Son is taking two classes with the professors with 1.5 ratings at Ratemyprofessor. I am worried about his GPA and what he will get out of classes. He is basically learning the stuff on his own and may have to seek help at the tutoring center.
He doesn’t want to drop them because he needs them to get in his major at the end of this semester.
Any advice I can pass along?
Office hours, study groups, internet resources, read the textbook, do extra problems.
@bodangles This. There’s no getting around required classes and the professors if they are the only ones teaching them. Son will have crappy teachers, crappy roommates, crappy bosses. Learning how to manage them to extract the most out of them is a useful skill.
Curiosity, what are the classes? Possible to switch profs?
He’s probably doing the best thing if he just needs the credits to get through to the next step in a timely manner.
Sometimes you just have to put your head down and plow on through.
Two words: Khan Academy
Your son will deal with people who aren’t great at what they do for the rest of his life. He needs to keep his head down, study, do the work, and go to offcie hours if he doesn’t understand stuff. It’s his problem, the college isn’t going to get rid of the professors becasue of Rate My Professor.
There is another thread on this page going around right now about RMP, by the way. Do a quick search, but in a nutshell, RMP isn’t terribly reliable. Many times it’s just vindictive and lazy students venting. FWIW, I am a little surprised that a parent posted this. I had bad profs in college, didn’t we all? It’s just part of getting a degree.
RMP, first of all, is not necessarily a valid source of information about the quality of a professor. Let your son decide for himself whether the professor is good or bad.
Otherwise I agree with everything everyone else has said. Really, part of the point of college is to learn how to learn on your own, because you won’t always have someone guiding you every step of the way. The professor - in some classes - is there as a facilitator and a guide for discovery.
Not all parents have gone to college. Mine didn’t.
I asked the question because I want to help.
The class has 24% drop+failed rate last year (top of the chart). It’s required for most engineering students (800+ enrolled). She is the only instructor for the course past year or two.
Not sure if it will help but go straight to the professor sometimes the only way out is through. Professors have some leeway in grading and it is good to be known as a student that is trying hard.
Been there, done that, in engineering as well. Agree with above suggestions.
Practically speaking, make sure your son knows process and deadlines for dropping a course - especially very late in the game. At my son’s school they have an option of dropping a class right before the final. You can only do that a couple times in your college career so you have to be careful when choosing to go this route. YMMV. Sometimes you just have to do that and take it again. Even with the same prof often the 2nd time through is much different/better. It happens.