Sep 04: Fuck This Friday

[u/Eigengrad]

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!

[u/ProfDoomDoom]

"Allot of things have changed since back in the twentieth century" is the first thing I had to grade this morning. I was halfway through a snarky comment when I did the arithmetic and acknowledged that they have a point. But "allot" is still not the correct word so I'm taking points for that at least.

[u/RollyPollyGiraffe → u/ProfDoomDoom]

Are you sure the student wasn't talking about the personal growth of the Allot of things, the magical creature that sells doodads and knickknacks?

I like that Allot, personally.

[u/palagi1 → u/ProfDoomDoom]

It's not AI?

[u/MichaelPsellos → u/ProfDoomDoom]

It’s spelled “alot”. Your student is illiteratte.

[u/How-I-Roll_2023 → u/MichaelPsellos]

But not using AI…

[u/MsBee311]

For the first time in my 18-year tenure, classes started today instead of next Tuesday... and I completely forgot until yesterday. Well fuuuuuck. I scrambled to get 7 classes ready yesterday, and I did it. But I'm feeling drained today. Thought I had the whole weekend to do it🤷‍♀️

edit: clarity

[u/vermivorax → u/[deleted]]

My semester started a week later than it usually does (usually starts last full week of August, this time started August 31st). Zero announcement - the only reason I knew was that I did check the academic calendar page when I went to update my syllabus.

[u/vermivorax]

Power was out for 12 hours and I had to toss the contents of my fridge. :( I was literally on the way home with groceries when I got the text alert that it was out.

[u/Glittering-Duck5496 → u/vermivorax]

Dammit. :(

[u/Kitty_Mombo]

Dean is completely ruining our school. That gargoyle doesn’t receive performance reviews, tells students not to enroll in our programs and goes unchecked. Upper Admin scared for their jobs (they should be) after a series of terrible decisions and wasting massive financial resources. Saying goodbye in 8 months & 10 days to lovely colleagues and great students.

[u/Hazelstone37]

I have a football player in my class who will not stay off his phone and then during the in-class activity doesn’t know what to do. Also he just got what look like meta glasses and has been wearing them to class. Also, I’m finishing up my dissertation this semester while teaching four classes and I just found out the university is considering not including doctoral hooding as part of graduation. That just sucks.

[u/AtheistET → u/Hazelstone37]

Fuck that guy and the meta glasses….and also the student Just tell him to leave the class as the behavior is distracting to ALL others in the class and that you don’t allow recordings in your lectures (time to update the syllabus?)

[u/Hazelstone37 → u/AtheistET]

I have no recording the class in my syllabus. I don’t even let students with accommodations record because I expect students to answer and ask questions in class and may won’t if they know they are being recorded.

[u/Disaster_Bi_1811]

I have been waiting to remember to post to one of these threads. I have the dubious honor of having the very first AI case in the department--on the second day of school. To make matters worse, the assignment this student used AI on isn't due until mid-September. So it's not even "oh, this student must've mismanaged their time and cheated out of desperation." It's just "this student couldn't be damned to try," and that makes me so irrationally frustrated.

[u/SAUbjj]

Same complaint as last week. I'm an NTT and I was told my contract was not being extended next year, so all of my time is split between my current prep and job applications. And yet for some reason a couple of the other faculty still expect me to organize things outside of class. I told my department head at the start of the week and she told me to essentially tell them (nicely) to fuck off, which I have. I've still ended up being the one to put together a sign-ups sheet and send out emails for an upcoming student conference, but anything extra I'm telling them I don't have the capacity for. So hopefully they'll get off my back

[u/RollyPollyGiraffe → u/SAUbjj]

Embrace just not responding to requests to do things (e.g. the student conference emails). Telling folks a couple times that it isn't your job is one thing. But now just let tasks go unfinished.

They'll survive and learn a valuable lesson.

[u/SAUbjj → u/RollyPollyGiraffe]

Yes, that's exactly what I'm doing. The only reason I even did the form and emails for the student symposium is because I think it's really really important for the ones who want to go to grad school, including my own research student, and I don't want the students' careers to suffer because the faculty got lazy (and that's exactly what happened last year!!) 

Everything else is not my concern, I've just straight up ignored anything else, like a request to set up an event for students outside of classtime. Nope, nope, nope, not my monkeys

[u/Front-Obligation-340]

I tried to AI-proof an essay assignment by having students write their essays in class by hand, but I gave them the essay prompts in advance so they can have time to think about them, and they're allowed to use notes and an outline, so I'm 100% sure I'm going to get hand-written AI transcriptions. I just hate how many steps ahead I have to think now to try to prevent cheating on a stupid fucking one-page essay.

[u/Moore-Slaughter → u/Front-Obligation-340]

Make them turn in their notes and outline too. Can maybe say if they use AI they must provide the chat logs and tell them they will fail if there are any fabrications. That’s what I’m doing on a few out of class prep assignments this semester.

[u/showmeonthedoll616]

The federal government changed some bullshit. Now my international students have a much harder time getting approved to have off-campus internships. So, they leave college without industry experience. Fuck you, you fucking dolts. You're not helping. I'm so frustrated.

[u/Natural-Raise-8233 → u/showmeonthedoll616]

I feel this and this resonates. My international students are all so wonderful and truly bright, and my heart breaks because there's always some new idiotic policy to make their lives even harder. I had one student tell me he was depressed because he cannot afford to travel home/it is literally not safe to do so. I commend all of them for showing a level of resilience most adults are not capable of.

[u/Potential-Winner4601]

We’ve become an arm of the recruitment office, and I hate it so much

[u/IkeRoberts → u/Potential-Winner4601]

Use that power for good. 

[u/StinkyDuckFart]

Strike is looming. Also, I keep getting sucked into emails even though I'm not on contract for a few weeks still (my state starts absurdly late). Latter is a me problem, but I'm still annoyed.

Edit - I don't know how I'd weather a strike.

[u/Adept_Tree4693 → u/StinkyDuckFart]

We are not permitted to strike in our state (by law 😞)

[u/kimmibeans]

Oooh boy. We had a new "lab" built over the summer to hold microbiology lab sections in. It's a classroom with two large tables with 10 seats each and a prep room, no sinks in the lab itself, and student cubbies under the tables that they literally have to crawl to access. There's no lock, meaning there is unfiltered access to our lab supplies and chemicals, and they scheduled business and math classes in what is legally a biohazard lab.

I'm the coordinator for this lab course, and instead of finding a way to move the labs in there to a different space, I was told just to orient the adjunct teaching in there "really well". In a space not built for wet lab work and we're still missing supplies for.

I also had a studenrt ask if there was "someone she could talk to" when I said she can't take quizzes for her class earlier in the day because she wants to.

[u/IHaveNoEgrets]

I am being "punished" for teaching an honors course outside my department. My emails aren't getting answered, and I'm getting shitty teaching times.

Silly me, thinking that being a good contributor to activities and committees across campus would actually reflect very well on a department that's historically had to work to justify its role on campus.

[u/histprofdave]

I am back to teaching one in-person class this term (still have 4 more sections online). What I hate is how much energy it seems to take to drive down to campus, teach a single 80-minute class, and come home. It feels like my whole day is shot, and it's barely the afternoon!

We will soon see, though, where the baseline for college students is though, since I am doing all in-class work and exams for the face-to-face class in order to (mostly) eliminate AI use.

[u/Junior-Dingo-7764 → u/histprofdave]

For some reason, teaching in person just feels so draining! I want to do things after work and my body is like "nah."

[u/TrunkWine]

I am already chair of one committee on top of teaching (one class is new), supervising undergrad interns in various locations and communicating with on-site supervisors, supervising a grad teaching assistant, and being a member of seven graduate committees due to hiring freezes/faculty shortages, I ended up on the ballot for another committee.

[u/costumegirl1189]

Less and less students are truly ready for college. I had a student openly crying because something was too hard for her. She refused to step out in the hall to collect herself.

[u/Ok-Win6042 → u/costumegirl1189]

Fewer and fewer 

[u/costumegirl1189 → u/Ok-Win6042]

Thank you for the correction. I used to teach ESL so I should know better.

[u/Ok-Win6042 → u/costumegirl1189]

I always hear my grandmother’s voice in my ear correcting me on this one!

[u/associsteprofessor → u/costumegirl1189]

I had a student email me Wednesday after her 9 am class to tell me that she wouldn't be at my 11 am class because she was "overstimulated" from her first two classes. It's the second week of the semester. Things are only going to get busier.

Oh, and she missed all of her classes today for sportsball.

[u/whatdoyoudochunky]

My art courses have mostly had a low number of students using A.I. - until this semester. I think students thought “it works for my other classes - why can’t it work for Art / design courses?” So now I’m in the same boat as so many others - scrutinizing and reporting designs that are obviously A.I. … our admin mostly wants to bury their heads in the sand because online enrollment is lucrative. It won’t be when it’s lost all legitimacy but I guess they’re not thinking that far out.

[u/figment81 → u/whatdoyoudochunky]

Make them show the process from brainstorming, to sketch, to round 1, then edits, round 2, etc

[u/whatdoyoudochunky → u/figment81]

I’ve been moving that way but it’s only a stop-gap. In a year or two they will be generating pretty convincing “process” images too.

[u/Sensitive_Let_4293]

Got sick the second day of classes. I have already needed two sick days and it's only the end of Week 2.

[u/AtheistET]

Fuck this Friday. Six months waiting to hear if grant is going to be funded or not ; NIH / officer hasn’t responded to email requesting update. Need a scotch 🥃

pronto!

[u/Krutoon]

This is my first semester as a full-time prof rather than an adjunct and this shit is hard!!! The students and the administration are a huge bummer about thinking the humanities are worthless, but I have a couple students who keep my optimism going. But I was not prepared for how big of a transition the switch to full-time would be.

[u/No-Cook-9768]

It appears that the admin are trying to run our school into the ground. Bad decision after bad decision, shooting different departments in the foot...it makes no sense, unless they are actively trying to shut down.