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[cynical]

I am the mother of a Ph.D. student at a top 20 programme in the humanitites (much closer to 20 than to 10).  My son took his MA at another University, did quite well, and transferred.

Last autumn, his first semester at New U.  he took two graduate seminars.  His professors were "Professor Zapp" and "Professor Almost Famous".  My son wrote seminar papers with a view towards potential publication.   Both professors praised him verbally; both gave him a final grade of A, but neither has been willing to return his work.  He had set up a meeting on three separate occasions to discuss his essay with Professor Almost Famous, who always cancelled at the last moment.  In short, it's been over six months since he submitted the papers, but has yet to have the papers returned or to receive any comments except generalized praise.

In the spring semester he had all written work returned promptly.

Obviously, there's nothing he can do.  He does not want to be perceived as a stalker.  In this uncertain field upon which he's embarked, he cannot make enemies by challenging anyone.  He has no illusions that anyone would want to "borrow" his work.  He believes that Professors Zapp and Prodigy are simply lazy. 

Is this "give them an A then run away" a common policy?  Shouldn't graduate papers be given feedback?  Am I wrong?  Am I confused? 

[busyslinky]

No.  It is not a policy to A and run away.  They should have given detailed feedback, even an A paper can be criticized and improved upon.

[voxprincipalis]

While the profs' behavior isn't perhaps everything one would want, I'm wondering what the issue is that's pressing you to inquire. Is it that your son really wants the profs' feedback on his work, with an eye towards incorporating it to make the papers stronger candidates for publication? Or (heaven forbid) -- is the issue that your son gave the only existing copies to his profs (and doesn't have them still on his computer) and so is unable to proceed along the path to publication until this work has been returned to him?

If the issue is just "shouldn't the profs be more responsible?" then my answer is, "well, yes, they probably should, but you probably aren't going to be able to change the situation and your son is just going to have to deal with it, as annoying as it may be."

Just my $0.02 --

VP

[smart_e_pantz]

My question is why is the mother of someone old enough to be in graduate school posing this question instead of her son posing the question?  Time to cut the apron strings!!

[zharkov]

In grad school, the acceptable grades are A and B.  Below a B is "bad news" and more than a couple of C grades typically get one tossed out. So the profs often do a sorting of work into A, B , and "unacceptable" piles. Ideally, this would be done with detailed comments and feedback, but to tell the truth and shame the devil, it may be done in a more holistic way, sans detailed comments. 

I myself to put more detailed comments on the B paper, to give the students suggestions for improvement, but say a lot less on A papers.

[wowisback]

Exactly how old is your son? Shouldn't HE be the one dealing with this instead of his mother?

[larryc]

"Is this "give them an A then run away" a common policy?  Shouldn't graduate papers be given feedback?  Am I wrong?  Am I confused?"

1. Yes, it is.
2. Yes, they should.
3. Yes you are--about the appropriate boundaries between an adult student and his mother.

[cynical]

Thank you, everyone, for your responses.  My son is certainly old enough to make his own inquiries.  He vents at us; he does not have his own internet access, and he most certainly does not have time for a forum like this one.  He does have his papers saved; his only real concern was the hope that he might receive some helpful feedback.

Which made me wonder if his expectations were normal in a graduate school setting.  Sorry about sentence frags.

[trabb]

Keep in mind that, especially in very large PhD programs, people enroll in seminars for all sorts of reasons.  At the university where I studied, seminars were capped at 15 (too large!), and professors routinely added a few over that.  That means 15-20 seminar papers at 20 pages each.  Given that some students were in the course to fulfill basic course requirements or even for general interest, it didn't make a lot of sense to treat every seminar paper as a potentially publishable article.  It's a bad way to run a seminar, which ideally would be 5-7 grad students with a professional interest in the subject matter.  Nevertheless, it happens.

Another possibility that may be a bit harder to take.  When I was in grad school, I sometimes received papers back with nothing but an "A" on it.  Being the over-motivated type, I would approach the professor to seek further feedback as I continued to revise towards publication.  Almost without fail, they explained to me that "A" meant excellent work for a graduate student.  They also gently explained that the excellent work of most graduate students should not ever see the pages of a journal because it's just that - excellent graduate school work.  Generally, my professors only included extensive comments when they thought the paper had that something extra that made it worth being revised.

[francie_]

My son is certainly old enough to make his own inquiries.  He vents at us; he does not have his own internet access, and he most certainly does not have time for a forum like this one.

You know what would be a real hoot, cynical?  Let say your son finally meets with his professors, only to find them at their computers engrossed in the CHE fora!  Busted!  Probably why they didn't have time to provide him with feedback in the first place.

Or, you could do what has become oh so common for the parents of undergrads to do: call the chair of the department and/or the dean to complain.  (Seriously, though, do not try this.  Being a helicopter parent will not help your son succeed in graduate school, and might very well work against him.)

You could do a search of this forum because I think there was a thread about a persistant graduate student a while back that might give you some better perspective on professors' attitudes toward students who hound them for things like extra feedback and recommendations.  Does anyone remember it?

[iomhaigh]

You could do a search of this forum because I think there was a thread about a persistant graduate student a while back that might give you some better perspective on professors' attitudes toward students who hound them for things like extra feedback and recommendations.  Does anyone remember it?

Was it this one by Angry College Student?  http://chronicle.com/forums/index.php/topic,17159.0.html

[sniderd]

It's outrageous. I would bet my house that neither faculty member had read the respective paper. The only reason not to return a paper is if you haven't read and commented on it. They're --appropriately-- embarrassed.

Because of the sentitive "political" situation, I would recommend dropping the issue with these two. In the future, though, it would probably help to add a sticky note to a paper before turning it in. The note could say something like 'I sure enjoyed your course. I look forward to reading your comments on my work.'

[smart_e_pantz]

It's outrageous. I would bet my house that neither faculty member had read the respective paper. The only reason not to return a paper is if you haven't read and commented on it. They're --appropriately-- embarrassed.

Because of the sentitive "political" situation, I would recommend dropping the issue with these two. In the future, though, it would probably help to add a sticky note to a paper before turning it in. The note could say something like 'I sure enjoyed your course. I look forward to reading your comments on my work.'

If this were simply the problem, all the professors would do is find the paper, write comments, and give said paper back. 

[kaysixteen]

But what if Prof. Lazy had not seriously read the paper, just skimmed it and slapped 'A' on it, when it was not actually worthy of getting an 'A'?  The student may well be operating under a delusion that an A seminar paper could be revised somewhat minimally and become acceptable for publication or, more likely, conference presentation, but the paper may be slop, and the student the victim of grade inflation, laziness, etc.

[newbie]

Well, in grad school, grade inflation seems to exist already, at least in many programs (as students only receive an A or a B for their work).

I agree with Trabb on this one:

They also gently explained that the excellent work of most graduate students should not ever see the pages of a journal because it's just that - excellent graduate school work.

There are also programs and/or professors who don't give much feedback on grad student papers for many reasons. With grants to write, research to conduct, administrative business to take care of... well, grad student seminars sometimes don't matter as much, especially when the grades are guaranteed to be As and Bs.

I did two papers for two different professors early in grad school that I was really thrilled about, and I just wanted to see their comments and perhaps continue a conversation about the topics. One said it was good and never handed the paper back. The other said it was good and eventually handed back the paper with only a couple comments.

I was really disappointed with both outcomes, but I used it as a wake-up call for setting priorities in future classes.