Question for professors and educators.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because of Covid and distance learning most students won’t be well prepared for college.

They weren't before. My son went to a well regarded public HS that offered lots of APs courses. In 9th grade, he got full credit in all of his classes for any work turned in before the quarter ended. So if work was assigned during the 2nd week of school and due during the 3rd week, he could hand it in in the 9th week of the quarter and get full credit. No points at all taken off for lateness. I couldn't believe this was true. He told me it was but I didn't believe him so I emailed all of his teachers. They confirmed that it was true. They said the school district wanted students to get the best grade they could for the work they turned in regardless of when it was completed. WTH? I took him out of there at Christmas and put him in a local Catholic HS. If the work is turned in one day later, he gets 50% taken off. Two days late, he gets a zero. A real zero, not a 50%. How can students be prepared for college with this wishy washyness?

[Anonymous]

The insistence on acceleration in math leaves a lot of students with a shaky grasp of fundamental concepts and poorly prepared for higher level work.

+10

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because of Covid and distance learning most students won’t be well prepared for college.

They weren't before. My son went to a well regarded public HS that offered lots of APs courses. In 9th grade, he got full credit in all of his classes for any work turned in before the quarter ended. So if work was assigned during the 2nd week of school and due during the 3rd week, he could hand it in in the 9th week of the quarter and get full credit. No points at all taken off for lateness. I couldn't believe this was true. He told me it was but I didn't believe him so I emailed all of his teachers. They confirmed that it was true. They said the school district wanted students to get the best grade they could for the work they turned in regardless of when it was completed. WTH? I took him out of there at Christmas and put him in a local Catholic HS. If the work is turned in one day later, he gets 50% taken off. Two days late, he gets a zero. A real zero, not a 50%. How can students be prepared for college with this wishy washyness?

Was that this year? Our school had quite strict policies similar to your Catholic HS's, but with Covid, the district has mandated no more than one hour of homework a week, forced teachers to waive all penalties, set zeros at 50%, and so on. I teach and it's a disaster. Many of my colleagues and I are very unhappy about this, but they're nothing we can do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because of Covid and distance learning most students won’t be well prepared for college.

They weren't before. My son went to a well regarded public HS that offered lots of APs courses. In 9th grade, he got full credit in all of his classes for any work turned in before the quarter ended. So if work was assigned during the 2nd week of school and due during the 3rd week, he could hand it in in the 9th week of the quarter and get full credit. No points at all taken off for lateness. I couldn't believe this was true. He told me it was but I didn't believe him so I emailed all of his teachers. They confirmed that it was true. They said the school district wanted students to get the best grade they could for the work they turned in regardless of when it was completed. WTH? I took him out of there at Christmas and put him in a local Catholic HS. If the work is turned in one day later, he gets 50% taken off. Two days late, he gets a zero. A real zero, not a 50%. How can students be prepared for college with this wishy washyness?

Was that this year? Our school had quite strict policies similar to your Catholic HS's, but with Covid, the district has mandated no more than one hour of homework a week, forced teachers to waive all penalties, set zeros at 50%, and so on. I teach and it's a disaster. Many of my colleagues and I are very unhappy about this, but they're nothing we can do.

No. This was 4 years ago. My DS is now a freshman in college and there are no changes to grading in college due to Covid.

[Anonymous]

I also think the whole rubrique concept has made them very flustered when they encounter an assignment that would allow them to be creative. They want a lot of direction (like to see an example if the completed assignment) in advance!

[Anonymous]

Rubrics are so dummies. We had to learn what our individual teachers wanted quickly since we might only have them for one semester. They would write notes on our papers so we could adjust to their expectations. Now you just follow the dots to your A. No wonder everyone has an A.

[Anonymous]

I have been taught at different Ivy League institutions for the past few decades. What was true in the 1980s remained true in the 1990s and the 200s and now: There is a very small group of students at the top schools (top 1-5 percent of those attending) which is truly gifted. This group was brilliant and remains so. After that tier, you have smart, motivated kids who have jumped through whatever hoops they had to in order to get admitted.

Today's students have had to do many multiples of the work that was required 20-30 years ago just to be admitted. So, yes, most of them needed support from parents to achieve this (we are putting applicants through incredible pressures as everyone knows). If they show up as freshmen less independent than earlier cohorts, we really shouldn't be surprised. Nor it is such an issue. Most grow up eventually. Some don't. Life continues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One thing I find puzzling as I am a millennial (in my 30s, so I also grew up with the internet) and an assistant professor is the generation younger than mine doesn't seem to know how to look up information. Whether it is on the textbook, or even using google/wikipedia searches effectively. I too have noticed this desire to be spoon fed formulaic material. You would think that with smart phones in their pockets, the one thing students would be good at would be finding information at their fingertips, but I haven't found that to be the case.

Many students have never seen a text book. Mine never had one until we moved them to Catholic school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, they're really ill prepared academically and emotionally. I've been teaching college for 20 years and in the last 4 years students have gotten much more demanding.

All this AP class is not helping ?

AP classes are taught to the test. And in many schools, once the test is over they stop learning.
Kids get the message from this that the point is not knowledge/education, it is a score/grade.

Exactly.

[Anonymous]

I have a theory about why the quality of writing has gone down. I have a bright teenager that is incredibly well-informed regarding national and international events, politics and history. He reads all day long. However, the vast majority of his reading is on the internet. When I was his age, I read constantly, as well, but I was reading books written by great authors. I would have loved to have the immediate access to information that he has, but the quality of the writing that he is reading on a daily basis is just not the same. My kid can produce a decent paper, but he hasn’t developed an “ear” for a well-turned phrase.

[Anonymous]

I’ve been a professor in an interdisciplinary field (bridges social sciences and STEM) for 10 years and agree with all of the observations here. The writing ability has absolutely declined and the need for spoon feeding (aka “scaffolding” in edu speak) has gone way up. Students want to know exactly what is going to be on a test. They seem to lack the ability to pick up on cues about what I am emphasizing and get overwhelmed by all the info. They want me to tell them I won’t test them on xyz and I tell them I wouldn’t bother going over xyz if I didn’t think it was important! There is a lot of pressure to provide practice tests, detailed study guides, and increasingly detailed rubrics for writing assignments. I hate grading papers with a rubric. I would much rather give a holistic grade along with comments on specific elements or sections. That is what I remember from college. Now they want a detailed justification of every single point you take off. Students seem to think they start out with 100% and the professor takes points away, as opposed to starting with a 0 and earning points. Some of them want you to “pre grade” their work, going over it sentence by sentence during office hours. I’ve had to put a stop to that preemptively by saying I will only give high level feedback before an assignment is due because I can’t pre-grade everyone’s papers.

I think the lack of textbooks in ES/HS is also hurting them. Now none of them see the need to buy the textbook in college and they are missing out on the opportunity to fill in their knowledge gaps by reading the chapters. Some textbooks are written by international experts in the field and they are missing our not reading them. I know textbooks have gotten expensive but there are cheaper options such as rentals, used books, and electronic copies. But they just assume they can get away without it. I wish students were less concerned with points and grades and more concerned with learning, but they’ve grown up in a system that teaches them to only care about points and grades. It’s frustrating. Some students are outstanding but I worry about a lot of them.

Please don’t take this post as a reflection of my writing. These are stream of consciousness thoughts typed on my phone before coffee!

[Anonymous]

I have been a professor for 20 years, and agree with everything the PP just said!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have been taught at different Ivy League institutions for the past few decades. What was true in the 1980s remained true in the 1990s and the 200s and now: There is a very small group of students at the top schools (top 1-5 percent of those attending) which is truly gifted. This group was brilliant and remains so. After that tier, you have smart, motivated kids who have jumped through whatever hoops they had to in order to get admitted.

Today's students have had to do many multiples of the work that was required 20-30 years ago just to be admitted. So, yes, most of them needed support from parents to achieve this (we are putting applicants through incredible pressures as everyone knows). If they show up as freshmen less independent than earlier cohorts, we really shouldn't be surprised. Nor it is such an issue. Most grow up eventually. Some don't. Life continues.

Maybe your grammar shows that the old generation do not have the imaginary better writing that they claim to have?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ve been a professor in an interdisciplinary field (bridges social sciences and STEM) for 10 years and agree with all of the observations here. The writing ability has absolutely declined and the need for spoon feeding (aka “scaffolding” in edu speak) has gone way up. Students want to know exactly what is going to be on a test. They seem to lack the ability to pick up on cues about what I am emphasizing and get overwhelmed by all the info. They want me to tell them I won’t test them on xyz and I tell them I wouldn’t bother going over xyz if I didn’t think it was important! There is a lot of pressure to provide practice tests, detailed study guides, and increasingly detailed rubrics for writing assignments. I hate grading papers with a rubric. I would much rather give a holistic grade along with comments on specific elements or sections. That is what I remember from college. Now they want a detailed justification of every single point you take off. Students seem to think they start out with 100% and the professor takes points away, as opposed to starting with a 0 and earning points. Some of them want you to “pre grade” their work, going over it sentence by sentence during office hours. I’ve had to put a stop to that preemptively by saying I will only give high level feedback before an assignment is due because I can’t pre-grade everyone’s papers.

I think the lack of textbooks in ES/HS is also hurting them. Now none of them see the need to buy the textbook in college and they are missing out on the opportunity to fill in their knowledge gaps by reading the chapters. Some textbooks are written by international experts in the field and they are missing our not reading them. I know textbooks have gotten expensive but there are cheaper options such as rentals, used books, and electronic copies. But they just assume they can get away without it. I wish students were less concerned with points and grades and more concerned with learning, but they’ve grown up in a system that teaches them to only care about points and grades. It’s frustrating. Some students are outstanding but I worry about a lot of them.

Please don’t take this post as a reflection of my writing. These are stream of consciousness thoughts typed on my phone before coffee!

The insanely high GPA required for medical and graduate schools are making students highly stressed about their grades .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I have a theory about why the quality of writing has gone down. I have a bright teenager that is incredibly well-informed regarding national and international events, politics and history. He reads all day long. However, the vast majority of his reading is on the internet. When I was his age, I read constantly, as well, but I was reading books written by great authors. I would have loved to have the immediate access to information that he has, but the quality of the writing that he is reading on a daily basis is just not the same. My kid can produce a decent paper, but he hasn’t developed an “ear” for a well-turned phrase.

In addition teaching writing is very labor intensive.