Reply to Tell High School Students to Stop Contacting Professors

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am horrified by this and would never allow it as a parent. But you are a business professor: they want something from you.

On the other hand, sometimes professors in severely undersubscribed areas are really the ones who should be wanting something from the student. After all, some humanities departments are dying on the vine.

For that reason, I did allow/encourage DC to write two very brief emails: one to a professor in a niche humanities major at a top 10 SLAC, and one to a professor in the same field at a very large but prestigious oos state flagship.

To my great surprise, the large school professor answered; he was lovely and informative. The SLAC professor did not.

Guess where kid did not apply?

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The [b]SLAC professor was probably conserving her time for the students who contribute to her salary and for whose learning she is responsible[/b].

The idea that faculty have a duty to respond to unsolicited junk mail is nuts. The idea that [b]mentoring high school students would be cost effective for anyone who is doing PhD level humanities or social science research is also nuts.[/b] (I have no lab experience. Though I think the value added of a high school student to a lab would be negative, perhaps there are some low level repetitive-but-not-critical tasks that a young student could be made responsible for.)

One reason Lumiere and the other pay-to-play research experience services cost so much is that they have to pay (very junior PhD and postdoc level) people to mentor them.  [/quote]
No mentoring or research was asked for. Just questions about studying there to decide whether to apply ED. You can disagree on whether the SLAC professor was kind of a jerk, but it is a very bad look for SLACs trying to sell themselves on intimate interaction with students. And it is against the prof's self-interest when the department is only producing a few majors a year...and basically has almost no students "for whose learning she is responsible."[/quote]

You have no idea [b]how many junk emails a particular professor gets per week[/b]. If you're on DCUM you know that many many applicants apply for niche subjects with the plan to switch to econ freshman year.

SLACs have whole departments tasked with responding to queries from high school students. [b]It's not the role of teaching faculty to do so[/b].[/quote]
You apparently don't know any professors in niche humanities majors at SLACs -- or seem to have much familiarity with SLACs at all.

You also have a very interesting take, namely, that a professor at a dying humanities department with 2-3 majors a year should not make an "email's worth of effort" to secure enrollment of a potential major the following year. If you are the "OP business prof," might I suggest you get to know your colleagues in marketing better?

As for the "role of teaching faculty" (a redundant phrase in discussing SLACs), it is, to be sure, not part of their job description. But that means, in the long run, they are in danger of not having jobs.

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I was not the OP.

For SLACs, niche departments are service departments. Anthropology and comparative literature professors often teach, for the most part, non-majors who are fulfilling distribution requirements.  [b]Some may lament the lack of serious students committed to their discipline; others may think such students take more time and energy than the average. [/b]

A big rebound in, for example, the number of art history or German majors is highly unlikely, even if professors in those departments start responding to emails from random high school students. [/quote]
That’s really the point: this thread is about contacting professors. I gave an example where a high school student contacting one, before committing to, say, ED is not only appropriate but wise (for an actual humanities kid who will not change majors). If a SLAC professor thinks “having such students take(s) more time and energy” than it’s worth, and does not deign to respond to an email, then that’s something the kid really needs to know — all the more so because it is a SLAC. If a professor is the opposite and is psyched to have any kid expressing real, demonstrated interest in an e-mail (unusual, as you are apparently unaware), that’s great information to have as well. I guess you disagree.

Your point that a humanities rebound is not likely is certainly a profound one. But if a professor can increase their majors by 50% every year or so (even from 2 to 3) by answering a few emails, it is highly advisable that they do so, lest they more rapidly lose yet another tenure track “line” in their department or, worse, have their department permanently “consolidated.” 
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The 16 yr old high schooler doesn’t have “real demonstrated interest” in some boring college research.  They are simply trying to check what is perceived as a prestigious box for their college application so they can get into an “elite” school and feel worthy. [/quote]
If you actually read these posts, the example you are referring to has nothing to do with research and mentoring. Rather, DC was probably applying ED (in only a few weeks) to a SLAC niche humanities department, and wrote a prof. to get a better sense of what it is like majoring in the department (majors yearly could be counted on one hand) before pulling the ED application trigger -- and got no response. Suffice to say, no application was submitted. I am so glad the letter was written before committing, because a similar email was warmly received by a prof at a huge research flagship. Of course an application was submitted there.

There you have it folks, a good reason for a high school kid to contact a professor -- contrary to the thread title.

A high school kid contacting a prof to ask for mentoring and research, on the other hand, is indeed a horrible thing. There is a difference.

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That’s still not the role of a professor. What if everyone wrote professors asking about the major?[/quote]
The kid got valuable information: go to a niche department where a prof is going to go beyond the call of duty (and there are many), or go to one (a SLAC no less; you detractors seem clueless about what profs have to do at SLACs) where one thinks, "This is not my role." Valuable information for the kid to have. Are you seriously arguing kid should not have obtained this valuable info? Er, OK.[/quote]

So, your decision rule is: only go to a place where a professor answered a random, unsolicited email from a non-matriculated student? While it does say that one particular professor at that university seems dedicated, it does not predict -- at all -- the behavior of professors who reserve their time and energy for matriculated students, or the experience of those students as majors in the department.
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