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[macaroon]

  Before we got on I could discern that he mentioned bedridden fat people and the movie Wal-E (which I have yet to see).  Once we got onto to the elevator, amidst a group of young students, he loudly and clearly (for a change) said something about blood in his stool!

Okay, I cannot defend the part about blood in his stool....  (But I am laughing about it...)

The movie Wall-E does INDEED tell of environmental disaster and bedridden fat people. It's an excellent movie that I think most people would enjoy.

[mad_doctor]

A few years back one of mine complained, the week before the midterm, after blowing off the homework readings and problems for two months, and two months of my own personal entreaties to ask for help as needed - "We spent, like, three whole hours on one problem last Friday night.  FRIDAY NIGHT!  And we got nowhere with it, and that's only one problem out of six chapters. What are you going to do?"

Keep in mind, this is the kind of course that requires at least three to six hours of problem-solving every week to pass the midterm.  That was a two-drink night.

[spork]

[. . .]
 (A male student is harassing female students who are in the class.)

[. . .]

This is not your problem, it's the problem of the dean of students and the head of campus security.  Stop letting the student waste your time and the time of his classmates, tell him his behavior must stop, inform the powers that be that you've notified the student of such.  The next time he steps out of line, kick him out of class.  Then let the gears of justice grind him up.

[hipgeek]

  Before we got on I could discern that he mentioned bedridden fat people and the movie Wal-E (which I have yet to see).  Once we got onto to the elevator, amidst a group of young students, he loudly and clearly (for a change) said something about blood in his stool!

Okay, I cannot defend the part about blood in his stool....  (But I am laughing about it...)

me too! In some way, I'm glad he mumbled whatever the first half of that sentence was, but all I could think was, "What the heck do these people on the elevator think we were just talking about?" 

[phlegmatic]

[. . .]
 (A male student is harassing female students who are in the class.)

[. . .]

This is not your problem, it's the problem of the dean of students and the head of campus security.  Stop letting the student waste your time and the time of his classmates, tell him his behavior must stop, inform the powers that be that you've notified the student of such.  The next time he steps out of line, kick him out of class.  Then let the gears of justice grind him up.

I have just spent almost this entire day dealing with this student. The plot thickens, because now I am banging my head on the desk because folks in a certain department on campus did not let me know about this student's condition, for which this behavior is somewhat expected. (Somewhat.) So I told the harassed student to report to the Dean of Students, the harasser is now on the Dean of Student's and everyone else's watch list, and I spent my day doing everyone else's work. I am now getting ready to fire off an email letting everyone know that if they just did their jobs, these things could be avoided. That's not inappropriate, is it? The email's not sent...there's still time to talk me out of it.

[mountainguy]

Phlegmatic, what a mess! I would revise the e-mail you mentioned to keep it focused on the future. You really appreciate the dean's prompt action on the matter, you want the class to continue on a positive note without any further disruption to the educational experience of the harassed student, what should you do if the problem arises again, etc.

[magistra]

Mine have just been flaky this year.  No idea why -- the weather, maybe?  It's making me want to hurt someone.

Clueless e-mails, some of which are from another prof's students, more e-mails asking about a quiz they'd missed than posts the night before an exam, no-one reading the basic files I gave them a quiz on and then insisting I'd never mentioned X (um, I did, like five times), not studying.... I'm not looking forward to grading the exams.  They probably won't be worse than usual, but I'm having dire suspicions.  This group is made up of nice students, some great workers, but there's a definite whiff of 13th grade I don't usually get.  Students leaving sections blank on the exam I'd thought they'd've picked up just by coming to class and doing the basic homework assignments.  Well, maybe they didn't do the assignments....

The snowflakes individually are small and don't bother me, but the avalanche is gonna get me.

[dr_evil]

So, after the earlier lab section couldn't read the instructions, I proceeded to outline the experiment for the second group.  I then ended up with many questions like, "What do I do next?"
DE: "What does it <pointing to procedure> say?"
Snowflake Student: "It says to do <this>.  So should I do that?" or "Where is <needed equipment which is in clearly labeled drawer, the same location as last week and the week before and for all time>?"

Oh, and after reminding students a few times to <part of handling equipment properly>, how many do you think forgot and asked me why things weren't working properly?

*Headdesk of frustration*  It's not usually this bad.  What is in the air around here today?

[hulkhogan]

Somehow it is my fault that a different class of mine (in which the student is not enrolled) has a different schedule from this class and is confusing the student, which is why assignments are late. At least that's what I think the student is saying. How and why did s/he even look at (much less get) a schedule for a class in which s/he is not enrolled? And so what?

[whatsmyname]

I can tell this is going to be a VERY long thread.

I am doing more babysitting now than at any point previously. It is primarily passive aggressive behavior and testing the limits of how much they can "get away with." There is really no other solution except to hold firm, without any exceptions.

[whatsmyname]

To elaborate, there is always some student "acting up" just about every day, and delaying or distracting from the proceedings in some noticeable way. I can't really turn to my "colleagues" who are only interested in "happy, cheery" b.s. delusional crap.

[gennimom]

Ugh. On the second grammar practice assignment, most of my students made the same mistakes they did the first time. Also, two just turned the first assignment in again. What, did they not think I would check it? Grrrr!
These are supposed to be juniors and seniors!

[goldfinch]

My MA students have several short writing assignments throughout the term.  One student failed to notice [I thought] that they were supposed to have a thesis, and wrote a summary instead.  I gave comments indicating the shortcoming, the student was receptive, and we've exchanged a number of emails that make it clear that this person actually doesn't know that a thesis needs to be debatable/take a stance on something rather than just make a statement.  A MA! 

wow...

[iclaudius]

I have another one. Last week I handed out a test and on the front page in big letters it said "NAME" with a line following it. Before I handed it out I told the students to make sure to write their name on the front page of the test. However, there are always a couple of students who look very confused and then ask me a minute later if their names go on that line on the front page where it says "NAME".

[gennimom]

I had a student email me asking for a topic for his term paper. I answered with three questions: What attracted him to his major, what areas is he interested in, and what problems is he aware of in his field.

So far he hasn't emailed back...