[Each week at ProfHacker, George Williams hosts "Open Thread Wednesday," a discussion forum in which readers are invited to share their answers to a particular question. The Commenting and Community Guidelines still apply.
You can suggest topics or ask us questions via email: ProfHackerCHE@gmail.com. —Ed.]
Back in April, at the end of a semester with a particularly heavy workload, Ethan wrote a post about “developing an electronic communication policy.” You may remember his memorable description of “an almost daily torrent of [student] emails, which not only took far more time than I would have liked to sort out…but [which] became a source of incredibly irrational stress.” Now that a new academic year is underway, I’d like us to revisit this topic from a slightly different angle.
Ethan’s thoughtful policy does a good job of imposing some useful conditions on student’s use of (and expectations regarding) email. However, I’m starting to wonder if maybe the goal should be to encourage students to use some other method to resolve whatever it is they’re trying to resolve by sending you an email.
Instead of emailing you, students could do any number of other things, including but not limited to the following:
- Talk to you in a 2-minute face-to-face conversation in class, right after class, or during your office hours;
- Chat with you using an instant messenger service during your “digital office hours” (to use Brian’s term);
- Consult your (surely well-designed) syllabus and course calendar to find the answer they need;
- Ask another classmate for help.
I don’t mean to suggest that we do away with email altogether. Clearly, though, it’s not the best tool for every job. And I’m not arguing that we should refuse to answer students’ questions or that we stop communicating with them. However, if students assume that the best thing to do is send you an email then they’re less likely to take advantage of the other means by which they might talk with you.
If we and our students can turn to alternative—and more effective, more efficient—ways of communicating, we might be able to keep from drowning in that “almost daily torry of emails.”
What are your best helpful tips for managing, reducing, or even preventing (!) the volume of email that instructors typically receive from students?
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11 Responses to Open Thread: Tips On Managing All Those Emails From Students?
lizgloyn - September 8, 2010 at 11:45 am
Two things have worked for me. The first is to set up a ‘questions/discussion’ thread on whatever on-line learning environment I’m using, for students to ask questions among themselves; if you have time you can parachute in to answer questions, but most of the queries get answered by students who have got the syllabus handy. The other is to set a deliberate ‘dealing with student e-mail’ hour in the day, to triage how much time you spend replying to e-mails. If students only get one reply from you a day, it can help them think twice before sending an e-mail in the first place, and from sending a barrage of follow-up e-mails.
daiya - September 8, 2010 at 12:35 pm
I put my syllabus online in an FAQ style with headlines written from the point of view of the students (when is the assignment due? what if I miss class? I put the table of contents in the paper version) and it seemed to reduce the number of “it’s in the syllabus” questions I got. When it failed, snarkily responding with nothing but the link was psychologically satisfying and prevented the annoyance at such emails from building up.I tend to write long assignment sheets, and I’ve taken to trying to use a few minutes of class to verbally explain my draft assignment, and then I have a chance to make sure common questions get answered in the final assignment sheet, so that it really is a reliable resource (more reliable than asking me, I tell them).I also use rules in my mail client (Entourage) to sort all student email into a folder so it’s easier to answer. I think maybe PH already had a post on doing that?Lizgloyn, thanks for idea of a questions thread! I avoid new classroom tech because of the support burden, so that might be a good workaround.
trvb72 - September 8, 2010 at 1:16 pm
I teach two online classes and have been getting fewer emails in recent quarters.I agree with lizgloyn: If you have Blackboard (or some other online discussion forum), have a “Questions for Prof….” forum, and subscribe to it so that you receive the notification in an email. Tell the students to also subscribe to it, because the questions students ask there are likely similar to their own questions. Yes, you get another email because you’re subscribing to the forum, but it cuts down on later email.Add a “syllabus and tips” test during the first week or so that isn’t worth many points. I think this has cut down significantly on the “it’s in the syllabus” questions. Along with the official syllabus, I do a second syllabus that has added clarification notes, as if these were notes the students were taking during the first day of a live class. I also do a “tips” document. This “tips” document is where I tell a story about my own experience as a student with “did you read the syllabus”. (Plus, I make an extra announcement about it just to emphasize the point.) In grad school, I remember popping in to ask the grad dean a few questions regarding deadlines (or something similar), and he would always say “did you read the graduate handbook”? I remember being a little annoyed, but then realized that in order for him to answer the specific questions, he would have to look them up himself. Why should he look it up himself when I could do it! (It’s also similar to Googling questions on the internet – who wants to waste time calling tech support when someone probably has posted your problem online? They should either already be used to, or should get used to, solving their problems online anyway.)I then make a point that I am VERY digitally available, so I don’t want to discourage them from contacting me. Since it’s only online and I’m not on the campus, I also give my cell phone number and encourage texting over calling (gives me time to look them up in the class before being put on the spot). They can call/text at any time day or night – and they know I might not answer after bedtime.I also tell them that some staff/faculty have too much fun with the “reply all” button with campus mail, so if they haven’t received a reply to their email in 24 hours, it might have gotten buried in my inbox. They can feel free to send a friendly reminder.I now receive “good” questions in my email. There’s still always a student or two who didn’t read the syllabus, but I’m not so annoyed with this anymore since the volume has dropped so dramatically.
csgirl - September 8, 2010 at 2:29 pm
I actually prefer that students send me email instead of the 2 minute face-to-face conversation. Why? Because right after a class (which is when most students want the conversation), I am usually rushing to another class, or someone else’s class is rushing into the room. I am trying to pack up all my gear, and make sure I don’t leave anything behind. Also, I end up with a line of students, all of whom want the 2 minute conversation. Finally, and most importanly, there is no RECORD of a 2 minute face to face conversation. I might tell a student I am going to do something and then forget, or a student might insist I had told him something that I in fact never said. With email, there is a trail.
matt_l - September 8, 2010 at 4:43 pm
I really like the idea of the “student email hour.” I am trying to get to where I only check my email at work twice a day so I can just focus on getting other things done. This semster in the second week, after I recieved a good email from a student. So I explained to the class why I liked the email and did a quick presentation on effective email communication. I gave them three points: Do use a salutation; err on the side of formality if you don’t know the person; use email for questions that can be answered quickly with either a yes or no or in one paragraph. Anything else should be done in person or with a phone call. This thread has given me some great ideas!
drnels - September 8, 2010 at 5:31 pm
I agree about the online space for questions for online classes.For me, though, it actually comes down to limiting how often I check email. Instead of always having it on in the background, I only check it at set times, and I answer everything when I check it. That has helped me achieve inbox zero almost every night since the semeser began. I no longer check email in the mornings until I get to campus, and I no longer check email when I get home from campus. I check it once at home at night, and then I’m done. That kind of focused time has been the answer to me.
trvb72 - September 8, 2010 at 8:07 pm
Since I only teach online, I go ahead a respond right away to emails if I’m at the computer, mainly because the student is probably sitting in front of their computer. They’re really happy when a question gets answered fast. This is really only possible, however, because I do other things for a living that also require a lot of emailing and being near a computer. I sometimes will implement the technique of only checking my personal email a few times a day, but it’s hard to do, and I only really do it when I’m on a deadline.
matthew_tiffany - September 9, 2010 at 9:48 am
I’m looking at setting up a group chat in Drop.io for use with the “vitual office hours”. It seems fairly simple to organize.
rvaneck - September 10, 2010 at 12:22 pm
I am now requiring all course-related questions and communications be delivered through the message system (NOT email) of our CMS. That way, I can devote one to three hours per day just on class-related issues. All communications regarding advising, research, and other non-course-related topics are done through dedicated office hours by phone, first, and email only if office hour times are not possible. After-class discussions are also possible, but limited to 20 minutes total since I teach night classes and cannot stay much longer than that.
philostitute - September 10, 2010 at 4:03 pm
Use the CMS to send mail announcements & reminders to the entire class once. Sort student emails into folders for each course. If you have Outlook or Gmail, sort the messages using filters into the appropriate folder. Finally use GTD methods to only check email once in the morning or afternoon. If everything is available online (syllabus, deadlines, reminders), you shouldn’t get much email.
finleyt - September 11, 2010 at 12:10 pm
Reaction #1: My students prefer to use a throw-away TodaysMeet discussion board than a channel authorized within a Moodle CMS for course related questions. I do to, for some reason. Reaction #2: Wasn’t there a study that just came out about high school students finding email too slow? What does that mean for student-professor communication?Reaction #3: I tell my students the truth and tell them often: I’m bad at email. -Todd Finley