{"id":6235,"date":"2011-04-15t07:00:08","date_gmt":"2011-04-15t13:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/?p=6235"},"modified":"2011-04-12t11:47:39","modified_gmt":"2011-04-12t17:47:39","slug":"student-and-faculty-expectations-about-responsibilities-highlights-from-a-conversation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2011\/04\/student-and-faculty-expectations-about-responsibilities-highlights-from-a-conversation\/","title":{"rendered":"student and faculty expectations about responsibilities &#8211; highlights from a conversation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/dirkdallas\/5056062295\/\"><img data-attachment-id=\"6237\" data-permalink=\"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2011\/04\/student-and-faculty-expectations-about-responsibilities-highlights-from-a-conversation\/5056062295_e6d3096e54_m-2\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/cdn.vanderbilt.edu\/vu-wp0\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/59\/2018\/07\/09153732\/5056062295_e6d3096e54_m1.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"179,240\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"design is a good idea\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/cdn.vanderbilt.edu\/vu-wp0\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/59\/2018\/07\/09153732\/5056062295_e6d3096e54_m1.jpg\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/cdn.vanderbilt.edu\/vu-wp0\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/59\/2018\/07\/09153732\/5056062295_e6d3096e54_m1.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-6237\" title=\"design is a good idea\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.vanderbilt.edu\/vu-wp0\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/59\/2018\/07\/09153732\/5056062295_e6d3096e54_m1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"179\" height=\"240\" \/><\/a>by cft assistant director derek bruff<\/em><\/p>\n<p>last month, the cft hosted a conversation titled \u201c<strong>negotiating student expectations about freedom and responsibility<\/strong>.\u201d  we\u2019ve found that when students and faculty have very different  expectations about teaching and learning, a variety of teaching  challenges can result, frequently leading to frustration for both  teachers and students. we\u2019re planning to explore this topic throughout  2011, and last month\u2019s conversation was our second event in this  exploration. (i previously blogged <a href=\"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2011\/02\/student-and-faculty-expectations-about-grades-highlights-from-a-conversation\/\">some highlights from our first conversation<\/a>, one on expectations about grades.)<\/p>\n<p>the conversation last month was exploratory in nature, designed to surface various perspectives on the different expectations students and faculty can have about their respective responsibilities but not necessarily to leave participants with concrete solutions for negotiating these expectations. we were glad to have several undergrads participate in the discussion.\u00a0 it seemed important to have student voices part of a conversation on student expectations!<\/p>\n<p>below are some perspectives on three aspects of this topic that seemed to generate the most discussion, along with a list of other areas in which student and faculty expectations about responsibilities sometimes diverge.<\/p>\n<h3>attendance policies<\/h3>\n<p>should instructors use attendance policies to hold students accountable for coming to class?\u00a0 here are some arguments in favor of attendance policies that were raised during the discussion:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>attending class helps students learn the course material.<\/li>\n<li>a student who skips class doesn&#8217;t contribute his or her unique perspective to the class discussion, negatively affecting other students&#8217; learning opportunities.<\/li>\n<li>instructors have to come to class. why not students, too?<\/li>\n<li>an instructor&#8217;s job is to help all students learn, not just those students responsible enough to come to class without some form of accountability.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>and some arguments against attendance policies:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>students who miss classes are likely to do poorly on other assessments (exams, papers).\u00a0 why penalize them further through an attendance policy?<\/li>\n<li>requiring unmotivated students to attend class results in poorer quality discussions and classroom management problems. better to let these students skip class.<\/li>\n<li>the goal is student learning.\u00a0 if students can learn the material well enough (or better) without coming to class, they should be allowed to do so.<\/li>\n<li>students should learn to be responsible for their own education and for managing their time. attendance policies short circuit this learning process.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>for one student&#8217;s perspective on this topic, read this guest blog post by erin baldwin, class of 2014: &#8220;<a href=\"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2011\/03\/from-a-students-view-fair-attendence-policies\/\">from a student&#8217;s view: fair attendance policies<\/a>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h3>&#8220;doing the reading&#8221;<\/h3>\n<p>should students be expected to &#8220;do the reading&#8221; before class? participants noted that students who don&#8217;t complete pre-class readings for discussion-based classes aren&#8217;t able to contribute as meaningfully to those class discussions.\u00a0 and students who do the reading are likely to be frustrated with those who don&#8217;t, particularly if they &#8220;drag down&#8221; the class discussion.<\/p>\n<p>it was also noted that an instructor who reviews the reading at the start of class (often because s\/he suspects that many students haven&#8217;t come to class prepared) tacitly encourages students not to do the reading. this creates a negative feedback loop in which students are rewarded for not preparing for class, and is something about which instructors should be cautious.<\/p>\n<p>some participants questioned the wisdom of requiring pre-class readings, particularly extensive ones. they noted that it can be challenging for a novice to make sense of a lengthy reading before hearing the instructor&#8217;s take on the material. one student participant noted that she is often able to understand her readings better after class, once she gets a sense of the &#8220;big picture&#8221; from her instructor. one option for instructors to assist students struggling with reading assignments is to provide them with guiding questions for each reading, giving them a sense of that &#8220;big picture&#8221; before class.<\/p>\n<p>participants also mentioned that students are often highly pragmatic in how they approach their studies. if it&#8217;s possible to do well in a course without doing the readings before class (or without doing all the readings at any point in a course), many students will elect to use their limited time working on other courses. other students (and instructors) see value in reading broadly for a course, however.<\/p>\n<h3>exam preparation<\/h3>\n<p>should instructors provide students with some sort of exam review aid (e.g. practice exam, review guide) before tests?\u00a0 <strong><\/strong>this question generated a lot of discussion.\u00a0 it was noted that fraternities and sororities keep copies of old exams on file, perhaps giving students in the greek system an advantage over other students unless instructors provide exam review aids of comparable usefulness.\u00a0 however, some participants argued that if a student doesn\u2019t know the material for an exam by that point in the semester, a review guide won\u2019t help much.<\/p>\n<p>some participants floated the argument that an instructor&#8217;s responsibility to prepare students for exams is fulfilled through class sessions, and that additional support (such as review guides) isn&#8217;t required.\u00a0 along those lines, one student said that she doesn\u2019t expect an exam review aid from her instructors, but that she\u2019s happy to receive one when it\u2019s made available.<\/p>\n<p>participants identified different aspects of an exam that might be highlighted in a review guide\u2014the course content that\u2019s \u201cfair game\u201d for the exam, the format of the exam, or the level of difficulty of the exam questions (factual recall, application, and so on).<\/p>\n<h3>other points of contention<\/h3>\n<p>during breakout group discussions, workshop participants surfaced a variety of other areas where students and faculty sometimes have different expectations for their respective responsibilities.\u00a0 here are a few:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>returning graded work &#8211; how long should students wait to receive back their graded work?\u00a0 a couple of days?\u00a0 a week?\u00a0 this depends on the nature of the assignment, of course.\u00a0 the length of time it takes to grade student work has an impact on their subsequent learning and performance in a course, however.<\/li>\n<li>make-up work &#8211; should assignment deadlines be hard and fast or should students be allowed to make up work with a sufficiently reasonable excuse?\u00a0 is allowing one student to make up an assignment fair to other students who completed it on time?\u00a0 if make-up work is not allowed, might that unfairly punish students with legitimate reasons for not completing the original assignment?\u00a0 and what relationship does this issue have with preparation for students&#8217; professional work after college?<\/li>\n<li>missed classes &#8211; should instructors review class material during office hours with students who miss classes?\u00a0 are students entitled to this given how much tuition they or their parents or sponsors are paying?\u00a0 or does that tuition essentially pay for an &#8220;event ticket&#8221; and if they miss the show, it&#8217;s their problem?<\/li>\n<li>mobile devices in the classroom &#8211; should students be allowed to use laptops and other mobile, connected devices during class? or should instructors disallow this to prevent a variety of potential distractions? are there other options for handling the &#8220;wireless in the classroom&#8221; issue?\u00a0 see these <a href=\"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2010\/09\/wireless-in-the-classroom-highlights-from-the-conversation\/\">highlights from a fall 2010 conversation on this topic<\/a> for some ideas.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>earlier this semester, guest blogger mara truslow (class of 2013) explored another aspect of this topic in her post &#8220;<a href=\"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2011\/02\/from-a-students-view-freedom-and-structure-within-a-course\/\">from a student&#8217;s view: freedom and structure within a course<\/a>.&#8221; in her post, mara discussed the extent to which students should be able to set their own learning objectives in a course.<\/p>\n<p>the cft will continue to explore the topic of negotiating student expectations for learning throughout 2011. look for more guest blog posts in our &#8220;from a student&#8217;s view&#8221; series, as well as additional conversations this fall. we hope to put together a set of suggested strategies for negotiating and clarifying expectations, as well.<\/p>\n<p><em>image: \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/dirkdallas\/5056062295\/\">design is a good idea<\/a>,\u201d dirk dallas, flickr (cc)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by cft assistant director derek bruff last month, the cft hosted a conversation titled \u201cnegotiating student expectations about freedom and responsibility.\u201d we\u2019ve found that when students and faculty have very different expectations about teaching and learning, a variety of teaching challenges can result, frequently leading to frustration for both teachers and students. we\u2019re planning to&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":451,"featured_media":6237,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[132,136,135,125],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/cdn.vanderbilt.edu\/vu-wp0\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/59\/2018\/07\/09153732\/5056062295_e6d3096e54_m1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6235"}],"collection":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/451"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6235\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}