Teachers of OO - Course Content Question

[Paingod]

I wanted to bounce a question off the instructors and teachers we might have here, past and present.

I'm in a basic statistics class at a local university, a prerequisite for other classes further down my degree line. It's absolutely a "100 level" introduction class and the way the instructor approaches the content, it amounts to a basic math class. It's about as rough as Algebra 101.

My question comes in the "legitimacy" of an assignment this guy is gave us, and if (as a student) there's recourse I can ask for. Normally I do my unpleasant assignments with a grimace and put forth my best efforts. Normally all of my assignments make sense for the classes I'm in. Whether it's a big paper on a specific topic or a hundred question test, I get the work done and don't really complain. This instructor, though, has assigned us a full-fledged academic quality "research paper" and expects us to turn in an 18-page dissertation on a topic of our choosing following all formal research and citation guidelines, right down to the complete format and style of peer-reviewed journals. In a math class. It's as though your trigonometry teacher asked you to write up a complete analysis of the geopolitical state of the middle east and propose a pathway to peace along with supporting evidence. It just seems wildly out of place. Granted, he gave us two months to get it done and I still have two weeks left to finish it. I'm maybe 50% done writing it. I have no doubt I'll get it done on time, and have no doubt I'll get a good grade.

Coupled with the fact that this guy is putting in zero effort on actually teaching (he's recycling his own YouTube lectures he's used since 2010 that even have an outdated class number on them), I'm feeling like he's simply throwing huge wads of bullshit at the wall to pad his own schedule to justify his job. I'm actually feeling insulted. I think he's intentionally wasting my time, and wasting lots of it. It's not the work that's getting to me. It's the wasteful feeling of it.

Am I overreacting or is something wrong with this picture? If there's something wrong, what can I (as a student with weeks left to the class) do? Leaving a nasty-gram in my class review for the school to maybe look at seems like a hollow gesture. Even if I can't get my own time back, I'd like to try and make sure his future classes don't have to deal with this.

[stessier]

My brother and his wife are college teachers and those reviews at the end of class not only get seen, but greatly factor in to how they are perceived in the department and their department head sees them as well. Just going off his stories, I would think the first thing is to talk to the professor about it - but I doubt that will go where you want. Then would be the department head. Would have been better to bring it up several weeks ago though.

[Paingod]

Would have been better to bring it up several weeks ago though.

Oh, I know. I was simply determined to just get it done and get past it, but the more work I put into it the more irritated I get about it. At this point I'm sure I'll just come across as a whiny laggard that's trying to skip out on the assignment.

I hadn't even considered talking to the instructor about it. I mean, he can't accidentally be using materials he recorded a decade ago as his only teaching tools and can't be completely unaware that he's assigned us a huge project that has nothing to do with his subject matter.

[Smoove_B]

What I'm seeing with my own employer is that there are countless instructors that spent exactly zero time learning about online instruction. Back in March this was understandable (to a degree), but when it was largely understood that remote learning was a possibility everywhere in the Fall of 2020, I don't get the impression that many spent time over the spring and summer learning about what their options were and trying to re-design courses to fit online delivery.

The worst sinners (that I've seen/heard) are those that simply held traditional lectures in an empty lecture hall with a camera recording them. They let the camera run for the entire class period and then just post that online. No stopping for questions, no interactions, no changing of instruction - just meeting the basic, technical requirement of instruction to claim it was done.

For your course I'd first ask if the research paper and research paper requirements were part of the syllabus before you signed up for the course, i.e. was this information available to you prior to registering? Even if it was, I'd personally question the submission of a research paper for a generalized math course - it feels wholly inappropriate. Here, the instructor could have been facing an inability to hold or offer some type of weekly recitation period where you'd be spending time deep-diving into math problems in smaller groups. To be clear, you can absolutely do this online, but apparently they opted not to do so and figured a research paper (!) was an appropriate substitution (it's not, imho).

Leaving feedback after the course might help; in my experience it doesn't. The reason is (assuming they're a tenured instructor), bad feedback is meaningless. If they're an adjunct (like me), there's always the possibility it could be used to justify not hiring someone back, but I've never actually seen that happen in my department.

I don't think there's anything wrong with holding your instructor to higher standards and if the course design and delivery isn't what you expected, I think it's appropriate to leave feedback and follow up with a message after the course to the department. Better (though perhaps not realistic) is to not take more classes with this organization, at least until in-person instruction resumes. I'm hearing absolute horror stories about what instructors are trying to get away with and it's depressing as hell. I've been teaching courses online since 2011 and it took me *years* to not only figure out the design but how to modify the instruction from traditional in-person lecture. I'm still learning new things, but for the most part I feel like I have it down.

If your instructor is pointing you to really old Youtube videos and there's zero interaction (discussion groups, online recitations, individualized feedback) then you're really missing out, imho. I hated online teaching at first, but came to embrace what's possible. If someone is half-assing their way through this, I genuinely believe the best way to address it is via your wallet. Students shouldn't be subjected to bullshit instruction because their instructors are too lazy to learn how to utilized online tools and technology - not at the money they're being charged to attend.

[Paingod]

If your instructor is pointing you to really old Youtube videos and there's zero interaction (discussion groups, online recitations, individualized feedback) then you're really missing out, imho. I hated online teaching at first, but came to embrace what's possible. If someone is half-assing their way through this, I genuinely believe the best way to address it is via your wallet. Students shouldn't be subjected to bullshit instruction because their instructors are too lazy to learn how to utilized online tools and technology - not at the money they're being charged to attend.

I checked the syllabus and the research paper is baked right in there, though it still doesn't fit the class content at all. It's sort of like the fine print or ELUA. No one really reads it, they just click "I Accept" and regret it later. This class is an absolute requirement for my degree program, though, with no option to test out.

We do have weekly discussions that the instructor doesn't participate in or leave feedback for. He just tells the students to post about an article he links to and then post responses to each other. I've never seen him engage anyone there.

This isn't my first class with the university, nor is it the first remote-only one. All the other classes I've had there (a state university) have been good; appropriately challenging. If this was the first class I had taken there, I absolutely wouldn't return. Since this is the 6th or 7th and this is the first bad egg, I'm not so sure I want to bail on the degree program.

[The Meal]

My daughter's currently in an online Biostatistics graduate course which is being taught asynchronously. She completed her take-home exam last weekend (with a bit of help from her father...), but still has to complete her 10-page paper. Her least favorite aspects of the course are:
online
asynchronous teaching (i.e., no interaction with the instructor excepting emails and office hours — all courses are recorded without student interaction available)
finding out at the end of the semester that all homework was graded "based on completion" (i.e., no feedback for whether topics were understood),
a 10-page research paper in a mathematical "tools" course (the idea is to introduce students to SPSS software).

This *is* a graduate level course. For an undergrad course, I'd think a significant research paper would be far afield from what the curriculum was shooting for. But as Smoove points out, maybe this is how this instructor thinks it best to make sure students understand the topics at hand? I'd be howling as well.

[edit: SPSS sucks. I did everything five times easier with a really stupid Excel add-in.]

[ImLawBoy]

[edit: SPSS sucks. I did everything five times easier with a really stupid Excel add-in.]

My wife is getting her doctorate in education, and she just had to take a statistics class that used SPSS. I can confirm that it sucks.

[LordMortis]

Am I overreacting or is something wrong with this picture?

IMO, you are both overreacting and something is wrong with this picture.


As a student at a university I remember both zero effort lecturers and obscenely difficult 100 level courses. I remember about having zero recourse other than dropping the course in the first week for a full refund, the second week for a half refund, in the fist five weeks for no refund and no grade penalty.

The nasty feedback was a thing. I only later in my college life learned that the feedback at EMU was published not just to the professor/lecturer but to everyone. Students use these as guides to figure out what classes/instructors to take. If no one takes his classes, they get cancelled and that affects his bottom line.

All that said, college is not like other places of learning. Professors/lecturers that teach are wonderful. I never "got" biology until I had college professor that taught it to me. But they are not there to teach. They are there to profess and lecture. Learning is on you and they won't assess their ability to teach. They will assess whether you grasp what you were supposed to grasp after it was presented no matter how poor they may be at helping you learn it. Heck I can remember a few 100 level classes taught in auditoriums to 400 people where a professor's name was attached to a class that were actually presented by TAs. And I was under the impression that larger universities did this more often.

[Smoove_B]

I checked the syllabus and the research paper is baked right in there, though it still doesn't fit the class content at all. It's sort of like the fine print or ELUA. No one really reads it, they just click "I Accept" and regret it later. This class is an absolute requirement for my degree program, though, with no option to test out.

Gotta read that syllabus (as cliche as it sounds). If you don't have a choice (because it's a class you need and there aren't multiple sections] then it super-sucks, but usually there are multiple instructors for a 100 or 200 level course and you can shop around.

We do have weekly discussions that the instructor doesn't participate in or leave feedback for. He just tells the students to post about an article he links to and then post responses to each other. I've never seen him engage anyone there.

That's kinda pointless.

This isn't my first class with the university, nor is it the first remote-only one. All the other classes I've had there (a state university) have been good; appropriately challenging. If this was the first class I had taken there, I absolutely wouldn't return. Since this is the 6th or 7th and this is the first bad egg, I'm not so sure I want to bail on the degree program.

Yeah, it's a not an easy decision and it sucks that we're collectively forcing a captive audience to endure bs conditions (imho). I don't think it would hurt to leave feedback regarding discussions (would be better if they were more interactive/participatory/graded) and that we didn't need to write a research paper for a *math class*.

[edit: SPSS sucks. I did everything five times easier with a really stupid Excel add-in.]

I haven't used SPSS since my undergraduate days and it sucked then. I've heard nothing but complaints from the current users as well.

[gilraen]

[edit: SPSS sucks. I did everything five times easier with a really stupid Excel add-in.]

My wife is getting her doctorate in education, and she just had to take a statistics class that used SPSS. I can confirm that it sucks.

We had to use SPSS in the undergrad statistics course in business school

As a student at a university I remember both zero effort lecturers and obscenely difficult 100 level courses.
<...>
Heck I can remember a few 100 level classes taught in auditoriums to 400 people where a professor's name was attached to a class that were actually presented by TAs.

Yes and yes...and yes. Although some TAs were so much better at teaching the material, I didn't care that the professor was MIA for most of the semester.

[Holman]

An 18-page research paper for a 100-level stats class indeed sounds ridiculous (unless, and I don't know, stats papers are mostly made up of numerical tables or something).

I especially can't imagine assigning something like that in this of all semesters. (I'm finding it almost heartbreaking that it's been so difficult to develop much in the way of community this term.) But I tend to create assignments that are about very specific writing tasks and feedback, so this guy sounds pretty alien to me.

[paulbaxter]

Reminds me of the travails I went through trying to get through classes at my community college. I had more than one instructor that was grossly incompetent to teach, but my own efforts to "do something about it" really came to naught. I guess I was fortunate to not encounter that particular sort of event where there was a huge assignment which seemed totally inappropriate to the class. More often I just ran into people who didn't understand the subject material they were tasked with teaching and exam questions that were poorly written and inaccurate.

[Hamlet3145]

An 18 page paper in a 100 level community college class is insane. I teach college writing and wouldn't even assign that in one of my *writing* classes. Maybe a 400 level seminar.

[Paingod]

I especially can't imagine assigning something like that in this of all semesters. (I'm finding it almost heartbreaking that it's been so difficult to develop much in the way of community this term.) But I tend to create assignments that are about very specific writing tasks and feedback, so this guy sounds pretty alien to me.

Last night in watching one of his old videos (recorded 10 years ago, posted on YouTube in a private channel) he mentions the research paper.

It's not that he went out of his way to create a massive research paper in his class this semester, but rather that despite the stress of COVID and the breaking of many people's sanity, he hasn't changed his class one iota. He'd have to re-record his videos if he did. Every other instructor I've had this year has been very mindful of what the pandemic, death tolls, and lockdowns have done to people. With COVID having little direct impact on me and my family so far aside from the stress of seeing millions get sick and hundreds of thousands die from it, I haven't taken advantage of the stretched due dates and optional assignments, but the options were there.

[edit: SPSS sucks. I did everything five times easier with a really stupid Excel add-in.]

My wife is getting her doctorate in education, and she just had to take a statistics class that used SPSS. I can confirm that it sucks.

We had to use SPSS in the undergrad statistics course in business school

SPSS?

Statistical Package for the Social Sciences
The software name originally stood for Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), reflecting the original market, then later changed to Statistical Product and Service Solutions.

Ah. We're not using that at all. The little bit of maths we've had to even look at, the instructor has just directed us to shortcut using Excel. I haven't once had to work out a formula by hand or even by calculator. He explains the maths in his video, then says "But we're not going to do that, so just do this" and shortcuts through Excel.

Reminds me of the travails I went through trying to get through classes at my community college. I had more than one instructor that was grossly incompetent to teach, but my own efforts to "do something about it" really came to naught. I guess I was fortunate to not encounter that particular sort of event where there was a huge assignment which seemed totally inappropriate to the class. More often I just ran into people who didn't understand the subject material they were tasked with teaching and exam questions that were poorly written and inaccurate.

Thankfully I haven't seen this yet. Every instructor to date has known their subject well. This is just the first one doing it on autopilot from a decade ago. It's the kind of "lesson" you can pay $20 for on eLearning sites.

I appreciate the feedback on the sanity level for this assignment, and appreciate LordMortis' view as well. I didn't sign up to just pay someone to hand me a meaningless degree, but I'm still annoyed at being asked to put in huge effort for an outwardly meaningless assignment with no bearing on the class content. The only thing it's teaching me is the proper research paper format that's been used in every peer review journal publication in the last 20 years. It's hard to swallow that I've paid $1200 for that privilege.

My review of the class is due by December 11th and since the research paper is baked into the syllabus and I can't justifiably complain about that (regardless of how absurd and off-topic it is for the class) I'll focus my disdain on the instructor's complete lack of effort and let them know that if I had started my scholastic career with them in this class, it would have been my last class with them.

[Paingod]

A little self-bump for any interested parties. I ended up with an 84% on this paper.

• Full marks (5) for the Title Page.
• 9 out of 10 for indenting my Abstract section (apparently the only part of the entire paper where paragraphs aren't indented according to APA formatting?).
• Full marks (20) on the Introduction.
• Half credit (5 out of 10 points) for the Methods and Procedures because I didn't explain how I used the data I collected, but rather explained how it was collected to preserve its integrity (similar to what I had found in other papers online).
• Half credit (10 out of 20 points) for the Results section because I didn't extrapolate it to his liking; I did not simply rehash what I found, but rather put the data together in new ways and explained what it meant. That was apparently incorrect.
• Full credit (20 points) for the Discussion section.
• Full credit (15 points) for the References section.

His big critique was that I didn't send him drafts to comment on before submitting my final. I did submit one draft as he had requested and will remind him of that (he said he'd add 5 points for that), but I wasn't interested in "collaborating" with him on this. I'd rather take the grade I earn than grovel for a better one. I'm likely to end the semester with a 91.5% to 93.5% in his class, depending on my final test.

[NickAragua]

Unless you're going for a Summa Cum Laude or something, I wouldn't bother about it too much. We live in the real world, so any details beyond "you have a degree in X" tend to get lost - your ability to get a job in the relevant field depends more on hitting the right keywords in your resume and if you get along with your interviewer(s).

I'd be pretty pissed though, if I had to write an 18 pager for an intro-level course. Unless it's like "intro to post-graduate quantum mechanics", then, well, good luck.

[Paingod]

Oh, I know. It just irks me because "A" is my standard. Not "A-" or "B+" - I don't shoot to merely pass. I prefer to succeed by my own standards.

When I did my Associate's degree, I had to talk myself out of taking a class I tested out of. Testing out of it gave me a B and was essentially free. It bothered me that it wasn't higher, but I wasn't going to spend $650 to get an "A" instead. Through that whole program I only ranked an A- in one class, and that was only because I misinterpreted instructions for a presentation and botched it.

[Defiant]

My first thought is that they're making it into a paper *because* it's an entry level class, because some students aren't from the department but are taking the course to fulfill a math requirement (I TA-ed an intro course once, and from what I remember, there was talk of making a course for non-majors that was along those lines.). But if it's a perquisite for another class (at least, one where you're supposed to learn something that you're going to use in a later course) then that probably isn't the case.

I had a remote class a long time ago where the instructor put almost zero effort - the class had been recorded in a previous semester, and the teacher was only reachable via email (they were on vacation on the other side of the world, so I'd have to wait a day to get a reply). They even forgot to submit the midterm (so we got tested a few days later). It was a poor learning experience. Fortunately, some of the material I'd already seen before so I was able to get by without that interaction and at least it allowed me to take a class over the summer (very few in-person classes were offered, and nothing that I hadn't already taken).

[Paingod]

I had a remote class a long time ago where the instructor put almost zero effort - the class had been recorded in a previous semester, and the teacher was only reachable via email (they were on vacation on the other side of the world, so I'd have to wait a day to get a reply). They even forgot to submit the midterm (so we got tested a few days later). It was a poor learning experience.

This is exactly what I said in my review of the class - letting them know that if this was my first class at this school I would not have come back.

Having completed the class, I'm still not sure at all why they jammed statistics and a massive research paper together. Statistics was taught with 10-year old YouTube videos and copy/pasted exam questions I found on years-old forums. The research paper was taught by holding up a research paper and saying "make it look like this".

If the research paper was the focus of the class as it seemed to be, with statistics being the vague backdrop that it was, proper instruction would have stepped us through the process. Writing a good introduction and what it should contain. How to structure your review of materials so it's a cohesive and useful component. The elements of the Methods section and how to successfully incorporate your ideas. You know, actually teach the process and elements; build the research paper together through the entire semester.

Instead "write it like this" and "send me drafts" was the entire lesson.

The last comedy was his final email saying when the last assessment was due. He neglected to change the pasted due date, so he's still asking for the paper to be submitted by Friday, December 20th 2019. When I turn it in, I fully plan to apologize for it being a year late.

[The Meal]

My daughter's currently in an online Biostatistics graduate [and] still has to complete her 10-page paper.

I'm not even kidding, Paingod. I wonder if you have the same instructor. She did complete her research paper and ended up getting dinged because she followed the instruction on the paper itself (paraphrasing): "submit your paper and your statistics output as separate files" rather than the assignment as listed in the syllabus (submit the text and software output as one file). She pushed back (once) pointing out the instruction she followed, and the instructor remained steadfast in docking her term-long paper 10 per cent for this travesty.

She's young enough that she's wrapped up in the grade assessed to her, but mature enough that logically she understand the value of her course is attached to what she takes away from it. Unfortunately for her, in both cases, these both ended up being a huge disappointment.

The instructor indicated to the students that the reason for the paper is because (again, paraphrasing) "so many of my previous students don't do well on the statistics side of things, so I want to give them a chance to make up the points on the paper-writing side." In a fucking math class. INFURIATING!

He's given so much wishy-washy "guidance" that I wonder how he maintains a job as an instructor (he's got a "Dr." title, but I refuse to use it). One of the best gems: the paper is to be "no more than 8-10 pages." He's a fucking math instructor but he uses an inequality with a range in his formal instructions?!? That's but a sample of the many reasons that I am infuriated (for her) regarding this situation.

I think I'll give her a pointer to this thread just so she can be equally outraged regarding the quality of statistics instruction throughout our fine institutions...

[Paingod]

I think I'll give her a pointer to this thread just so she can be equally outraged regarding the quality of statistics instruction throughout our fine institutions...

Maybe we can start a rebellion.

After my last post, all I had left was the final assessment. I used every resource at my disposal and nailed every single question to a degree he wasn't even asking for. He wanted to see our work, I showed him my work and explained why as well as alternate outcomes. The test is worth 20% of my final grade in the class. I triple-checked everything. If I get a 100% on this, I get an A in the class. Anything less and I get an A-

It came back today with a 86 out of 88. He docked me 1/2 credit for one answer.

That one answer was one that he specifically said in his instructional video was something we could do anyway we wanted. It was creating a pattern to pick a random number from a series provided in a table. I explained my logic, stepped through the process, and gave an answer. It was a clean pattern and perfectly aligned with his previous complaint in my last exam where he said I did it wrong there by not using a cleaner, simpler pattern (I lost 1/2 credit for that too). So I know he's looking for clean, simple patterns.

In his correction of my "wrong" answer, M-F'er told me the "right" answer was to use the first five digit block of a 5x9 digit string and drop the duplicate. This is contrary to his instructional video and what he told me in my last exam. I called him out on it and asked him to explain why it was wrong.

Dude came back with a complex system of counting the number of times each digit appears in the string and taking the highest four by count. I kindly reminded him that this is inconsistent with the "right" answer he just gave me, and contrary to what he gave us in his own videos. I concluded with "Since there seem to be a number of ways to achieve a random number sample, and you've previously said the pattern we select is at our discretion, I don't see how any of these answers are actually inaccurate as long as they're explained" - and oh boy, did I explain my answer.

I'm at a point where if he doesn't just fix my grade, I'm going over his head if I can. Those 2 points are the difference between an A in the class and an A- and his reasoning is entirely arbitrary - like he had to make up an answer on the spot to disprove me so he wouldn't be wrong. Problem is, I have two previous comments from him and his own videos to argue against it.

*Edit: M-F'r! Now he's counting from Zero to try and prove his point. That's a fourth way he's instructed on this one concept now! I have been nudged to an A, but I still need him to explain why all the patterns he's selecting are somehow better than the ones I'm selecting.

[Zarathud]

Part of college is learning to deal with dickhead instructors who aren’t clear. That’s not in the intended curriculum but it’s real world.

[Smoove_B]

I'm at a point where if he doesn't just fix my grade, I'm going over his head if I can.

I'm going to tell you this will end poorly (for you).

Those 2 points are the difference between an A in the class and an A- and his reasoning is entirely arbitrary

Is there a reason that you need to have an A vs an A- (which, for the record is a totally made-up grade designation)?

Part of college is learning to deal with dickhead instructors who aren’t clear.

Definitely true. So much of the undergrad experience (which isn't really at stake here) is what you learn outside the classroom. I didn't realize it at the time, but I wish I had.

[Paingod]

I'm at a point where if he doesn't just fix my grade, I'm going over his head if I can.

I'm going to tell you this will end poorly (for you).

Didn't need to. After five emails, I'm sitting at the barest possible grade for an A.

Is there a reason that you need to have an A vs an A- (which, for the record is a totally made-up grade designation)?

It's mostly the extreme annoyance of having an instructor that was shit, with expectations way out of proportion to his level of effort in return, and knowing I did exactly what he wanted and yet was still penalized. I think it's called "on principle" ... maybe not the best reason, but it's really got it's hooks in me this time.

Part of college is learning to deal with dickhead instructors who aren’t clear.

Maybe that's the real lesson here. If I wasn't throwing thousands of dollars at this and considering myself a customer of their educational experience, it'd be something I could eat with a little side of crow. Since I paid this man to throw his shit at a wall, I feel like I have some basic expectations for it to be worth the money. College or not, it's a service and when a service provider fails, I let them know.

[Smoove_B]

It's mostly the extreme annoyance of having an instructor that was shit, with expectations way out of proportion to his level of effort in return, and knowing I did exactly what he wanted and yet was still penalized. I think it's called "on principle" ... maybe not the best reason, but it's really got it's hooks in me this time.

I'm the first to argue on principle; I identified to my core with Ned Stark in season 1 of GoT. The only way you're going to do anything worth noting is by submitting accurate and fair feedback as part of your end-of-semester review of the course. The hope here is that someone in the department actually reads these things (maybe) and that future students can see them archived online (also, maybe) and make a choice regarding this instructor.

If he was capricious or negligent, you might have a chance of a grade adjustment. If he's operating "in bounds" for the course and can justify why you earned the grade you did (despite your disagreement with his evaluation), then I'm telling you, just let that shit go.

If you still feel the need to die on this hill, then review the policy for the school/program on how to dispute a grade. When I say review, I mean every word - what the policy is, how it works, what needs to be submitted and to whom. I love policy; I love process. I've seen shit that is bonkers when it comes to challenging a grade. Bonkers.

To borrow - when you come at the king, you best not miss.

[paulbaxter]

All of this is giving me PTSD about my community college experience. I think I had exactly one instructor who was pretty reasonable about reviewing test items based on student feedback, and a few I never had any problems with. But I distinctly remember that feeling of anger that my instructors would mark an answer as incorrect when I knew 100% they were wrong. By the time I started my nursing courses proper, my soul had died enough that I just accepted it. I recall one question in particular where I reached out to PhD scientists I knew who were experts in that particular area who confirmed I was correct. At least I had the satisfaction in my heart of knowing I was right.