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[navydad]

I don't suppose we want to discuss variations on this theme, eh? Like the professor I know who routinely (i.e., every week) dismisses her three hour per week class one hour early.

[watermarkup]

No, it's not worth discussing, because a 3-hour class is often 3 x 50 = 150 minutes = 2.5 hours, and 3-hour grad seminars are regularly 2-hour events in some programs. It depends on departmental and institutional culture.

So maybe letting the class out an hour early is a huge scandal, and maybe it's business as usual. It depends on the program. It's not my program, so I don't care.

[mathspice]

it's the end of the semester and you discover you were supposed to teach a class, but you've never gone to the class, and you're hoping you can buy the students' silence by giving them all A's.

Like we all haven't done that.

LarryC, you rock. As I mentioned to Anakin, I haven't been in the forums in a while and
I needed the laugh.

[goldenapple]

So...does this mean she was living the dream?

I'd say so. 

I often fantasize about just telling students first day of class "Listen let's skip this whole meeting weekly business, me assigning and responding to work that you sometimes turn in and sometimes actually try hard to do well.  I can't give you all A's since that'd raise suspicions so let's use this day to hash out a bargain on what grade you're willing to accept."

Have your students considered applying to Winston University?
I hear they offer a good bargain. Come to think of it, maybe the professor in question was one of their graduates.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

The course in question was evidence-based medicine.

I wasn't going to post here until I saw this.

Evidence-based medicine is a pretty tough subject for med students, let alone physician assistant students (who have had even less math in their undergraduate education).  I've taught statistics to nurses as part of an EBM component, and an 'A' would be a really exceptional grade.  These students are not going to learn it on their own. - DvF

[fourhats]

Apparently the first term was taught in person, and the next terms were on-line courses.  So not showing up means she didn't teach the on-line terms.  Seems like an email to the appropriate person earlier in the second term might have gotten someone's attention.

The students got to keep the As, and were refunded the tuition.  Bet they're pleased.

[treehugger1]

I don't suppose we want to discuss variations on this theme, eh? Like the professor I know who routinely (i.e., every week) dismisses her three hour per week class one hour early.

Or the grad student who stopped teaching because she (said she) could no longer afford the train fare from Paris (where she had decided she simply had to live) to the smaller (and much less interesting) University town one hour away where she was supposed to be teaching English. She needed the money though, so she never informed the department that she had merely quit. This went on for over 2 months before anyone complained.

I know the story because I was the one who took over that same teaching position the following year. I took me a while to figure out why everyone was acting so strangely towards me. (I was from the same small (American) French department as the flake-out student and I think they were worried about the quality of our program -- or just getting their revenge).

[navydad]

"No, it's not worth discussing, because a 3-hour class is often 3 x 50 = 150 minutes = 2.5 hours, and 3-hour grad seminars are regularly 2-hour events in some programs. It depends on departmental and institutional culture."

Oh come on. OK, it's an undergraduate class, it is scheduled for 150 minutes, and the prof routinely dismisses class after 100 minutes. Better? And maybe you don't care, but there is a widespread impression, accurate or not, that faculty have cushy part time jobs for which they are paid full time salaries. This sort of story does not help.

[polly_mer]

"No, it's not worth discussing, because a 3-hour class is often 3 x 50 = 150 minutes = 2.5 hours, and 3-hour grad seminars are regularly 2-hour events in some programs. It depends on departmental and institutional culture."

Oh come on. OK, it's an undergraduate class, it is scheduled for 150 minutes, and the prof routinely dismisses class after 100 minutes. Better? And maybe you don't care, but there is a widespread impression, accurate or not, that faculty have cushy part time jobs for which they are paid full time salaries. This sort of story does not help.

Yep.  While I do sometimes let my combo lecture-lab classes out early, that's a result of on-the-ball students not needing the full time for what is often a lengthy lab, not the result of ignoring instructional considerations.  If some people take 30 minutes to drop five objects in water and record the results while other people only take the 5 minutes the lab ought to take, I see no reason to not let some people take longer and let other people go do other things.

To get back to the OP, do we know if the professor in question simply set up an auto-graded, self-paced set of modules or went completely AWOL with no lessons of any kind.  The first situation doesn't seem as egregious to me (not desirable, but not the end of the world) as the second.

[chromatic]

On Being Completely AWOL.

When I was an undergrad I use to have this dream, during finals, of not having attended some class or another for the entire semester. Of course I would be nervous about failing the that final because I never was in the class.

On being short concerning time

I was told in TA orientation that a teacher should always use the entire time scheduled, but no more.

However, I am willing to let my basket structures lab students leave whenever they want. I stay the whole time. If anyone needs to be there to work or if they need help, I'm there; but if they are done with their work, or can do the work at home, I'd just as well let them go home. Thinking about it it kinda feels wrong, but that is how I have been operating.

[scampster]

On Being Completely AWOL.

When I was an undergrad I use to have this dream, during finals, of not having attended some class or another for the entire semester. Of course I would be nervous about failing the that final because I never was in the class.

I'm long past undergrad, but I still have this dream.

[egilson]

I'm giggling at the notion of a class of students showing up dutifully, day after day, week after week, sitting there just waiting for the instructor to show up.

E: (staring at his phone) "Well? Shall we go?"

A: (also staring at his phone) "Yes, let's go."

Only their thumbs move.

[lasquires]

On Being Completely AWOL.

When I was an undergrad I use to have this dream, during finals, of not having attended some class or another for the entire semester. Of course I would be nervous about failing the that final because I never was in the class.

I'm long past undergrad, but I still have this dream.

Ditto. In my dream, it's always a calculus class, which is weird, because I was good at math.

[polly_mer]

On Being Completely AWOL.

When I was an undergrad I use to have this dream, during finals, of not having attended some class or another for the entire semester. Of course I would be nervous about failing the that final because I never was in the class.

I'm long past undergrad, but I still have this dream.

Ditto. In my dream, it's always a calculus class, which is weird, because I was good at math.

I had this dream until I took my qualifying exams in graduate school where I, in real life, looked at the title of the exam, looked at the problems, and cried because I had several freakin' semesters of that topic (three at the graduate level and all of them not lower than an A-), had done a substantial part of my master's work on that topic, had taken several of the previous-qualifying-exams-on-file-to-help-students-study-for-that-topic to study, and still had never seen half the material.

Since I lived through that experience, I stopped having the dream.  After I was actually a full hour late to a final exam as a freshman in college (and took the exam anyway and got the highest score), I stopped having the dream of being late for something important.

Life experience is useful that way.

[macaroon]

On Being Completely AWOL.

When I was an undergrad I use to have this dream, during finals, of not having attended some class or another for the entire semester. Of course I would be nervous about failing the that final because I never was in the class.

I'm long past undergrad, but I still have this dream.

Ditto. In my dream, it's always a calculus class, which is weird, because I was good at math.

For me, the dream has become more colorful and nuanced.  Most recently, I dreamed that I hadn't shown up to class, but I was going to try to take the final anyway because I taught the class last year.  Only, only, I used the competing, inferior textbook that my chair made me use.  The class I never showed up to take used the textbook I WANTED to use, but I  had only glanced at the textbook when it came to my office rather than actually studying it.