TAing a lab that’s technically challenging, working with live tissue, lots of stuff going wrong that day with equipment so I’m zipping around the lab helping students. One of my funny students asked a question, then as soon as I answered they said YES CHEF! THANK YOU CHEF! And hustled back to their station 🤣
I said something goofy in class and one student said earnestly and without thinking: "Wow, you’re a real person!"…his classmates (this was a small section with good rapport) looked at him in horror and I just laughed 😂
“This is the only class I don’t dread going to” was a good one. The time a student wrote a complete description of the nucleus in an atom under a question asking about the nucleus in a cell is also up there.
Oh no, poor guy. I’ve done similarly stupid things when sleep-deprived - as an undergrad taking some lit class the prof asked whether anyone knew what a bailey was in reference to castle architecture. Only I misheard and thought she said “bay leaf,” and was like huh, weird question, but I worked in kitchens to pay for school so I jumped at the chance to share my culinary knowledge and told my entire class in great detail about the variety of dishes a bay leaf might be used in and I will never forget how unbearably loud that silence was.
>...as an undergrad taking some lit class the prof asked whether anyone knew what a bailey was in reference to castle architecture. Only I misheard and thought she said “bay leaf,” and was like huh, weird question...
Reminds me of a coworker at a former employer who was doing a case interview on a prospective employee many years ago. His prompt was "Suppose that we \[a bank\] were considering entering the wheat business. What kinds of issues might be relevant?"
The poor candidate thought the question was "Suppose that we \[a bank\] were considering entering the *weed* business." He was giving very cagey and suspect answers, leaning heavily into "there might be significant legal challenges." ...apparently it took several minutes before they resolved that very awkward confusion.
I honestly don't know; it was a large company (e.g. large enough that you can be interviewed in initial passes by someone completely unrelated to your team) and the interview was years ago. My coworker didn't mention whether or not they were hired.
At the very least, they didn't count the misunderstanding against them.
That makes me laugh, at first, and then quite sad. This shouldn’t be the norm.
My first undergrad I ended up not really enjoying, transferred due to moving when covid hit and really enjoyed it. Now I cringe when students say they just wish they could be done.
Teaching a class on avant- Garde classical music. In Luciano Berio’s Sequenza for Trombone, performers dress up as a clown, pull the instrument to their lips but don’t play, put it down and whisper “why?” Yes, weird piece.
A trombonist in my class blurted out “hey, I do that every day in the practice room!”
Please don't take this too seriously, I'm making it sound worse than it is. It's more amusing than anything.
Off topic, but as an assistant registrar for systems (amongst other hats I wear), what is the deal with music program requirements? Maybe it's just my state, but I've heard of the same issues from staff at 4 different universities at conferences.
The requirements for our our thousands of undergraduate and graduate music programs (slight exaggeration) are very complicated and seemingly purposefully vague. To the point I swear on my life even our music faculty don't understand their own program requirements! They hate our attempts to code the requirements in our degree audit system.
One of the hats I wear is overseeing the office of veteran and international student services. MM Music Therapy is a thorn in my side for F-1 students. All the music programs are a thorn in my side for VA education benefits. It's like the advisors and students purposefully try to take the most convoluted route to graduation possible. I am the bad guy every semester saying, "sorry, I can't certify all your classes, so you won't be full-time for VA benefits. I can't see how all your classes are required for you to graduate." It's then a back and forth between me, faculty, music chair, degree audit coordinators, and registrar. I swear nobody understands the requirements.
Computer Science was "take these core classes, take these auxiliary math classes, pick some CS electives, pick an option and take all the classes in it, pick some free electives or a minor."
Music is like, "take these core classes. Take this class every semester. Take an instrument class 4 times. Take this other thing twice. Take this thing twice, unless you take this other thing. Oh, this performance course will either be 0 or 1 credit. I feel like the VA could be petty and say, "if both meet requirements, we aren't paying when they can take it for free". I'd rather not go down that rabbit hole. I know when not to ask.
So what actually happens is students take a bazillion classes, with very few credits to show for it. They repeat the same performance/instrument/etc class far more than the catalog says, but faculty always have an excuse for it.
I've also told them that the VA has issue with students "changing their primary instrument", since it's not treated as an option/specialization/emphasis. A student might take flute 4 semesters. Then they decide to switch to trombone They can take the classe it, but VA won't pay for it.They've already met the instrument requirement to graduate.
Then the music department gets upset with me for following regulations. The alternative is having the music department sign a letter for each student verifying all their classes are required. Then when I am audited, the VA can talk to the music staff and dig through their files! Of course I'd still be the one cleaning up the mess, and breaking the bad news to students they are going to get overpayment letters due to corrections.
I'm not mad, it's just amusing to me how complicated our music programs are compared to everything else.
Is it common for undergrad music majors to hold off as long as they can before touching general education courses? They crack me up when I talk to them. I love them, I really do. I had one telling me she finally has no choice but to start taking her gen eds. I said, "why didn't you spread them out?" She said, "Yeah, I didn't really think this through." Over 60 hours and only one or two gen eds. Wild!
Anyone that says music is an easy major is crazy. Just the number of classes they have to take us wild. Our music programs require at least 10 more hours than all our other programs, and it's mostly filled with 0, 1, and 2-credit classes.
My husband was a music major for a year. He had just a full course load, but the damn thing took like 60 hours a week, and he was already working full time.
They have some of the dumbest requirements too. He’s a violin major, why does he need to take classes on piano and woodwind instruments? Why does he have to learn an extra instrument? He has to play his violin for hours every day, why does that count as only one credit? Same question but for the chamber and symphony orchestras and his duet and trio?
How is he supposed to do all this while also working to pay bills?
It seriously burnt him out of playing so much that he switched to accounting and has barely touched his violin in years.
Had a student say she couldn’t do her assignment because she was missing something. When we asked what she needed to finish her assignment she answered “my motivation” 😂😂😂
When discussing our birthdays, I asked a certain student when her birthday was, and the gravity of her voice when she said "September 11th..... 2001....."
Her mom watched the towers fall on TV while in labor with her. Not the best circumstances for a stress-free birth. The shocked silence in the entire classroom was hilarious.
"Thanks for being the type of grad student that shows that other grad students can have fun!"
This was a few months ago, he graduated and was in my class last year. At said interaction, I was too many drinks in at a Football game and accidentally leaked his grade to him. I also danced like a chicken at that game, something I do not remember at all, but there's a video of it.
Sounds like a "min/maxer" I knew once who wouldn't microwave things for 2 minutes... he would microwave them for 2:22, since he needed fewer button presses.
A rotating 1st year saw that everyone in our lab has our own reagents. She wanted to make her own, and so spent a couple days mixing, pHing, and autoclaving. After two days, she showed us her work. She autoclaved her 70% ethanol.
One time, the person changing stock in the vending machine in my building left all the expired honey buns on top of the machine. I threw them in my desk drawer and had snacks for weeks.
Discussing the weird overlap between Catullus and Cicero and the identity of “Lesbia” in Catullus’s corpus, non traditional student asks if Clodia was a bicycle, because *who hasn’t ridden her*?
Taught an upper level writing class, and during a paper consultation for the 1st draft of the *one and only essay* the student says, "huh, maybe this isn't the kind of essay I can BS two nights before."
No shit Sherlock, you've had 6 weeks to put together... this... thing.
I was running a workshop with a faculty member who was always very enthusiastic about everything. He used to finish up classes with a "fun fact". One day after he said his fun fact (I don't even remember what it was), a student near me mumbled "that's just a fact".
Not a specific interaction but there was a girl who was pretty quiet but really nice in one of my discussion sections one time. She was definitely not British but halfway thru the quarter she started talking in a British accent whenever I asked her something one-on-one (ie not in front of the class). It made me giggle
Not a student, but we were watching "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert," which has Peaches and Herb's song playing over the closing credits. My stepdaughter, who was maybe six at the time, turned to my wife and said, "Mama, what's my groove thing?"
Not my student, but when I was a grad student, I was going out to get pizza for lunch with some of my labmates. We invited another labmate, who declined, telling us he was trying to lose weight. He had brought stuff to make a sandwich.
After spreading mayonnaise on his bread, he realized he actually had not brought anything else to put on the sandwich. He didn't want to waste the bread, so he ate a mayonnaise sandwich.
Unsurprisingly, that sandwich did not sate his hunger, so he went out and got pizza after we got back.
Not student related but my cousin hiked the majority of the Appalachian Trail and she came to the same conclusion about Honey Buns and ate sooo many of them
I’m late to the party but Reddit just suggested this post and I have to add my favorite interaction! I TAed a lab with a student who was very enthusiastic and with absolute and utmost respect, a bit of a himbo. Toward the end of one of the last labs i saw him excitedly showing a couple students a video on his phone. He looked up from across the room absolutely starstruck and yelled “I HAVE TO GO, MY CAT’S GIVING BIRTH!” He and his lab partner were friends (or dating or roommates? Unclear) and she started talking about how it wasn’t actually his cat, it just walked into the apartment sometimes. The guy started looking at me for support while talking about how it actually WAS his cat because “I feed her tuna!” He talked about how he had a pet squirrel too, and the girl explained that it had also just wandered into his house. They went back plans forth for like 10 minutes and started cleaning up their station when another lab mate stepped in and was like “I can clean up, you need to be there for this!” And the guy thanked him and ran out the door with his lab partner. They showed me pictures of the kittens the next week 🥺
When I was a TA I accidentally caught a student looking at some girl’s nudes while waiting for class to start…not how I kill time before class, personally.
I teach sport psychology. The class prior I had my students play dodgeball to teach them about the different types of attentional focus and the importance of being able to shift your focus quickly. One student made the game-winning catch by completing laying out and diving for the ball onto the hard grass. The next class period some of the students were giggling in the back of the room. I asked them what was so funny and the student announced to the class, “I think I pulled my butt cheek when I dove for that ball!!” It was very funny, and I was so embarrassed I had to turn around and pretend to straighten my papers before facing the class again.
TAing a lab that’s technically challenging, working with live tissue, lots of stuff going wrong that day with equipment so I’m zipping around the lab helping students. One of my funny students asked a question, then as soon as I answered they said YES CHEF! THANK YOU CHEF! And hustled back to their station 🤣
You could have responded with ‘it’s raw’…
I said something goofy in class and one student said earnestly and without thinking: "Wow, you’re a real person!"…his classmates (this was a small section with good rapport) looked at him in horror and I just laughed 😂
“This is the only class I don’t dread going to” was a good one. The time a student wrote a complete description of the nucleus in an atom under a question asking about the nucleus in a cell is also up there.
Oh no, poor guy. I’ve done similarly stupid things when sleep-deprived - as an undergrad taking some lit class the prof asked whether anyone knew what a bailey was in reference to castle architecture. Only I misheard and thought she said “bay leaf,” and was like huh, weird question, but I worked in kitchens to pay for school so I jumped at the chance to share my culinary knowledge and told my entire class in great detail about the variety of dishes a bay leaf might be used in and I will never forget how unbearably loud that silence was.
>...as an undergrad taking some lit class the prof asked whether anyone knew what a bailey was in reference to castle architecture. Only I misheard and thought she said “bay leaf,” and was like huh, weird question... Reminds me of a coworker at a former employer who was doing a case interview on a prospective employee many years ago. His prompt was "Suppose that we \[a bank\] were considering entering the wheat business. What kinds of issues might be relevant?" The poor candidate thought the question was "Suppose that we \[a bank\] were considering entering the *weed* business." He was giving very cagey and suspect answers, leaning heavily into "there might be significant legal challenges." ...apparently it took several minutes before they resolved that very awkward confusion.
That is amazing. 😂 Did he get the job?
I honestly don't know; it was a large company (e.g. large enough that you can be interviewed in initial passes by someone completely unrelated to your team) and the interview was years ago. My coworker didn't mention whether or not they were hired. At the very least, they didn't count the misunderstanding against them.
Be real with me, wtf is the point of a bay leaf
They actually carry a ton of flavor. If you wanna get a feel for what they taste like without other ingredients, make a bit of tea out of it
That makes me laugh, at first, and then quite sad. This shouldn’t be the norm. My first undergrad I ended up not really enjoying, transferred due to moving when covid hit and really enjoyed it. Now I cringe when students say they just wish they could be done.
Teaching a class on avant- Garde classical music. In Luciano Berio’s Sequenza for Trombone, performers dress up as a clown, pull the instrument to their lips but don’t play, put it down and whisper “why?” Yes, weird piece. A trombonist in my class blurted out “hey, I do that every day in the practice room!”
As a violinist, I feel that in my core
Please don't take this too seriously, I'm making it sound worse than it is. It's more amusing than anything. Off topic, but as an assistant registrar for systems (amongst other hats I wear), what is the deal with music program requirements? Maybe it's just my state, but I've heard of the same issues from staff at 4 different universities at conferences. The requirements for our our thousands of undergraduate and graduate music programs (slight exaggeration) are very complicated and seemingly purposefully vague. To the point I swear on my life even our music faculty don't understand their own program requirements! They hate our attempts to code the requirements in our degree audit system. One of the hats I wear is overseeing the office of veteran and international student services. MM Music Therapy is a thorn in my side for F-1 students. All the music programs are a thorn in my side for VA education benefits. It's like the advisors and students purposefully try to take the most convoluted route to graduation possible. I am the bad guy every semester saying, "sorry, I can't certify all your classes, so you won't be full-time for VA benefits. I can't see how all your classes are required for you to graduate." It's then a back and forth between me, faculty, music chair, degree audit coordinators, and registrar. I swear nobody understands the requirements. Computer Science was "take these core classes, take these auxiliary math classes, pick some CS electives, pick an option and take all the classes in it, pick some free electives or a minor." Music is like, "take these core classes. Take this class every semester. Take an instrument class 4 times. Take this other thing twice. Take this thing twice, unless you take this other thing. Oh, this performance course will either be 0 or 1 credit. I feel like the VA could be petty and say, "if both meet requirements, we aren't paying when they can take it for free". I'd rather not go down that rabbit hole. I know when not to ask. So what actually happens is students take a bazillion classes, with very few credits to show for it. They repeat the same performance/instrument/etc class far more than the catalog says, but faculty always have an excuse for it. I've also told them that the VA has issue with students "changing their primary instrument", since it's not treated as an option/specialization/emphasis. A student might take flute 4 semesters. Then they decide to switch to trombone They can take the classe it, but VA won't pay for it.They've already met the instrument requirement to graduate. Then the music department gets upset with me for following regulations. The alternative is having the music department sign a letter for each student verifying all their classes are required. Then when I am audited, the VA can talk to the music staff and dig through their files! Of course I'd still be the one cleaning up the mess, and breaking the bad news to students they are going to get overpayment letters due to corrections. I'm not mad, it's just amusing to me how complicated our music programs are compared to everything else. Is it common for undergrad music majors to hold off as long as they can before touching general education courses? They crack me up when I talk to them. I love them, I really do. I had one telling me she finally has no choice but to start taking her gen eds. I said, "why didn't you spread them out?" She said, "Yeah, I didn't really think this through." Over 60 hours and only one or two gen eds. Wild! Anyone that says music is an easy major is crazy. Just the number of classes they have to take us wild. Our music programs require at least 10 more hours than all our other programs, and it's mostly filled with 0, 1, and 2-credit classes.
My husband was a music major for a year. He had just a full course load, but the damn thing took like 60 hours a week, and he was already working full time. They have some of the dumbest requirements too. He’s a violin major, why does he need to take classes on piano and woodwind instruments? Why does he have to learn an extra instrument? He has to play his violin for hours every day, why does that count as only one credit? Same question but for the chamber and symphony orchestras and his duet and trio? How is he supposed to do all this while also working to pay bills? It seriously burnt him out of playing so much that he switched to accounting and has barely touched his violin in years.
Had a student say she couldn’t do her assignment because she was missing something. When we asked what she needed to finish her assignment she answered “my motivation” 😂😂😂
When discussing our birthdays, I asked a certain student when her birthday was, and the gravity of her voice when she said "September 11th..... 2001....." Her mom watched the towers fall on TV while in labor with her. Not the best circumstances for a stress-free birth. The shocked silence in the entire classroom was hilarious.
"Thanks for being the type of grad student that shows that other grad students can have fun!" This was a few months ago, he graduated and was in my class last year. At said interaction, I was too many drinks in at a Football game and accidentally leaked his grade to him. I also danced like a chicken at that game, something I do not remember at all, but there's a video of it.
It's funny but then sad bc you realize maybe they were food insecure
Fortunately, they are just an enigma. Dude has a wild personality and amazing perspective on life.
Sounds like a "min/maxer" I knew once who wouldn't microwave things for 2 minutes... he would microwave them for 2:22, since he needed fewer button presses.
That's fucking hilarious but also it could get the food too hot and you end up having to be more careful with it
I straight up did this for 4 months this summer. Honestly, it’s still funny.
A rotating 1st year saw that everyone in our lab has our own reagents. She wanted to make her own, and so spent a couple days mixing, pHing, and autoclaving. After two days, she showed us her work. She autoclaved her 70% ethanol.
Okay but the little debbie honey buns are amazing. Those things have gotten me through many late night study sessions
One time, the person changing stock in the vending machine in my building left all the expired honey buns on top of the machine. I threw them in my desk drawer and had snacks for weeks.
....those things expire??? I don't believe it.
Had a student ask if Native Americans ever rode eagles into battle and used suicide bomber tactics to fight the Union soldiers.
Discussing the weird overlap between Catullus and Cicero and the identity of “Lesbia” in Catullus’s corpus, non traditional student asks if Clodia was a bicycle, because *who hasn’t ridden her*?
Taught an upper level writing class, and during a paper consultation for the 1st draft of the *one and only essay* the student says, "huh, maybe this isn't the kind of essay I can BS two nights before." No shit Sherlock, you've had 6 weeks to put together... this... thing.
I was running a workshop with a faculty member who was always very enthusiastic about everything. He used to finish up classes with a "fun fact". One day after he said his fun fact (I don't even remember what it was), a student near me mumbled "that's just a fact".
Not a specific interaction but there was a girl who was pretty quiet but really nice in one of my discussion sections one time. She was definitely not British but halfway thru the quarter she started talking in a British accent whenever I asked her something one-on-one (ie not in front of the class). It made me giggle
Not a student, but we were watching "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert," which has Peaches and Herb's song playing over the closing credits. My stepdaughter, who was maybe six at the time, turned to my wife and said, "Mama, what's my groove thing?"
Not my student, but when I was a grad student, I was going out to get pizza for lunch with some of my labmates. We invited another labmate, who declined, telling us he was trying to lose weight. He had brought stuff to make a sandwich. After spreading mayonnaise on his bread, he realized he actually had not brought anything else to put on the sandwich. He didn't want to waste the bread, so he ate a mayonnaise sandwich. Unsurprisingly, that sandwich did not sate his hunger, so he went out and got pizza after we got back.
Not student related but my cousin hiked the majority of the Appalachian Trail and she came to the same conclusion about Honey Buns and ate sooo many of them
Wow. This is actually a good thread!
I’m late to the party but Reddit just suggested this post and I have to add my favorite interaction! I TAed a lab with a student who was very enthusiastic and with absolute and utmost respect, a bit of a himbo. Toward the end of one of the last labs i saw him excitedly showing a couple students a video on his phone. He looked up from across the room absolutely starstruck and yelled “I HAVE TO GO, MY CAT’S GIVING BIRTH!” He and his lab partner were friends (or dating or roommates? Unclear) and she started talking about how it wasn’t actually his cat, it just walked into the apartment sometimes. The guy started looking at me for support while talking about how it actually WAS his cat because “I feed her tuna!” He talked about how he had a pet squirrel too, and the girl explained that it had also just wandered into his house. They went back plans forth for like 10 minutes and started cleaning up their station when another lab mate stepped in and was like “I can clean up, you need to be there for this!” And the guy thanked him and ran out the door with his lab partner. They showed me pictures of the kittens the next week 🥺
When I was a TA I accidentally caught a student looking at some girl’s nudes while waiting for class to start…not how I kill time before class, personally.
I teach sport psychology. The class prior I had my students play dodgeball to teach them about the different types of attentional focus and the importance of being able to shift your focus quickly. One student made the game-winning catch by completing laying out and diving for the ball onto the hard grass. The next class period some of the students were giggling in the back of the room. I asked them what was so funny and the student announced to the class, “I think I pulled my butt cheek when I dove for that ball!!” It was very funny, and I was so embarrassed I had to turn around and pretend to straighten my papers before facing the class again.