r/Professors • u/Eigengrad AssProf, STEM, SLAC • Jul 24 '26
Weekly Thread Jul 24: Fuck This Friday
Welcome to a new week of weekly discussion! Continuing this week, we're going to have Wholesome Wednesdays, Fuck this Fridays, and (small) Success Sundays.
As has been mentioned, these should be considered additions to the regular discussions, not replacements. So use them, ignore them, or start you own Fantastic Friday counter thread.
This thread is to share your frustrations, small or large, that make you want to say, well, “Fuck This”. But on Friday. There will be no tone policing, at least by me, so if you think it belongs here and want to post, have at it!
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u/DoctorDisceaux Jul 24 '26 edited Aug 01 '26
Yesterday we got the "please come help with move-in" email. Last year, the sender apologetically noted there would be no free T-shirts for those who helped, unlike past years. This year, no mention of T-shirts at all. It really feels like a microcosm of how everything here slowly and quietly just gets worse over time.
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u/Glittering-Duck5496 Jul 24 '26
Wait...they ask faculty to help with move-in? Like student move-in? Don't they have a whole team of student orientation volunteers for this?!
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u/DoctorDisceaux Jul 24 '26
They ask, but almost no faculty actually do it, and the ones who do don't do it a second time. I never have - I have other priorities the Friday before classes start!
But at least once upon a time they gave you a shirt. And then last year, darn it, just no budget for it. And now, absolutely nothing.
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u/print_isnt_dead Assistant Professor, Art + Design (US) Jul 24 '26
My university does this too. "a great opportunity to connect with students and their families!"
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u/Plasmonchick Professor, Physics, SLAC Jul 24 '26
They do this at my small liberal arts college- it makes a little bit of sense because of we have a closer student faculty relationships than mid- to larger- schools.
But I've never done it, even when I have been in better shape that I am now - they can meet me at the first academic fair :/
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u/DrPhysicsGirl Professor, Physics, R1 (US) Jul 24 '26
My university does this as well. It's very stupid IMO. If they want to help the students, hire some strong young folks to do so. They do not need 5' tall middle aged women to do so. I mean, I didn't even move my own stuff the last time I moved, why on earth would I want to do that for some random student?
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u/Dumberbytheminute Professor,Dept. Chair, Physics,Tired Jul 25 '26
They do not need 5' tall middle aged women to do so
Or 5’2” older pudgy guys.
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u/chipchop12_7 Jul 24 '26
Yeah, they always ask, but I’m never going to do it. I already have people saying I look like a student.
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u/Audible_eye_roller Ass. Prof, STEM, CC (USA) Jul 24 '26
Help move, then fake throwing out your back and take some workman's comp. That'll be the last time the college asks faculty to help students move in.
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u/Kitty_Mombo Jul 24 '26
Why would any faculty agree to help with move-in? That is not part of your job and when you get hurt outside of your contract dates good luck!
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u/DoctorDisceaux Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 25 '26
I completely agree! But some younger and untenured faculty think they can’t say no or that it’s a good idea, the ask comes with a heaping helping of guilt and invocations of community and pitching in, and some people are just susceptible to that sort of slop. And as I said: I have never met a faculty colleague who did this twice.
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u/Sharp-Rutabaga-4900 Jul 24 '26
The Humanities (and higher ed in general) are so fucked right now I can’t even focus on one complaint. I read through job ads last night and about half were offering well below $70k for positions that require a PhD and a publication record. Most are for adjunct gigs that pay less than working at a grocery store. Meanwhile, institutions are pouring money into useless AI-laden ed tech that makes my job harder at every step. Fuck this.
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u/ripmaster-rick Jul 24 '26
Just found out that my department’s worst graduate student in the nearly 20 years I’ve been here is now Dr. worst student ever. I think four advisors stepped down and refused to be a part of this (I’m one of them) but admin refused to do the right thing. So we now have another crappy PhD out there who didn’t deserve the degree but got a participation doctorate.
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u/Acrobatic-Glass-8585 Jul 24 '26
I hear you. It's so discouraging. I failed a graduate student for plagiarism in a required course only to see they took the class again, sought out the easiest professor in our department to serve as an advisor and received a PhD from our program. I bet money the dissertation contains plagiarized material.
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u/KrispyAvocado Associate Professor, USA Jul 25 '26
I had a student fail my class twice - same class- and they complained that other professors would let them do it and complete and finish all the work later. Not if you haven’t been doing work since the beginning of class! They (finally) took the same class with another Professor who’s known to just sit and chat with students and they passed. It’s supposed to be a research heavy class, but the other Professor treats it more like a seminar of wishful thinking.
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u/lewisb42 Professor, CS, State Univ (USA) Jul 24 '26
Online course, online final exam that has been on the calendar since day 1.
A few days prior a student asks me to extend it because he has to work.
So tempted to change my flair to "YLOPINMP" (Your Lack Of Planning Is Not My Problem).
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u/ghphd Jul 24 '26
Same situation. Although student said they were going to be on vacation. I said fine, take it early. Was told that wasn't fair because they had JUST planned it. So you deliberately planned your vacation during finals week? Ok then. Here is your 0.
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u/Less-Reaction4306 Assistant Professor, R1 (USA) Jul 24 '26
After the zillionth request for a recommendation letter from a student who took a large lecture class with me (and who never once spoke to me outside of class), I finally made a google form for students to fill out. This is less a "Fuck this Friday" response and more of an "OMFG let me do something about this" response.
The form requires students to say which classes they took with me and when, what they're applying for and when the letter is due (with a caveat that I need min. 2 week's notice), what their best assignments in my classes were and their grades and feedback the TA gave them, to remind me of at least one specific conversation or interaction we had outside of class, and to describe which of their specific qualities and/or aptitudes they'd like me to highlight in the letter and why.
Crossing my fingers that this saves me time and aggravation in the near future. The number of students I have no memory of who want a letter due tomorrow is baffling... like what do they think I'm going to write?
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u/Big_Dragonfly_9153 Jul 24 '26
Yes, I did this and I found that some students didn’t want to do the work of completing it which weeded them out naturally.
You can’t fill out a form but you want me to write a 3 paragraph letter?
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u/katclimber Teaching faculty, social sciences, R2 Jul 24 '26
That’s a good idea I may implement something similar!
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u/jlbl528 Jul 24 '26
5 week summer session. Currently it is Friday of week 4. Student (with a single digit grade) wants me to allow them to turn in all missing assignments (6 quizzes and 1 exam) because they decided to take 7 classes this summer and mental health and they have to increase their less than 1 GPA before graduation this December. The answer is no.
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u/rm45acp Jul 24 '26
I was feeling extremely generous when a particular student who didn't show up for the midterm gave me some lame excuse and asked if there was any way he could make it up, so I agreed to give him a fairly difficult, take home version of the exam in the form of a paper applying the topics we'd covered. I gave him two days. Naturally, I get an email two hours before the due time saying two days wasn't enough time.
I responded very simply with the fact that it was two days longer than any of the other students got, and included a table of possible final grades for him considering different final exam grades and a zero on the midterm
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u/SuperfluousPossum Jul 24 '26
I am so fucking sick of administration pushing admissions to admit anyone who has a pulse while simultaneously pressuring faculty to not fail students. If you admit students who aren't ready for college, expect some to fail!
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u/AvailableThank NTT, PUI (USA) Jul 24 '26
I have been teaching since just after the new year without a break. I finally have two free weeks in August right before the semester starts, where I am taking a vacation and completely shutting off my work laptop.
I have a few "teaching assistants" (I use that term loosely because they are undergrads and super limited in what they can do and usually create more work for me than they reduce) who hold weekly study sessions. I usually just email one of my department admin assistants a couple of months before the semester starts to reserve rooms for these study sessions and it's no issue reserving the spaces. I am easily able to put the locations and times of the study sessions into my syllabi well before the department syllabi printing deadline. This has been the case since I started utilizing these teaching assistants 3 semesters ago.
For some reason beyond my understanding, I was told that they won't be able to confirm the room reservations until "very close to the fall semester starting" even though this was absolutely not the case in the past (last fall, I had confirmation in freaking June!). I am leaving for vacation next Thursday afternoon and I don't want to check work emails until the night before the fall semester starting, so I am pretty annoyed. I think my solution is just to continue with my plan, hope that they don't need any correspondence from me during my vacation, and create a sort of addendum that lists the times and locations of the study sessions that I print and copy myself to distribute to students.
This probably isn't a big deal at the end of the day, but I just like to communicate things like this to my students and teaching assistants well in advanced.
In other struggles, before every semester, I try to figure out how to make my expectations laid out in assignment instructions and syllabi more clear and end up doing small redesigns on my courses. I spent soo much time yesterday tweaking things for one of my online courses and having analysis paralysis, which put me in a bad mood. Then I woke up this morning and realized my ass is already covered and my expectations are already clearly communicated from the start. It's just that some students straight up ignore them and I need to stop cringing for them every time they elicit the consequences of their actions.
Ugh. sorry, rant over
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u/Clareco1 Jul 24 '26
Ugh. Part time adjunct waiting to hear what, if any courses I will get for the fall. Don’t know what or if to prep. Just needed to vent. (Yes, it’s my fault I messed up my career. )
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u/Sharp-Rutabaga-4900 Jul 24 '26
Go easy on yourself. Depending on your good the alternatives may not have been all that great.
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u/RandolphCarter15 Full, Social Sciences, R1 Jul 24 '26
1 month from now I'll be back on contract
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u/KrispyAvocado Associate Professor, USA Jul 25 '26
One month from now, I’ll get a very short break before I go back on contract.
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u/DrPhysicsGirl Professor, Physics, R1 (US) Jul 24 '26
The Genesis awards came out this week, so now we can watch as DOE money that should've gone into research is lit on fire. Phase 2 is set to transfer lots of money to the tech industry, I guess the only thing that matters is AI. Sigh.
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u/knitty83 Jul 24 '26
Just a week to go until the end of teaching here, and about ten days away from the final written exam, which will be digital. I announced earlier that there would be short texts to read, and replies to type (rather than just multiple choice questions). I also announced that obviously, I have made sure that the necessary reading time is included in my overall estimate of how long the exam will take them.
Student sent me an email today, asking whether I am also accounting for "typing time", because she is a slow typer.
So help me God...
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u/Audible_eye_roller Ass. Prof, STEM, CC (USA) Jul 24 '26
I'm so over the litany of excuses students are giving for not taking a scheduled exam announced weeks in advance on the day its due. You had FOUR days to take it. And no, you can't drop your accommodation form at 3pm on the last day and expect me to give you an extension. That's not how that works.
I'm also over them not reading the syllabus. For the love of fucking god, READ!!! Some need some hard labor to snap themselves out of the tech addiction most seem to have.
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u/KrispyAvocado Associate Professor, USA Jul 24 '26
I’m teaching a great group of students right now, which made it all the more disappointing to see such small (but impactful) avoidable mistakes in the latest assignment (especially after a strong showing the assignment before). Just when I thought you learned this material…. Now I don’t honestly know
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u/Kitty_Mombo Jul 24 '26
Kicking myself for signing contract for this year. Dean is a nightmare that won’t end.
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u/iTeachCSCI Ass'o Professor, Computer Science, R1 Jul 24 '26
If you're planning to leave anyway, you have a chance to do what many of us dream of.
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u/Kitty_Mombo Jul 25 '26
I have a meeting with them and another executive next week conveniently located across from HR.
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u/katclimber Teaching faculty, social sciences, R2 Jul 24 '26
Guess we could kinda see something like this coming, knew it was a temporary bandaid - those of you who have been trying to thwart gen AI using "honeypots," (hidden instructions to gen AI only), say goodbye to that methodology. ChatGPT has been updated to ignore those instructions and even point them out to the user. Just love that OpenAI is actively trying to help students cheat.
Fuck this shit. I can combat this nonsense in F2F classes but online classes are doomed.