1. If you give me a due date for an assignment, you should also have a due date for when I get it back—and you should honor it.
Too often I find myself completely in the dark come exam time—because my professor has still not given me any of my grades despite promising to have essays, assignments or tests back in a timely fashion. The unfortunate fact of university life is that in order to best manage exams, one often must study more for courses that are more challenging, or courses that one has a lower grade in. But, oftentimes students have no idea where they stand in a course before the exam. I get it—you’re busy, you have kids, you have emergencies—you have a life. But so do I, so where’s your accommodation note?
2. I can tell when you’ve read my essay, and when you’ve skimmed my essay.
Just like you can tell when I have stayed up until 4am using coffee as a life force to finish my essay, I can tell when you have taken the time to really read and absorb my work, and when you’ve just skimmed it to look for inconsistencies and spelling mistakes. When your comments don’t make sense in regards to my essay as a whole—you’ve been given away. Sure, I could come see you and we could argue about my grades during your office hours, but that’s IF you don’t cancel them. Again.
3. COME TO YOUR OFFICE HOURS, and be on time!
Too many times I have trekked my sorry self across the winter tundra of campus to come to a professor’s office hours,and they either don’t show up, or show up an hour into the office hours. If I can’t walk into class two minutes late clutching caffeine for dear life without you giving me the stink eye, you can’t walk into your office hours late after preaching for 20 minutes of lecture about how students “never take the initiative” to come to office hours.
4. Uploading things after the class has nothing to do with me showing up, or not showing up.
Uploading things before class can have a multitude of benefits for students. Seeing the material before class allows students to prepare questions, thoughts, comments for participation, and also helps guide the notes we take from the readings. Trust me, if I’m not coming to your class, your secret mystery slides are not going to make a difference. It helps the studious kids, and means nothing to the slackers. I happen to be a fine mix of both.
5. If participation is going to be in the syllabus, offer a variety of ways in which students can participate.
If your participation consists only of how much one speaks in class, and how academically constructed their comments are, this form of grading is not fair nor accessible to those suffering with social anxieties, speech disabilities, and learning disabilities. Someone who is suffering from any of these conditions may not find this method of grading to be POSSIBLE. Some people would rather take a zero in participation than speak publicly—and our university classrooms should be accessible to people of all forms of ability. Let those of us who feel unable to participate during class email you comments following class discussion, or talk in small groups.
6. If I put up my hand in class and do participate, listen to what I say, and acknowledge it with your own comments.
There is nothing more discouraging than the moment after you feel like you just spit some academic gold and a professor just nods and says “okay, who else.” I want to know what you think about what I have just said: am I on the right track? Do you disagree? Am I academic dirt? Let me know!
7. If I bring up a discrepancy about my grade, stop telling me “It’s only ___ percent.”
The thing is, medical school, law school, master’s programs—they don’t care if it’s only ____ percent. Every percentage counts, and I’m taking the time to demonstrate that I really care about my grades. Maybe 1% isn’t a lot, but I don’t want it to be the 1% that pushes me out of a competitive GPA for my future. Honour my dedication.
8. Please stop giggling and saying “You are all going to hate me, I know it’s a lot of reading, etc.”
You aren’t being relatable. Stop it.
8a. Unless you are going to actively try to prepare us for the amount of readings, provide us with strategies to manage the readings, or listen to our feedback on how we feel about the course load, yes, we may very well hate you. Don’t make light of this stress—consider how you could use your academic experience to help us with the course load.
8b. OR JUST GIVE US A READING WEEK (hint, hint, Western).
9. “Back when I was in university we had to…..”
Stop, stop, stop, stop. Let’s be clear. Some things have definitely gotten better since your ripe days of university education. We are absolutely lucky for some of the technological advancements that we have been granted with, the access that Western gives us to libraries and study spaces, and public transit. BUT, back when you were in university, it was cheaper. Degrees were of WAY more value—currently my degree might get me a sick job flipping burgers, who knows. The cost of university today results often in students having 2-3 part time jobs, which reflects poorly on our performance, and our ability to time manage. Most of us will never even be able to fully own homes. THINGS SUCK FOR US TOO.
10. If you are working constantly at adapting your classroom to help students—thank you.
Though one may think that I have a large vendetta against professors at Western University, I can confidently say that I have had some gems as professors. So, thank you to the professors who actively try to engage with the struggles students face, and do what they can in their classroom to make our academic journey any easier. You are so appreciated.