are professors not required to check in on students?

[Anonymous]

This is hilarious. Maybe you should place an air tag on that boy of yours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is what Life 360 is for. If you want to track your student and don't think they'll tell you if they are going to class or not, you can keep tabs on them.

It's not the professor's job or the college's. They offer an education and many extra services. They aren't a personal concierge.

OMG, land the helicopter and stop monitoring your young adult down to the eyelash. My gosh. Life 360 is stalker-ish behavior. Let your kid have a life outside of you.

If kid is paying this makes sense. If parent is paying for college they have a right to see how their investment is performing. Should they be following 24/7 no but random checking to see if kid is going to class is prudent.

Perhaps, I don't know, ASK your kid. If you don't trust them to tell you the truth I can't help you. You have failed at parenting.

And you simply do get it, but that is true for most of the DCUM crowd.

[Anonymous]

So FERPA and HiiPA prevent professors from getting involved in students not showing up. They are legally adults, so they cannot check on either their grades in other classes, attendance, or mental health--it's illegal!

-SLAC professor

[Anonymous]

I am not allowed to take attendance but I do reach out to students and submit early alerts if they miss a few classes in a row or are in danger of failing.

One of my students died recently and I didn't know until I saw a news report. I care about my students' well-being but it can be hard when they stop attending class and don't respond to emails/calls.

[Anonymous]

The modern college classroom has changed quite a bit. Kids get up in the middle of class and use the restroom. Kids drip in after the class started. Some kids leave early. Most kids take zero to minimal notes. Very few eyeballs are up and on the Professor. Most eyeballs are reading electronic devices. Students drop the class without announcement during any week up to and including the final one. The classes are always changing.

[Anonymous]

If you want your kid to be more supervised, they need to go to a small college where most students live in campus.

[Anonymous]

“Hello Chad? This is Professor Weezic, your Himalayan Sociology instructor? Yeah, I noticed that you’ve missed the last 3 class sessions, and uh—“

“Bite me.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“Hello Chad? This is Professor Weezic, your Himalayan Sociology instructor? Yeah, I noticed that you’ve missed the last 3 class sessions, and uh—“

“Bite me.”

No way Chad is even picking up the phone!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So FERPA and HiiPA prevent professors from getting involved in students not showing up. They are legally adults, so they cannot check on either their grades in other classes, attendance, or mental health--it's illegal!

-SLAC professor

Yet we can call someone’s family if they no show to work for a few days.

Perhaps you midunderstand FERPA and HiiPA.

[Anonymous]

I have a clinical teaching position at an R1 university, and if a student has been absent and/or not turning in work for an extended period of time, I do try to check in to make sure everything is ok and to help if there is support I can provide. But I don't have anyone's phone number, so if I send email and don't get a response, there isn't much more I can do other than to contact the student's advisor (if I can figure out who that is) and let him/her know I'm concerned. I do take attendance because we have a departmental policy that affects grades if there are too many absences, but between my committee work and grading--between covid, helicopter parenting, what the internet has done to everyone's brain (and, relatedly, both mental health issues and the fact that no one reads for pleasure anymore), my students' analytical abilities are nowhere near what they should be at this stage of their lives which means that I spend much more time evaluating their work than I might have years ago, in part because we assign more tasks and in part because I have to address more issues in their writing--I honestly don't have time to pay meticulous attention to their attendance. However, I also think, at least for traditionally-aged students who have the luxury of being able to attend a residential school, that part of what I'm supposed to be doing is preparing my students to be successful adults, and not hovering over them is a key component of that process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So FERPA and HiiPA prevent professors from getting involved in students not showing up. They are legally adults, so they cannot check on either their grades in other classes, attendance, or mental health--it's illegal!

-SLAC professor

Not exactly. FERPA at least is both more complicated and more flexible than that. Especially if you are operating in an advisory capacity, you might like to ask for the next level of institutional training/information at your school. We're not as prevented from helping people as it may initially feel like we are: the law has a bit more legitimate space.

[Anonymous]

Women’s colleges are more known for providing “in loco parentis”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s hilarious.

Of course professors don’t check in on students.

It’s not hilarious. It’s sad and pathetic that universities are not held to some standard to check the welfare of students.

Some lectures have 300+ students. You expect professors to be able to keep track of who is there and who is not?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s hilarious.

Of course professors don’t check in on students.

It’s not hilarious. It’s sad and pathetic that universities are not held to some standard to check the welfare of students.

They are adults. It's not a boarding school. It's college.

My coworkers are adults but we check on them when they don’t show up.

So in that example, the boss didn’t check up on them so in a college, it would be the classmates or dorm mates to check up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, that’s your job as a parent.

And how does a parent do that? Do you have cameras installed in your student's dorm room?

If your child isn’t responding to you and you are worried, go to their school for God’s sake! If they won’t answer their door, call public safety. If they don’t have a roommate, have them let you in. This isn’t hard.