How are kids supposed to address professors? Dr., Professor, first name? Daughter got rude reaction

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the professor who wrote at the top of this page. Even staff who do not work directly with someone initially refer to faculty by "professor." It is simply the formal title used in this professional setting. It is the default unless someone insists on a first name. My belief is that professors should not ask students to refer to them by their first name. If they do insist students use their first name, I would worry they have boundary isssues.

I am flabbergasted to read all these parents who are shocked or resentful that there are formal boundaries in academia. It's not about subservience. It's about professionalism.

I am someone who has a title that could be used and doesn't, not a shocked parent. I will not insist another adult address me in a subservient manner.

May I ask what your title is?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The sad part is that OP and her DD have to live in the world they actually live in, and deal with any consequences thereof, not the world they want to live in.

Sucks not to always be on top. Sucks to try so hard to insult someone, when they don't really care that much -- and yet still are going to pass judgement on you, because that is their job.

Oh, well. Maybe OP feels better for ranting here. One can only hope. It's a small enough gift.

Consequence for an adult addressing another adult by their first name? It's not like OP said her daughter uses "Hey cat lady" or "Yo" to greet professors. What's wrong with "Hi Ryan" or "Hi Suzy"? It's completely normal and okay.

I suggest OP's DC should continue to call the professor and counselor by their first names. I know professors who would give partial credit for wrong answers, try to read answers in a favorable way, allow a student to take a test early or late to go home (not for an emergency), write letters of recommendation for graduate school, provide contacts for jobs. Young professors might prefer "professor" to keep boundaries. Older professors might think it's a sign of respect. Whatever the reason, why would a student want to go against someone's wishes on how they should be addressed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My god, even Gillian, the Howells, Ginger, Maryann and the Skipper has enough sense to use the title Professor! And they were all stranded on an island, not on a college campus!!

Wasn't that in the 60s? Back when a semester of college cost maybe $200 and professors were 99% leisure class white men?

Did the "Professor" even have a name other than professor? That was not due to respect necessarily; I think that was his name in the script.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My god, even Gillian, the Howells, Ginger, Maryann and the Skipper has enough sense to use the title Professor! And they were all stranded on an island, not on a college campus!!

LOL. And note it is Skipper. Don't know what either of their first names were.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the professor who wrote at the top of this page. Even staff who do not work directly with someone initially refer to faculty by "professor." It is simply the formal title used in this professional setting. It is the default unless someone insists on a first name. My belief is that professors should not ask students to refer to them by their first name. If they do insist students use their first name, I would worry they have boundary isssues.

I am flabbergasted to read all these parents who are shocked or resentful that there are formal boundaries in academia. It's not about subservience. It's about professionalism.

I am someone who has a title that could be used and doesn't, not a shocked parent. I will not insist another adult address me in a subservient manner.

May I ask what your title is?

Doctor of Naturopathy

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The sad part is that OP and her DD have to live in the world they actually live in, and deal with any consequences thereof, not the world they want to live in.

Sucks not to always be on top. Sucks to try so hard to insult someone, when they don't really care that much -- and yet still are going to pass judgement on you, because that is their job.

Oh, well. Maybe OP feels better for ranting here. One can only hope. It's a small enough gift.

Consequence for an adult addressing another adult by their first name? It's not like OP said her daughter uses "Hey cat lady" or "Yo" to greet professors. What's wrong with "Hi Ryan" or "Hi Suzy"? It's completely normal and okay.

I suggest OP's DC should continue to call the professor and counselor by their first names. I know professors who would give partial credit for wrong answers, try to read answers in a favorable way, allow a student to take a test early or late to go home (not for an emergency), write letters of recommendation for graduate school, provide contacts for jobs. Young professors might prefer "professor" to keep boundaries. Older professors might think it's a sign of respect. Whatever the reason, why would a student want to go against someone's wishes on how they should be addressed.

I don't understand. Why are you advising the DC to continue to call the professor and counselor by their first names?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the professor who wrote at the top of this page. Even staff who do not work directly with someone initially refer to faculty by "professor." It is simply the formal title used in this professional setting. It is the default unless someone insists on a first name. My belief is that professors should not ask students to refer to them by their first name. If they do insist students use their first name, I would worry they have boundary isssues.

I am flabbergasted to read all these parents who are shocked or resentful that there are formal boundaries in academia. It's not about subservience. It's about professionalism.

I am someone who has a title that could be used and doesn't, not a shocked parent. I will not insist another adult address me in a subservient manner.

May I ask what your title is?

Doctor of Naturopathy

Lol— I think it’s a good thing you don’t require people to use doctor with you given this degree. From what accredited institution, pray tell?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the professor who wrote at the top of this page. Even staff who do not work directly with someone initially refer to faculty by "professor." It is simply the formal title used in this professional setting. It is the default unless someone insists on a first name. My belief is that professors should not ask students to refer to them by their first name. If they do insist students use their first name, I would worry they have boundary isssues.

I am flabbergasted to read all these parents who are shocked or resentful that there are formal boundaries in academia. It's not about subservience. It's about professionalism.

I am someone who has a title that could be used and doesn't, not a shocked parent. I will not insist another adult address me in a subservient manner.

May I ask what your title is?

Doctor of Naturopathy

Omg I hope this is another PP and responding just to eff with me.

Doctor of Naturopathy is literally a made up title for a pseudoscientific field. I wouldn’t use your title either (if you are indeed serious).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the professor who wrote at the top of this page. Even staff who do not work directly with someone initially refer to faculty by "professor." It is simply the formal title used in this professional setting. It is the default unless someone insists on a first name. My belief is that professors should not ask students to refer to them by their first name. If they do insist students use their first name, I would worry they have boundary isssues.

I am flabbergasted to read all these parents who are shocked or resentful that there are formal boundaries in academia. It's not about subservience. It's about professionalism.

I am someone who has a title that could be used and doesn't, not a shocked parent. I will not insist another adult address me in a subservient manner.

OK, but do you really feel that college students are adults just because they have reached the legal adult age? I think we are talking about undergrads here.

Come to think of it, when I was in business school and most of the students were in fact adults, we still called our professors by their last name as they did with us.

[Anonymous]

I know a handful of lunatic morons with EdDs from degree mills who demand they're addressed with Dr.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not OP and haven't read the thread.

Personally I think honorifics should be done away with entirely. I don't think doctors should insist on Dr. I don't think professors should be Prof. I think the use of honorifics perpetuates power imbalances that on the whole aren't good. Let everyone go by first name. And yes, I have honorifics I could use but I don't.

An adult insisting another adult use a title is just cringeworthy behavior to me.

I respect your opinion. Would you consider reading the NYT article linked in this thread to see if any of the issues outlined there might, in your opinion, warrant an exception?

I will find it and read it.

Mostly I find the insistence on honorifics to be the vestiges of a racist and misogynistic history in which those honorifics were used as a way of keeping people who deserved it on their merits out of power.

You want respect? Earn it based on your behavior, not by insisting another adult address you with a title.

So when your kids turned 18 they dropped grandma, grandpa, aunt, uncle...and just went to first names. They immediately started calling all your friends by first name, calling their friends' parents by first name, all without regard to whether those people were ok with it? I'm happy I'm not a professor because I would show no leniency toward students who behaved like OP's DD. I would never mark a right answer wrong, but I'd so no leniency where I wasn't required to. By the way, these are the same people to go to interviews, are overly casual and then wonder why they weren't hired for a job that requires professionalism, or any job for that matter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The sad part is that OP and her DD have to live in the world they actually live in, and deal with any consequences thereof, not the world they want to live in.

Sucks not to always be on top. Sucks to try so hard to insult someone, when they don't really care that much -- and yet still are going to pass judgement on you, because that is their job.

Oh, well. Maybe OP feels better for ranting here. One can only hope. It's a small enough gift.

Consequence for an adult addressing another adult by their first name? It's not like OP said her daughter uses "Hey cat lady" or "Yo" to greet professors. What's wrong with "Hi Ryan" or "Hi Suzy"? It's completely normal and okay.

No. Not completely normal and okay...unless you're a doorknob. If you want to go through go through life as a doorknob by all means overstep your boundaries and show no respect for so societal conventions. People will smile and be polite but will write you off as a moron.

Yep. If OP's daughter wants to call her professors by their first names when they have indicated otherwise because "we're all adults here!!!! I'm paying YOUR salary!!!" then by all means, she should. She should just not be surprised when said professors are not eager to write her letters of recommendation, invite her to work in their labs, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The sad part is that OP and her DD have to live in the world they actually live in, and deal with any consequences thereof, not the world they want to live in.

Sucks not to always be on top. Sucks to try so hard to insult someone, when they don't really care that much -- and yet still are going to pass judgement on you, because that is their job.

Oh, well. Maybe OP feels better for ranting here. One can only hope. It's a small enough gift.

Consequence for an adult addressing another adult by their first name? It's not like OP said her daughter uses "Hey cat lady" or "Yo" to greet professors. What's wrong with "Hi Ryan" or "Hi Suzy"? It's completely normal and okay.

I suggest OP's DC should continue to call the professor and counselor by their first names. I know professors who would give partial credit for wrong answers, try to read answers in a favorable way, allow a student to take a test early or late to go home (not for an emergency), write letters of recommendation for graduate school, provide contacts for jobs. Young professors might prefer "professor" to keep boundaries. Older professors might think it's a sign of respect. Whatever the reason, why would a student want to go against someone's wishes on how they should be addressed.

Are you inferring these professors are unprofessional and suffer from deep-seeded psychological issues as they will attempt to sabotage a young lady's education because of this batsh*t supposed slight?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the professor who wrote at the top of this page. Even staff who do not work directly with someone initially refer to faculty by "professor." It is simply the formal title used in this professional setting. It is the default unless someone insists on a first name. My belief is that professors should not ask students to refer to them by their first name. If they do insist students use their first name, I would worry they have boundary isssues.

I am flabbergasted to read all these parents who are shocked or resentful that there are formal boundaries in academia. It's not about subservience. It's about professionalism.

I am someone who has a title that could be used and doesn't, not a shocked parent. I will not insist another adult address me in a subservient manner.

OK, but do you really feel that college students are adults just because they have reached the legal adult age? I think we are talking about undergrads here.

Come to think of it, when I was in business school and most of the students were in fact adults, we still called our professors by their last name as they did with us.

Good point. My professors also referred to me as Ms. X, so it wasn't an issue of ego/subservience it was just decorum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Question for the Americans: What do you call a 'real' Professor? As in, someone with several decades of academic experience who brings in a lot of funding and leads various groups, etc. Is it not a position here?

It is a position in the US, but in this thread you can see examples of people who have no respect for university professors.

You call them Professor. Dr. might be OK in some circumstances.

But then how do you distinguish them from the postgrad students or just random other industry lecturers? You can't just call them all professors, surely.

What I'm referring to is the idea that a "professor" on DCUM (and apparently in US universities) doesn't even need a PhD. That's impossible in many other countries.

Where I'm from, you're basically a student until you have a PhD (even if you teach some classes - although it's very rare that they'd have a non-PhD leading a course in any decent university, usually they'd just be TAs) at which point you're considered an academic and only after many years and a very strong publication record plus funding achievements would you be even able to apply for a Professorial position. Many (most?) professors have also completed their habilitation.

It's fascinating to me that I could walk into a US university tomorrow with my PhD and teach a class and everyone would need to call me professor I might need to put that on my list to do one day, just for fun... from the sound of this thread, I'd get some strange looks when they find out I have a doctorate but would prefer to be called "professor"!