I generally feel comfortable with using my professors first name. However, when I hear a student use doctor when referring to the professor, I typically call them doctor after that since I feel it is safer to in that case. I have noticed that most of the time, it is considered acceptable to use your professors first name in college. I feel like part of the college culture and how it differs from high school culture is that the professors treat you more equally to them as opposed to acting as an authority over you, and I feel like part of that is letting you use their first name. I have even had professors explicitly tell me and the class that it is okay to use their first name.
Ouch. In my opinion, ONLY if the professor expressly tells you and your classmates that they want you to refer to them that way or says something in a conversation along the lines of “call me Nell.” You should not presume familiarity. I may be old school.
I agree that if the professor tells you that it’s okay to call them by first name, then you can do that. My children use the “Dr.” label often, since they don’t feel comfortable presuming informality.
The majority of my professors assumed that the students would use their titles-they earned it.
At the college where I work students call the professors Professor + Last Name. None of them use their first names with students. The professors at the colleges my children attend also use their titles. I’d address them formally unless they tell you otherwise. That’s a good policy for business too.
Agreed. Follow the lead.
I had an instructor who on the first day of class said, “When you graduate, feel free to call be Steve. Until then, you may address me as Professor Smith.”
On the flip side, I had another instructor who said, “Please feel free to call me Peter. I am not a medical doctor, so I prefer not to be called ‘Dr.’ and calling me “Professor” reminds me that I was denied tenure.”
start by addressing them formally, but then do what they ask. if they ask you to call them by their first name, it is considered rude to call them doctor in some instances
I cringed every time a classmate called our instructor Ms. Lastname instead of Professor. It felt so disrespectful.
Well, it depends on the person’s job title. If the person is a female lecturer without a doctorate, I would certainly address her as Ms. Lastname.
At my institution faculty generally go by Professor or Dr. X. There is the occasional professor who has a terminal degree of MFA (for ex) and therefore is never Dr. X but might be called that by accident. I never invite first name basis until my students graduate.
@skieurope I don’t understand why being called professor would remind someone of being denied tenure. If someone earns tenure they are also called professor (as they were before tenure). Failing to finish the PhD would deny you the right to use doctor. But failing tenure has no such trigger. Can you elaborate? I’m curious.
I did not ask his rationale. I suppose it’s because since he was denied tenure, his job title is not “Professor” (or Asst/Assoc Professor). @ProfessorMom1
@skieurope. Ok. That’s still odd bc if someone is denied tenure, they’d most likely be denied further employment anyway. Anyone on tenure track with a terminal degree would still be “Professor”. Oh well. I suppose all institutions have their peculiar policies. Thanks for the clarification.
She was an “Assistant Teaching Professor” with no PhD, but I feel like that’s beside the point.
H was very young looking when he started teaching, and felt awkward with Dr. + LastName, so he goes by Dr. + FirstName.
However, most students begin by addressing him as Dr. + LastName and then he invites them to use Dr. + FirstName.
There are many professors and lecturers who do prefer to be called by their first name, but I would never assume that. Even with H’s co-workers, many of whom are much younger than we are now, I address them with their professional title until they indicate they prefer informality.
While the relationship between college faculty and students is at a different level, never forget that the faculty are still the authority figures, regardless of how informally they prefer to be addressed. Best to begin the relationship with respectful formality and be invited to be informal than to make assumptions and offend a professor who prefers to be addressed formally. It’s their choice, not the student’s.
You should always assume Dr. Lastname unless you have specifically been told by the professor otherwise.
When we met, my husband was my dad’s engineering student. For years after we were married, DH still called my dad “Dr. __.” After we had kids, DH started calling him “Granddad.”
I may be old-fashioned, but I always find it wise to address a professor with formality. If a professor wants to be addressed by his or her first name, he or she will be very explicit about that on the first day of class.
You don’t want to be put in that awkward situation where you call a professor his first name and he corrects you. I’ve seen that happen to some peers, and it makes me embarrassed for them.
I absolutely agree with above posters who say to start with the most appropriate formal title. I usually use “Professor Lastname” for faculty giving lectures (all teaching faculty at my school are professors), because it’s gender-neutral and doesn’t assume any degree status, as well as being formal. I’ll also use just “Professor” if the person’s last name is easily mispronounced.
Exceptions to this rule are mainly if the professor introduces themselves with a different name; like if they introduce themselves as “Dr. Lastname” or just “Firstname” I’ll call them that.
Another situation to consider is when you are working under a professor/PI in research. Then, it’s likely that you will hear people in the lab referring to the PI by their first name, and you should follow their lead when addressing the PI. In my experience, research settings are less formal than class; there’s less of a superior/inferior distinction.
D and my wife and I had tea with her honor’s thesis advisor the day before graduation. It was then that the professor said to D, “It’s time for you to call me Margaret.” She was very British, and D would not have dared to call her anything but Professor X before then. B-)
I think it depends on the convention in the department. I recently graduated, and while enrolled, I used Ms/Mr., Prof., Dr, or just first name depending on the professor.
My default that I used was always Prof (or Dr. if i knew they had one) +Last Name in emails, unless told otherwise. I only ever had one professor that wished to only be referred to by first name, even in emails.
In the dance/theater department, almost all the professors used they first names with students (I can only think of one exception). This made sense because of the more collaborative nature of the classes. Music was split, but I think most used Honorific+Last Name.
My math and CS were all Dr/Prof Last Name, except my CS advisor, who told all students they could use her first name- but that just felt weird to me, so I never did, always Dr. Last Name.
Agreed that you follow the prof’s lead. As a general rule, always err on the side of more – rather than less – respect. When in doubt, use Professor with or without a last name.
I say this as a result of my a variety of experiences: 1) as undergraduate student back in the Stone Age; 2) much later as an older grad student (in both Masters and PhD programs – not in that order); 3) as the wife of a tenured “(Full) Professor”; and 4) as the mother of a rising college sophomore who in her first year took both freshman and upper level undergraduate/graduate-level classes and completed a two-quarter independent study with a renowned professor. In short, this is my take:
Graduate students in PhD programs in the Humanities and Social Science at most schools are generally welcome – and expected – to use first names in addressing faculty. (The unique exception to this was a quirk – some 35-odd years ago at UChicago where DH got his PhD, the grad students all referred to their professors as Mr. _____ and Miss/Mrs _____ despite the fact that ALL their professors were tenured faculty. Somehow, I’d imagine that this has changed over time and that grad students now use first names with their professors there).
I can’t speak for STEM fields, but in my PhD program in the humanities/social sciences, all of the grad students used first names with professors. In my Master’s program, which supposedly used a “medical model” the older professors (with PhDs) tended to prefer Dr. _____; the younger professors with PhDs and those with Masters degrees usually went by their first names.
Undergraduates are generally expected to use either Dr. _______ or Professor ______ unless told otherwise. Still, unless a professor indicates discomfort in the manner of @skieurope’s second example, when speaking or writing emails to professors, using Professor (with or without the last name) is a sign of respect.
Graduate (PhD students) in D’s upper division undergrad/grad classes used first names with the prof in her seminars; D did not and was never specifically told to do otherwise, although the prof signed his emails to my D with his first name only.
The prof with whom she did an independent study uses his first name with grad (PhD) students but uses Prof _____ with undergraduates. When my D. emails him she writes Dear Professor. He has never told her to do otherwise…
For the record, my H will always sign his emails with his first initial, and tends to ascribe to the "I am not a medical doctor, so I prefer not to be called ‘Dr.’ (He wasn’t denied tenure, so “Professor” is still okay in his book).