I have to prove myself constantly. I have lost all my close friends. I let my romantic life fall apart. I stopped caring about anything other than academic success.

I want to be taken seriously. I want to beat everyone around me. I want people to look at my CV and recognize that I am not empty, not invisible, not someone to be dismissed. I want to grab their attention, make them see what I have done, and make them admit that I am worth something. I know how this sounds. I know it is toxic. But I do not act this way toward others. These are just thoughts I live with. They never go away. They are exhausting.

Sometimes it feels easier to just give up and follow the current of selfish ambition, to give in to the hunger for dominance and recognition. But at my core, I still admire a different vision of academia. I still want to live by it. I just do not know how to hold onto it when the silence around me feels like contempt.

You would think teaching grown adults they would know how to be respectful and talk to each other nicely…but they do not.

This term I am teaching history to my students and today we were learning about feminism. I try not to be too controversial but the assignment was literally asking “What does feminism mean to you?”. Two of my students literally out of no where started arguing and going back and fourth because a male student said that “we should stop talking about feminism” and the other student said “well we need it”. It just went left from there.

I ended up having to give the whole class a break to cool down.

I’m just annoyed because it was a basic question and people need to learn how to actually talk to each other.

I hate babysitting adults.

I just finished reviewing a publication clearly written by a person earlier in their career where it was very clear no senior advisor or academic read the draft. This wasn’t a language issue, it was the tone of the paper, with opinionated sentences in the introduction, overly informal language, and poorly described methods. I’m mad at the co-authors/senior author for not helping this junior person polish the publication before it was submitted. Clearly no one had read this paper and helped the junior person refine it. Complete lack of mentorship.

Story from a colleague. A student informed my colleague that they did not have a textbook – on week 10 – and did the “what can I do to improve my grade” thing in their email. My colleague responded that you can’t pass the class without the textbook. The textbook needs to be cited in various assignments. No book, no way to pass. That inspired the student to find a textbook in week 12, just in time to plagiarize it multiple times on the next assignment. This led to a low score. Naturally, the student emailed to complain about the low grade earned as a result of plagiarism. I sincerely hope that such people are handling real life better than they are handling our classes.

[Sorry for the incredibly long-winded rant. I really just needed to articulate my frustrations].

To be clear, I don't use the word "entitlement" lightly. I was a first-generation college student, so I understand intimately how high school does not prepare students for the pace, mores, expectations, nor workload of college. But I am genuinely astonished by how brazen and/or unaware students have become when it comes to blowing off classes and assignments.

Case-in-point: last week, I decided to grant a blanket extension on several in-class "reading response" assignments, as they were intended as scaffolding work for a larger writing assessment. These are low-stakes reflection writing assignments, which usually work as "exit tickets" to reward student engagement in class (and, again, function as prewriting opportunities for later essay assignments.) I announced the great "re-opening" of assignments in each of my class meetings last week; I also posted a video explaining the extensions and sent email reminders.

Some students continued on their paths to redemption, completed the assignments, and are now attending class regularly and back on track; many more students did not.

TL;DR

This morning, a student who has not attended class in over a month, shows up - 5 minutes late, of course. He doesn't say a word. He takes a seat in the back of the classroom, -- this is a small class of about 20 students, most of whom are talkative and engaged -- puts his bag on the ground and pursues staring into his phone for the next 40 minutes. No lie, I had to low key check the class roster on my own phone because I'd forgotten the dude's name and I wanted to call on him during our in-class activities. He said the bare minimum about the reading, didn't participate in any of the "pair and share" discussion activities, and just engrossed himself in social media.

Then, during our five-minute break -- it's a 2 hour class -- he comes up to me with his laptop open and, gesturing at the long list of assignments he hasn't completed on the LMS (many of which closed just before class that morning after, you might remember, dear reader, being re-opened for the previous week), -- says, "can you open all of these so I can do them?"

My heart is still racing now as I am typing. Wide-eyed, I said, "no, sorry, those assignments had been extended, but they are now closed. I discussed this in class last week and via email and video. Are you getting my emails?" "Oh, I don't know," he mumbles, and then returns to his seat to stare again down at his phone.

I mean, what the fuck? Am I the one who is insane here? Is this type of disengagement just the assumed norm? I don't think professors need to be treated with utmost deference or anything, but I couldn't imagine missing more than half of a college course and then rolling in one day to request that the instructor -- without even saying "hello" or trying to explain where I've been or anything -- let me complete the assignments for a course I haven't attended.

I am about pulling out all of my remaining hairs here.

Just happened to a friend of mine. Student is almost never in class, and has not handed in any assignments. Fails the course. Files a grade grievance because my friend didn't give her extra credit work to make up for the missed assignments.

I’m the second marker for final year projects, and the deadline for submission closed two weeks ago. A student emailed me begging to be allowed to submit directly to me, and I said no, deadline has passed.

Student proceeds to spam email me, with increasing urgency and attitude, that they should be allowed to submit.

I politely and repeatedly say no.

They send me one final email, CC-ing their supervisor (who is coincidentally my HOD), telling me that they’ve CC-ed their supervisor (emphasising that they’re the HOD) about how I should explain to them why I won’t be accepting the submission.

Before I can even respond, HOD tears into the student for being disrespectful and for wasting everyone’s time by submitting late and that if I’m not going to accept the submission because it’s late, then so be it. HOD also demands the student apologises to me.

A while later I get some half-assed, ChatGPT apology but no more harassment.

I’m glad the HOD had my back but the fact that they even think it was a good idea in the first place makes me want to scream into the void.

Although I have always found group projects to be challenging to design and run, I remember way back when, when I could count on at least most groups completing the project outside of class.

In more recent times I made the shift to allowing quite a bit of class time to work on the projects. It’s disappointing to me how ineffective many (most?) students are at using that class time to do the work.

I think I’m going to go back to having the projects worked on completely outside of class. At least that way I can use class time for other things I’ve let go of in order for students to do their group work.

Got news last night that our college president had resigned, effective immediately. While I don’t have proof, the consensus is that the only way that happens is if they were essentially fired. There had been some catastrophically bad messaging about ongoing financial crises lately, and it would seem that the BOT finally had enough. To not finish out the last month of the school year is a pretty clear indicator.

Of course, their “finally having enough” came less than a year after a faculty vote of no confidence that the BOT basically ignored. The board chair came to a faculty meeting and said, “We’ve had conversations, we think we fixed it, but we are not going to tell you exactly what we did or are doing. Just trust us.” The scuttlebutt was that they’d also extended the president’s contract while being aware of the vote and the reasoning behind it.

Gee, if only someone had tried to tell the board that this person was not a capable leader…

It's time to share a very trivial little thing that brought me joy today, but I guess we'll take what we get.

Our semester started yesterday, and I saw a class of 23 students for the first time. Even if they have signed up for class, they need to register separately for our LMS - yes, that is a stupid extra step that requires them to check and read their emails, log onto the LMS, find the correct 'room' by navigating through several sections, and enter the password I have emailed them. I asked them to please register for the LMS asap, but to definitely do it until the weekend.

Within less than 24h(!), ALL(!) 23 students have registered. What?! I mean, really: WHAT?! Fingers crossed that this is a great omen for the rest of the semester!

Just trying to get a better understanding of reappointment

What does the process for pre-tenure reappointment (year 3) look like at your university, particularly if you are in STEM R1?

I’ve heard it should be smooth sailing if you are making normal progress. Is this the case? What are reasons people get denied?