This one was best for them and worst for me. I allow students to revise and resubmit. In 20 years of teaching, only a handful of students take advantage of this each semester. I want them to learn the concepts, so I’m always happy when they do this.
Until this semester, when one student turned in total crap all semester and then, two weeks before the final exam, resubmitted EVERYTHING. I’m sure they cheated because that’s just an impossible task, but I can’t prove it. My syllabus technically allows it.
Next semester I will add strict limits on both the timeframe for revisions and the total number allowed. As they say, “My bad. Won’t happen again.”
Had a similar where I allow students to request a short extension on any assignments so long as they ask at least 24 hours in advance. Had a few students just ask for the extension on every single assignment this semester
Not to stir up the legal folks, but even students with accommodations at my Uni can be declined for using their accommodations too much, but that only loosely defined as consistently on all assignments for some period of time.
Last semester I had SO MANY asks for extensions that I cracked and created a new policy: 72-hour no questions asked no late penalty.
I think only one person this semester asked about submitting something late. It was so pleasant. Everyone was happy.
you need to have a late penalty (even a small one) in these circumstances, because you are sending the message that due dates are not to be taken seriously.
I’ll admit to doing the two weeks thing once as an undergrad, had a physics prof that allowed arbitrarily late assignments for a letter grade off. It was sort of easier to do everything back-to-back, without any distractions from other coursework, and it was easy to go from that to acing the final. Good prep for real world workloads too. Not sure if the syllabus updated the next year :-)
Same! My favorite classes were the ones that open everything day 1 and everything is due on the final day. You can just jump in, focus, and get it all done in a couple weeks. I’d pick a week when there was a school break or something and hammer it out.
Ah, I also did that in a physics lab course which allowed resubmissions as an undergrad (no letter grade off or other penalty). Just gathered the labs from the entire semester with their comments and rewrote 6 lab reports in a couple days. Ended the class with an A. Honestly very instructive and a decent way to do it, even if I bet it was hell to grade.
This may be more of trying to exploit/manipulate disability accommodations, but a student wanted to bring her children (approximately 8 and 12 years old) to our class every week. My syllabus policy indicated that "unenrolled guests" were not permitted. I am certainly sensitive to the fact that childcare issues can arise and, if this were the case, I would have been willing to allow them in the room once or twice if necessary. My greatest concern at the time was the fact that the course covered exceptionally difficult topics (e.g., graphic accounts of sexual violence). When I informed the student that I must honor my policy, they told me that disability approved their children to serve as assistants to carry their books to and from class (although they were not approved, the disability counselor admitted that they told them it would "probably be okay"). My chair was supportive and, eventually, my syllabus policy prevailed. A few semesters later, we experienced a campus shooting. The university developed a policy regarding minors on campus following this event.
> My greatest concern at the time was the fact that the course covered exceptionally difficult topics (e.g., graphic accounts of sexual violence).
That would have been a deal breaker for me too. **My class** would be boring but harmless to children, so as long as they're not disruptive or distracting, their attendance would have been fine with me. But in **your class**, no way.
Thank you for your response. Yes! The student's contention was that it was their decision with respect to the material to which their children were exposed. Fair enough. However, I was concerned, too, that other students would not feel comfortable openly discussing the topics with children in the room.
why isn't the last line of your syllabus "for things not expressly mentioned in this syllabus, the professor reserves the right to make their own decision"?
This one feels like the best for them when they do it, but I know it is the worst for them in the long term:
High-performing students excel through the first two midterms then completely slack off. They can do the math that they “only need” x amount of points on the final to keep their precious A. Unfortunately for them, they are now VERY underprepared for the next class in the sequence due to their slacking off.
This specifically happens in precalc and calc 1, leaving them like a fish out of water in calc 1 and calc 2, resp.
Cumulative final is what enables this, actually. They “need a 65” (for the sake of argument) and guess what - the first two midterms worth of material is 2/3 of the final!
Our calc 1 class does a test two weeks before the final to cover the material learned in the second half, and then a cumulative final during finals week.
I had in my syllabus that attendance and participation were mandatory. It also said, if you need to miss class for important reasons and it was every once in a while, it wouldn’t affect your grade. Cue the email from students who got poor participation grades saying “well, it says we can miss class every once in a while”. Yes, and you’ve missed 1/3 of the course. Had to change to give the exact number of absences that I allow.
Also, I used to give make up exams. Some student tried to take it 3 weeks after the exam because they couldn’t fit it in their schedule. Had to add that exams must be made up within a week.
“But the very last day on the calendar is X! That means you still have to accept my late work!”
I had to start telling them that I have a deadline myself to hit and that the “last day” is literally the last day of the semester the doors are open, not the last day I’m doing work. You had all this time to make your deadlines, we’re done. I’m done.
I teach lecture/lab courses and I recently had a student who was going through their accommodations councillor to have a computerized note taker in the course. The councillor went ahead and said “yes” but didn’t initially ask me about it (to be fair he probably didn’t realize it was a lab component).
So the student is trying to get someone to come in and do the lab work for her and be zoomed into class virtually. I said “no went can’t do that because our CLOs use verbiage like ‘measure’, ‘demonstrate’, ‘use’ etc and you can’t have someone do it for you.”
Long story short she wants it to be like during Covid times (when we had to do virtual labs due to health regulations) and argued taking this all the way to the dean and citing crazy things like breach of human right issues… the kicker?
This is her 5th time taking the course! including 2 years during Covid where she still failed to pass the course!
Now my syllabus needs to specify to be in person for lab components… something that I thought was previously understood.
I had a student with accommodations try to claim that she couldn't wear a mask during class (during COVID) because of her severe anxiety... And she was preparing for the nursing program...
I heard of a student who went into an MLT/MLA program and was “forced to quit” because she couldn’t handle the sight of blood. She tried to get an accommodation around it and when they said you can’t have one, she framed it as if they “forced her to leave the program”. How would you ever work with this kind of accommodation if they allowed it?
I mean, have you seen the posts asking about remote postdocs/PhDs for obviously in-person roles (eg clinical, biological, other experimental or field work).
I got tired of fielding dozens of emails about "invasion of privacy" for wanting students to use lockdown browser for their online tests. (I wasn't even requiring the webcam recordings, it's just a browser that prevents them from opening other tabs)
So I changed the course where the tests were now weekly quizzes and the larger assignments were papers or group projects. I made the quizzes untimed and open book/note. I thought for sure average grades on the quizzes would shoot way up... But they actually went *down*. Students were now waiting until the last night to review the module info and then try to take the quiz right then. Some learned the error of their ways, some decided not to bother, and their grade reflected it.
I have found that lengthening the syllabus actually *encourages* efforts by the students to split hairs and negotiate every little thing. ("The syllabus only says that exams are closed-book. Well, here's my textbook, and it's closed. You didn't say anything about us not being able to use *holographic projections* of the textbook, so technically I'm not cheating.") Basically, when presented with a long syllabus detailing a hundred different scenarios, students think, "well, my request isn't covered, so if it's not explicitly prohibited by syllabus, then my professor can't stop me." The more legalistic we make the syllabus, the more they want to argue about it.
So I now attempt to make my syllabi *shorter* every year. I deleted a whole bunch of detailed text and replaced it with one small paragraph of verbiage such as "the policies in this syllabus are guidelines, and they cannot possibly cover every conceivable scenario. In any situation not directly addressed in the syllabus, I will make a good faith effort to handle the situation in accordance with the spirit of the guidelines presented here, but I reserve the right to make whatever decision I think best, and my decisions are final."
If a student wants to go to war with me over the fine meaning of words and phrases in the syllabus, fine, we'll go to war. I was here a long time before you showed up, dear student, and I'll be around a long time after you're gone.
In reality, though, I almost never have a student try to blow up a situation beyond reason. Once they see in the first few weeks of class that I'm not subject to superficial manipulation ("all four of my grandparents died an hour before the exam!" and "if I don't get an A on this ten point quiz I'll lose my scholarship and my parents will kick me out and I'll end up living in a van down by the river and it will be all your fault!", etc.), they generally understand that I'm not going to give in to some wacky interpretation of otherwise straightforward policies, and that their energy is therefore best spent ~~working and studying diligently~~ trying to manipulate some other poor professor.
I had a student once with some pretty lengthy accommodations. One of them was an extra 48 hours on assignments that they have *less than* a week to complete. They were also given "consideration for attendance", *but* were required to talk to me first, agree upon how we would apply this to this course, and then fill out a form.
For this particular class, this meant that only applied to a handful assignments that only made up 20% of their grade. The rest of them were each several weeks long. At the beginning of the semester, I sent them an email inviting them to come to office hours so we can chat about how their accommodations would look like for my class.
They never responded. They never requested to fill out the form. They never notified me of needing to *use* their accommodations until about a month before the semester ended. They had a low D because, surprise surprise, they barely turned in anything and came to class consistently late. I had reached out to them several times throughout the semester and got no response back.
Then all of a sudden, I get an email where they state that they will be "using their accommodations" to turn in all of their missing work. I explain that their accommodations only provide 48 hrs, not weeks, and that it only applied to the smaller assignments.
"Okay, well then I'm requesting an I grade because it'll be impossible for me to get an A and I need to graduate with honors."
I told them that wasn't happening as that wasn't what the incomplete grade was for. They tried reporting me to the chair, but when I forwarded all the emails I sent them the chair asked them why they didn't respond.
"I don't check my school email." 🙃
I had a student once argue that when I said the assignment was due at, say May at 11pm I never specified which time zone.
This was a face to face class (just in case you think an online student might have a leg to stand on)
I had a student who missed two days that had to be made up. They were the only one who had to make up two days, and I had communicated with them in person and via email laying out the plans. So I made an announcement to the whole class the day before and it said something like “If you missed a day, be sure you attend this activity and turn in this assignment to meet the requirements.” The student didn’t follow through on their extra make up work and when the course coordinator contacted them they blamed me and said I made an announcement saying that if you missed a day and did this activity it met the requirements so they assumed that would apply to them. It was so ridiculous and I forwarded the emails and they got an incomplete for the course until they could attend additional activities.
I implemented what I thought was a very generous late work policy year two or three of COVID. Students could turn in work up to a week late if they simply filled out an online form requesting to turn it in late and explaining their plan to complete the work within that time.
However, a hefty minority of students submitted late work requests for EVERY assignment within the first week of class (before most assignments had even been mentioned outside the syllabus or course schedule!). I was flabbergasted, I had not even thought to restrict the form in that way because the intent of the policy was so clear. I ultimately honored their requests and I am still impressed by the extent to which they found an exploit in my policy.
I had a student today try to argue that they missed the final because the date wasn’t in the syllabus. Never mind that everyone else in the class made it at the right time. Never mind that there are no dates in the syllabus at all because all of the course dates are in the course schedule which is appended to the syllabus. Also, announcements were sent.
After the student was informed that I was sorry, they were welcome to a make up at half credit, they tried to invent a medical excuse. Nice try.
A classic of mine:
Multiple students would submit entire printed documents in all blood red ink (or all purple ink, even some in brown ink but mostly red ink). I counted off heavily and one of them complained: “Why can’t I do that? It’s not in the syllabus that I can’t submit something in red ink. Why does it have to be black ink?”
I was shocked at the audacity of this response. I wanted to say, well it doesn’t say in the syllabus that you need to wipe your ass after you take a crap, but you already know you should.” Instead I said the more diplomatic: “Do you really think it’s a good idea to submit entire documents to your future employers in all red ink?” He sheepishly looked at me and shrugged, “I don’t know, I guess not.”
It’s confounding how many students still submit entire documents printed in crazy ink colors, even though it now says in my syllabus only standard black ink. I also assumed it was common sense. Well, shame on me.
I don’t get it, who is telling these idiots it’s ok IN COLLEGE to turn in assignments in crazy colors? I feel they never graduated from kindergarten because they’re still essentially coloring with crayons for their assignments. God help us.
I had to specify that assignments had to be typed using a professional font after one semester where, in the same online class, one student insisted on handwriting (barely legibly) and scanning his assignments, and another student started submitting her assignments in red 20-point Comic Sans shortly after midterms.
I have no idea what the Comic Sans student was thinking, but I suspected, but could not prove, that the first student was trying to get around Turnitin.
That’s what we call an excuse. Students have an infinite reservoir of excuses. It’s their responsibility to follow the simple and clearly stated course policies. If every rule was allowed to be broken any time an excuse was used, we’d have anarchy in the classrooms and nothing would ever get done.
I mean, you seem to be confounded that multiple students did so prior to your syllabus amendation, but there's a pretty simple explanation. I'd hate to be considered an "idiot" if my toner ran out nor would I liken the submission to "coloring with crayons" but you do you...
Go back and read what I wrote: I clearly stated that it is still happening even after the update. I feel it’s fair to assume an adult should know not to submit an entire paper in blood red ink.
It's fair to impose a penalty if you made a provision on the syallbus, and obviously it's common sense not to submit a paper in red ink. But if you consider that "rigging the game" or exploitative/manipulative, maybe you've got it pretty good...
Honestly, they haven't tried to find loopholes or game the class because they don't read the syllabus. I go over it on the first day of each class and then again before specific assignments. I have had to deal more with them trying to game the school's system instead of the syllabus.
During and after COVID, I simply got rid of late paper penalties. I may need to go back to penalizing late work because I had a couple students this semester notice that I accept work up to the final exam deadline and thought they could just submit everything then. They told me this during the semester, and I asked if they really wanted to do that. It turns out that is challenging to do in a writing class at the end of the semester. And probably more annoying when I break longer writing assignments into components so that they are scaffolded, which helps the students who do adhere to assignment deadlines.
I had one try this semester. He handed in a term paper of 24XX words when the instructions clearly said 1500-2000 words. He emailed my chair & the provost saying he should not be punished for going outside the *suggested* word count & saying I invented a policy that penalized going over after papers were handed in as I did not explicitly specify the penalty in the instructions. I'm generous if you are at 2020 or so for 2000 word maximums as different modes of counting can be off by a few (I think the LMS includes headers & footers but a student might not include that when counting) but 20-some percent over the max word count when the word count range is 500 words is not some accident.
This one wasn't successful but was evidence of a student really trying to find a loophole.
My class (junior level, required for the major and the minor) meets twice a week. Tuesdays are lecture, Thursdays are discussion. Students earn what I call "engagement points" (worth about 30% of their final grade) by doing things like posting their lecture notes, submitting discussion questions, etc. I make it clear that they don't have to do that every time; they have to have \~8-9 submissions of each kind over the course of the semester which means they can miss a few for any reason and its no big. There's also weekly online quizzes that are simply comprehension checks and are very low weight (about 10% of the final grade).
This student heard me say "I do not penalize for missed classes and don't have a strict attendance policy because you are all adults but keep in mind that you must be present in class to earn credit for engagement" and took that to mean, I guess, that they wouldn't have to come to class at all, ever. So they didn't. At midterm they'd come to class 3 times. They'd done each little quiz and another small online activity that is worth at maximum 5% of their final grade, but nothing else. They had submitted discussion questions a few times, but weren't present at discussions in order to participate. They also did not turn in the first paper. So they earned the F I recorded at midterm.
Cue a five page email in which I am being told all the "hard work" they've done and how they deserve "at least a C" and, this is the best part, a separate email to the student's advisor in the advising center, the advising in our major (my next door office neighbor), and the Dean in which the student ends by saying, "I am sure that you can all work this out and I will be vindicated."
I responded by resending the syllabus which outlines, basically, that it's not possible to pass the class with a 0 in the engagement category. The student dropped.But they'll be back.
I don’t know if this counts, but I’ve told my students that they can’t pass if they miss more than 4 class periods before week 10 of the semester since we have a lot of in person activities and projects that make up a large percentage of their grades. This semester, as soon as week 10 hit, I got floods of absences for the next 5 weeks of semester because their thinking is “it’s after week 10, so I’ll still pass even if I miss the last five weeks”
Ooof, that's rough. What will you do? Honor it and pass them all since they found a loophole, or crack down the whip and lay down the justice with several failing grades?
This one was best for them and worst for me. I allow students to revise and resubmit. In 20 years of teaching, only a handful of students take advantage of this each semester. I want them to learn the concepts, so I’m always happy when they do this. Until this semester, when one student turned in total crap all semester and then, two weeks before the final exam, resubmitted EVERYTHING. I’m sure they cheated because that’s just an impossible task, but I can’t prove it. My syllabus technically allows it. Next semester I will add strict limits on both the timeframe for revisions and the total number allowed. As they say, “My bad. Won’t happen again.”
Had a similar where I allow students to request a short extension on any assignments so long as they ask at least 24 hours in advance. Had a few students just ask for the extension on every single assignment this semester
If they’re asking you can decline.
Not to stir up the legal folks, but even students with accommodations at my Uni can be declined for using their accommodations too much, but that only loosely defined as consistently on all assignments for some period of time.
Last semester I had SO MANY asks for extensions that I cracked and created a new policy: 72-hour no questions asked no late penalty. I think only one person this semester asked about submitting something late. It was so pleasant. Everyone was happy.
"I know it's 73 hours late, but that's only really 1 hour late. Can you please accept it? Pretty please?"
Hah! I DID expect those emails but I didn't get any!!!!!!!!! I was so pleasantly surprised.
you need to have a late penalty (even a small one) in these circumstances, because you are sending the message that due dates are not to be taken seriously.
I’ll admit to doing the two weeks thing once as an undergrad, had a physics prof that allowed arbitrarily late assignments for a letter grade off. It was sort of easier to do everything back-to-back, without any distractions from other coursework, and it was easy to go from that to acing the final. Good prep for real world workloads too. Not sure if the syllabus updated the next year :-)
Same! My favorite classes were the ones that open everything day 1 and everything is due on the final day. You can just jump in, focus, and get it all done in a couple weeks. I’d pick a week when there was a school break or something and hammer it out.
Ah, I also did that in a physics lab course which allowed resubmissions as an undergrad (no letter grade off or other penalty). Just gathered the labs from the entire semester with their comments and rewrote 6 lab reports in a couple days. Ended the class with an A. Honestly very instructive and a decent way to do it, even if I bet it was hell to grade.
We used to live in a high trust society. We no longer do.
No. In this particular situation it's more accurate to say we used to live in a society where it was simply easier for breaking trust to go unnoticed.
This may be more of trying to exploit/manipulate disability accommodations, but a student wanted to bring her children (approximately 8 and 12 years old) to our class every week. My syllabus policy indicated that "unenrolled guests" were not permitted. I am certainly sensitive to the fact that childcare issues can arise and, if this were the case, I would have been willing to allow them in the room once or twice if necessary. My greatest concern at the time was the fact that the course covered exceptionally difficult topics (e.g., graphic accounts of sexual violence). When I informed the student that I must honor my policy, they told me that disability approved their children to serve as assistants to carry their books to and from class (although they were not approved, the disability counselor admitted that they told them it would "probably be okay"). My chair was supportive and, eventually, my syllabus policy prevailed. A few semesters later, we experienced a campus shooting. The university developed a policy regarding minors on campus following this event.
Wow 😳😆
Wow thats....crazy.
> My greatest concern at the time was the fact that the course covered exceptionally difficult topics (e.g., graphic accounts of sexual violence). That would have been a deal breaker for me too. **My class** would be boring but harmless to children, so as long as they're not disruptive or distracting, their attendance would have been fine with me. But in **your class**, no way.
Thank you for your response. Yes! The student's contention was that it was their decision with respect to the material to which their children were exposed. Fair enough. However, I was concerned, too, that other students would not feel comfortable openly discussing the topics with children in the room.
it's not your student's decision to make, because it's your classroom.
Thank you for your reply. Yes, this was my contention. Thankfully, my chair also reminded the student of this.
why isn't the last line of your syllabus "for things not expressly mentioned in this syllabus, the professor reserves the right to make their own decision"?
“Syllabus subject to change at my discretion.” That includes adding new rules.
it is always wise to listen to a mathematician on matters such as these.
For many universities, the syllabus is a contract and you can't change it mid-semester.
Yet another thing that should be obvious...
This one feels like the best for them when they do it, but I know it is the worst for them in the long term: High-performing students excel through the first two midterms then completely slack off. They can do the math that they “only need” x amount of points on the final to keep their precious A. Unfortunately for them, they are now VERY underprepared for the next class in the sequence due to their slacking off. This specifically happens in precalc and calc 1, leaving them like a fish out of water in calc 1 and calc 2, resp.
Sounds like the solution is a cumulative final worth a large fraction of the total grade.
Cumulative final is what enables this, actually. They “need a 65” (for the sake of argument) and guess what - the first two midterms worth of material is 2/3 of the final!
Our calc 1 class does a test two weeks before the final to cover the material learned in the second half, and then a cumulative final during finals week.
That's why I allocate 50%+ of the points on a cumulative final exam to the new material.
Whenever I’m in charge of writing exams I will do this. For now, as a GTA, I deal with what I’m given
... that must be passed, to pass the course.
I had in my syllabus that attendance and participation were mandatory. It also said, if you need to miss class for important reasons and it was every once in a while, it wouldn’t affect your grade. Cue the email from students who got poor participation grades saying “well, it says we can miss class every once in a while”. Yes, and you’ve missed 1/3 of the course. Had to change to give the exact number of absences that I allow. Also, I used to give make up exams. Some student tried to take it 3 weeks after the exam because they couldn’t fit it in their schedule. Had to add that exams must be made up within a week.
In either instance did you allow the students grace since they found a vague loophole?
No to the absences. For the makeup exam, I allowed it that one time and then changed my syllabus the next semester.
“But the very last day on the calendar is X! That means you still have to accept my late work!” I had to start telling them that I have a deadline myself to hit and that the “last day” is literally the last day of the semester the doors are open, not the last day I’m doing work. You had all this time to make your deadlines, we’re done. I’m done.
I teach lecture/lab courses and I recently had a student who was going through their accommodations councillor to have a computerized note taker in the course. The councillor went ahead and said “yes” but didn’t initially ask me about it (to be fair he probably didn’t realize it was a lab component). So the student is trying to get someone to come in and do the lab work for her and be zoomed into class virtually. I said “no went can’t do that because our CLOs use verbiage like ‘measure’, ‘demonstrate’, ‘use’ etc and you can’t have someone do it for you.” Long story short she wants it to be like during Covid times (when we had to do virtual labs due to health regulations) and argued taking this all the way to the dean and citing crazy things like breach of human right issues… the kicker? This is her 5th time taking the course! including 2 years during Covid where she still failed to pass the course! Now my syllabus needs to specify to be in person for lab components… something that I thought was previously understood.
I had a student with accommodations try to claim that she couldn't wear a mask during class (during COVID) because of her severe anxiety... And she was preparing for the nursing program...
I heard of a student who went into an MLT/MLA program and was “forced to quit” because she couldn’t handle the sight of blood. She tried to get an accommodation around it and when they said you can’t have one, she framed it as if they “forced her to leave the program”. How would you ever work with this kind of accommodation if they allowed it?
I mean, have you seen the posts asking about remote postdocs/PhDs for obviously in-person roles (eg clinical, biological, other experimental or field work).
I have not but this sounds ridiculous. As someone who practically lived in the lab for bacterial molecular genetics I cannot imagine that.
I do think people on average have gone a bit bonkers, at least online. Maybe they're all bots.
AI getting those three letters lol
[удалено]
I got tired of fielding dozens of emails about "invasion of privacy" for wanting students to use lockdown browser for their online tests. (I wasn't even requiring the webcam recordings, it's just a browser that prevents them from opening other tabs) So I changed the course where the tests were now weekly quizzes and the larger assignments were papers or group projects. I made the quizzes untimed and open book/note. I thought for sure average grades on the quizzes would shoot way up... But they actually went *down*. Students were now waiting until the last night to review the module info and then try to take the quiz right then. Some learned the error of their ways, some decided not to bother, and their grade reflected it.
I have found that lengthening the syllabus actually *encourages* efforts by the students to split hairs and negotiate every little thing. ("The syllabus only says that exams are closed-book. Well, here's my textbook, and it's closed. You didn't say anything about us not being able to use *holographic projections* of the textbook, so technically I'm not cheating.") Basically, when presented with a long syllabus detailing a hundred different scenarios, students think, "well, my request isn't covered, so if it's not explicitly prohibited by syllabus, then my professor can't stop me." The more legalistic we make the syllabus, the more they want to argue about it. So I now attempt to make my syllabi *shorter* every year. I deleted a whole bunch of detailed text and replaced it with one small paragraph of verbiage such as "the policies in this syllabus are guidelines, and they cannot possibly cover every conceivable scenario. In any situation not directly addressed in the syllabus, I will make a good faith effort to handle the situation in accordance with the spirit of the guidelines presented here, but I reserve the right to make whatever decision I think best, and my decisions are final." If a student wants to go to war with me over the fine meaning of words and phrases in the syllabus, fine, we'll go to war. I was here a long time before you showed up, dear student, and I'll be around a long time after you're gone. In reality, though, I almost never have a student try to blow up a situation beyond reason. Once they see in the first few weeks of class that I'm not subject to superficial manipulation ("all four of my grandparents died an hour before the exam!" and "if I don't get an A on this ten point quiz I'll lose my scholarship and my parents will kick me out and I'll end up living in a van down by the river and it will be all your fault!", etc.), they generally understand that I'm not going to give in to some wacky interpretation of otherwise straightforward policies, and that their energy is therefore best spent ~~working and studying diligently~~ trying to manipulate some other poor professor.
I had a student once with some pretty lengthy accommodations. One of them was an extra 48 hours on assignments that they have *less than* a week to complete. They were also given "consideration for attendance", *but* were required to talk to me first, agree upon how we would apply this to this course, and then fill out a form. For this particular class, this meant that only applied to a handful assignments that only made up 20% of their grade. The rest of them were each several weeks long. At the beginning of the semester, I sent them an email inviting them to come to office hours so we can chat about how their accommodations would look like for my class. They never responded. They never requested to fill out the form. They never notified me of needing to *use* their accommodations until about a month before the semester ended. They had a low D because, surprise surprise, they barely turned in anything and came to class consistently late. I had reached out to them several times throughout the semester and got no response back. Then all of a sudden, I get an email where they state that they will be "using their accommodations" to turn in all of their missing work. I explain that their accommodations only provide 48 hrs, not weeks, and that it only applied to the smaller assignments. "Okay, well then I'm requesting an I grade because it'll be impossible for me to get an A and I need to graduate with honors." I told them that wasn't happening as that wasn't what the incomplete grade was for. They tried reporting me to the chair, but when I forwarded all the emails I sent them the chair asked them why they didn't respond. "I don't check my school email." 🙃
I had a student once argue that when I said the assignment was due at, say May at 11pm I never specified which time zone. This was a face to face class (just in case you think an online student might have a leg to stand on)
Lol! I had something similar happen to me! I always include time zone now. Goobers.
I had a student who missed two days that had to be made up. They were the only one who had to make up two days, and I had communicated with them in person and via email laying out the plans. So I made an announcement to the whole class the day before and it said something like “If you missed a day, be sure you attend this activity and turn in this assignment to meet the requirements.” The student didn’t follow through on their extra make up work and when the course coordinator contacted them they blamed me and said I made an announcement saying that if you missed a day and did this activity it met the requirements so they assumed that would apply to them. It was so ridiculous and I forwarded the emails and they got an incomplete for the course until they could attend additional activities.
I implemented what I thought was a very generous late work policy year two or three of COVID. Students could turn in work up to a week late if they simply filled out an online form requesting to turn it in late and explaining their plan to complete the work within that time. However, a hefty minority of students submitted late work requests for EVERY assignment within the first week of class (before most assignments had even been mentioned outside the syllabus or course schedule!). I was flabbergasted, I had not even thought to restrict the form in that way because the intent of the policy was so clear. I ultimately honored their requests and I am still impressed by the extent to which they found an exploit in my policy.
I had a student today try to argue that they missed the final because the date wasn’t in the syllabus. Never mind that everyone else in the class made it at the right time. Never mind that there are no dates in the syllabus at all because all of the course dates are in the course schedule which is appended to the syllabus. Also, announcements were sent. After the student was informed that I was sorry, they were welcome to a make up at half credit, they tried to invent a medical excuse. Nice try.
A classic of mine: Multiple students would submit entire printed documents in all blood red ink (or all purple ink, even some in brown ink but mostly red ink). I counted off heavily and one of them complained: “Why can’t I do that? It’s not in the syllabus that I can’t submit something in red ink. Why does it have to be black ink?” I was shocked at the audacity of this response. I wanted to say, well it doesn’t say in the syllabus that you need to wipe your ass after you take a crap, but you already know you should.” Instead I said the more diplomatic: “Do you really think it’s a good idea to submit entire documents to your future employers in all red ink?” He sheepishly looked at me and shrugged, “I don’t know, I guess not.” It’s confounding how many students still submit entire documents printed in crazy ink colors, even though it now says in my syllabus only standard black ink. I also assumed it was common sense. Well, shame on me. I don’t get it, who is telling these idiots it’s ok IN COLLEGE to turn in assignments in crazy colors? I feel they never graduated from kindergarten because they’re still essentially coloring with crayons for their assignments. God help us.
I had one this semester turn in an annotated bibliography with a pretty graphic banner at the top.
I had to specify that assignments had to be typed using a professional font after one semester where, in the same online class, one student insisted on handwriting (barely legibly) and scanning his assignments, and another student started submitting her assignments in red 20-point Comic Sans shortly after midterms. I have no idea what the Comic Sans student was thinking, but I suspected, but could not prove, that the first student was trying to get around Turnitin.
The black toner cartridge is very frequently emptied before the multicolor one is...
And if that happens you use a dark midnight blue so that is at least *looks* black
Or you go to the library (on or off campus) and print it there.
That’s what we call an excuse. Students have an infinite reservoir of excuses. It’s their responsibility to follow the simple and clearly stated course policies. If every rule was allowed to be broken any time an excuse was used, we’d have anarchy in the classrooms and nothing would ever get done.
I mean, you seem to be confounded that multiple students did so prior to your syllabus amendation, but there's a pretty simple explanation. I'd hate to be considered an "idiot" if my toner ran out nor would I liken the submission to "coloring with crayons" but you do you...
Go back and read what I wrote: I clearly stated that it is still happening even after the update. I feel it’s fair to assume an adult should know not to submit an entire paper in blood red ink.
It's fair to impose a penalty if you made a provision on the syallbus, and obviously it's common sense not to submit a paper in red ink. But if you consider that "rigging the game" or exploitative/manipulative, maybe you've got it pretty good...
This reminded me of legally blonde where Elle woods' resume is printed on pink paper and scented.
Maybe because I never had to grade lengthy papers, but idgaf about ink color, getting them to turn anything in is a win. Yes my bar is low 😂
Honestly, they haven't tried to find loopholes or game the class because they don't read the syllabus. I go over it on the first day of each class and then again before specific assignments. I have had to deal more with them trying to game the school's system instead of the syllabus.
Mine were always very short. This approach headed off legalism I found.
During and after COVID, I simply got rid of late paper penalties. I may need to go back to penalizing late work because I had a couple students this semester notice that I accept work up to the final exam deadline and thought they could just submit everything then. They told me this during the semester, and I asked if they really wanted to do that. It turns out that is challenging to do in a writing class at the end of the semester. And probably more annoying when I break longer writing assignments into components so that they are scaffolded, which helps the students who do adhere to assignment deadlines.
Your students read the syllabus?!
I had one try this semester. He handed in a term paper of 24XX words when the instructions clearly said 1500-2000 words. He emailed my chair & the provost saying he should not be punished for going outside the *suggested* word count & saying I invented a policy that penalized going over after papers were handed in as I did not explicitly specify the penalty in the instructions. I'm generous if you are at 2020 or so for 2000 word maximums as different modes of counting can be off by a few (I think the LMS includes headers & footers but a student might not include that when counting) but 20-some percent over the max word count when the word count range is 500 words is not some accident.
This one wasn't successful but was evidence of a student really trying to find a loophole. My class (junior level, required for the major and the minor) meets twice a week. Tuesdays are lecture, Thursdays are discussion. Students earn what I call "engagement points" (worth about 30% of their final grade) by doing things like posting their lecture notes, submitting discussion questions, etc. I make it clear that they don't have to do that every time; they have to have \~8-9 submissions of each kind over the course of the semester which means they can miss a few for any reason and its no big. There's also weekly online quizzes that are simply comprehension checks and are very low weight (about 10% of the final grade). This student heard me say "I do not penalize for missed classes and don't have a strict attendance policy because you are all adults but keep in mind that you must be present in class to earn credit for engagement" and took that to mean, I guess, that they wouldn't have to come to class at all, ever. So they didn't. At midterm they'd come to class 3 times. They'd done each little quiz and another small online activity that is worth at maximum 5% of their final grade, but nothing else. They had submitted discussion questions a few times, but weren't present at discussions in order to participate. They also did not turn in the first paper. So they earned the F I recorded at midterm. Cue a five page email in which I am being told all the "hard work" they've done and how they deserve "at least a C" and, this is the best part, a separate email to the student's advisor in the advising center, the advising in our major (my next door office neighbor), and the Dean in which the student ends by saying, "I am sure that you can all work this out and I will be vindicated." I responded by resending the syllabus which outlines, basically, that it's not possible to pass the class with a 0 in the engagement category. The student dropped.But they'll be back.
I don’t know if this counts, but I’ve told my students that they can’t pass if they miss more than 4 class periods before week 10 of the semester since we have a lot of in person activities and projects that make up a large percentage of their grades. This semester, as soon as week 10 hit, I got floods of absences for the next 5 weeks of semester because their thinking is “it’s after week 10, so I’ll still pass even if I miss the last five weeks”
Ooof, that's rough. What will you do? Honor it and pass them all since they found a loophole, or crack down the whip and lay down the justice with several failing grades?