Professor is more difficult than others in his dept.

Parents Forum
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<p>I'm currently engaged in a conversation with parents of students who attend a well respected university. A few mothers are livid that their daughters (ironic that it is only daughters) are currently taking Organic Chemistry 1, and earning very low grades. The mothers claim that the professor will not answer questions from the students, even during office hours, and that when their daughters take a test that their friends had in another Organic Chemistry 1 class with a different professor, they score a 100%. </p>

<p>Their contention is that this professor is impossibly hard, doesn't want to help students, and their children will have a low grade which will hamper their chances to be accepted into med school.</p>

<p>A few parents have entered the conversation to suggest that this professor wants students to learn how to think for themselves, and encourages students to work with each other. I read the comments on rate my professor, and was surprised to read that some students even commented that this professor is very helpful, and if you do all the work he assigns, including the problems on practice tests, you should earn at least a B. The fact that he was a very difficult professor was consistent throughout all comments, but most seemed to indicate that you could survive the class.</p>

<p>The daughter whose parent started the conversation dropped the class, but will retake it next semester. The mother is stating that she is going to fight for her daughter to be able to retake the class without paying for it, and to have the class show up as a late drop, rather than a withdrawal passing on her transcript. </p>

<p>She also is advocating for all professors of Organic Chemistry 1 to administer the same exams in class.</p>

<p>What am I missing? First of all, I would never get involved at this level in any of my children's classes, but I can't help but suspect that these kids have been coddled by their parents and are not accustomed to having to work hard. These kids could have dropped the class earlier in the semester. They are adults and can make choices so I don't understand what the problem is.</p>

<p>Have you ever heard of professors in any given department administering the same exam across the board? Maybe this is customary and I just never heard of it.</p>

<p>I defer to the opinions of the parents on CC...and thanks for letting me rant!!</p>

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<p>I agree with you- these sound like uber</p>

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<p>And when you get to the workplace, you get assigned a difficult boss and your co-worker has an easy to work for, helpful boss. Then what? Such is life. No guarantees.</p>

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<p>At my previous school the math exams were exactly the same no matter the professor. I prefer it that way as it standardizes the curriculum so long as the exams are being administered at a high level. At my new school this isn’t the case and it’s well known that some Calc classes will be much more difficult than others (case in point, in my math class, all tests have at least one proof problem and ask what are considered difficult problems by textbook standards. In my friend’s Calc class, she never gets tested on proofs, and the problems tested are considered easy-medium difficulty).</p>

<p>The parents need to stay out of this.</p>

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<p>Sent too soon- darn phone! These sound like uber-helicopter parents!! I can’t imagine getting so involved at the college level. My kids would not be happy. Heck, I don’t even know what professors my son has. I would hope their children could figure out when to drop the class if it is not working out for them. As far as each instructor giving the same test, I think most would be very resentful if so required. Sounds like kids who were definitely coddled in HS. hope they figure it out before they enter the working world so mommy doesn’t have to call the boss!</p>

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<p>That is plain stupidity. (Think about the opportunities for cheating!)</p>

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<p>Since Organic is not a Frosh class, and a professor’s reputation for rigor is easy to review online, why did it take so long to figure it out? :rolleyes:</p>

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<p>Silly math. No Chem professor is gonna give everyone an A. So even if a quiz/midterm is “easy” and has a high mean, the next test will likely be brutal. STEM profs live for the curve, particularly in lower division courses.</p>

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<p>I’ve always seen that they have the same exam for every section of the same course at my school. So if they have five sections of, for instance, Chem 210 (which is Orgo I here) every section will take the same exam at the same time. It’s strange to me that a policy like this would not be in place at a school. </p>

<p>Now, obviously the exams change from semester to semester, otherwise yes, cheating would be inevitable. But there’s never been a problem with having every section the same semester take the same test. </p>

<p>As for the professor, some professors are good at teaching to some students and bad to others. One of the best few instructors I’ve ever had has a fairly low RateMyProfessors score (3.4 - just checked). He seems to have mostly a mix of very positive and very negative reviews. Could be that the professor is simply not suited to teaching them very well, but is suited to others.</p>

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<p>I hear the helicopters from here. O Chem is a weeder course. I’m sorry Janey may not have what it takes to be a doctor, but the student needs to own her career now.</p>

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<p>I think there are two complaints here. That the test varies in difficulty between different professors is a legit one. That the prof won’t spoon-feed them the answer is not.</p>

<p>But OP, why is it ironic that it is only daughters?</p>

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<p>I encourage my D to investigate whatever sources are available to try to determine which professors are good and which ones are not. She then uses whatever method she can (taking advantage of priority registration, being online and ready to register at the first available second) to try to get the better professor, and she prioritizes classes and schedules to try to maximize the number of good profs in important classes. Beyond that, we figure the chips fall as they will, and you do the best you can in the class you end up with. I find it annoying when a school (particularly a large school) will have one abysmal professor as the sole choice for a class, and you wonder why, when students are complaining semester after semester for years and years, that professor is still teaching. But I’ve had bosses like that who seemed to survive for one reason or another, so maybe it’s good to get used to it early.</p>

<p>While I agree that it doesn’t seem fair that some students have to take a ridiculously hard class with the prospect for a lower grade and other students with the same goals (med school, for instance), coast through the same course with an easier prof, for parents to get involved is inappropriate, and I don’t think those parents are doing their kids any favors.</p>

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<p>Disagree. That is part of the learning process of college. Heck, majors vary in "difficulty’. Choose wisely.</p>

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<p>You have your major and school on your diploma and the courses you’ve taken on your transcript. You don’t have your professors listed anywhere.</p>

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<ol>
<li>The child is an adult. She can fight her own battles.</li>
<li>Every one of us with the collegiate sheepskin had one Prof who was a complete a*shole or just plain difficult at either the undergrad or graduate level. there would be far fewer collegiate “war stories” to tell if it were all a bed of roses.</li>
</ol>

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<p>Standardizing exams across all sections of the same course is fine if 1) the exams are administered at the same time to minimize opportunities for cheating, and 2) the course coverage (assigned readings and material addressed in lectures) is identical in all sections. I’ve heard of situations where professors gave the same exam, or drew exam questions from a common department-wide “question bank,” but major parts of the exam were on material that was neither in the assigned readings nor addressed in the classroom in one or more of the sections. IMO this is more unfair than drawing a “difficult” professor; students get blindsided by exams testing them on material they’ve never been exposed to.</p>

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<p>Tell this mom, good luck and back away slowly. College is not your local high school. Students must learn to stand up for themselves and figure out things on their own. Telling profs what to do never ends well.</p>

<p>I remember in college one department giving the same final to all sections of a class, but the final is given to all the students at one sitting. And then grading the exam is one big party with all the professors, teaching assistants and graders joining in for a few hours. I don’t remember if the midterms were all the same.</p>

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<p>How do these parents all even know where to find each other to communicate all this? It sounds more like high school than college – my kids have been at 3 different universitiess;(Ivy, high-ranking LAC and state flagship) my husband and I have had experience as students or employees at 4 more (state flagship,2 x high-ranking private U and 2 public directional) and none of them (as far as I know) have had any parent forums or facebook pages in which this kind of discussion might happen.</p>

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<p>I know these parents. They show up as early as elementary school, lobbying hard for their child to get Ms. So and So for first grade, complaining that the reason your child got an A is because she had the “easy” teacher, and whining about Mr. Such and Such’s unfair grading practices when he declares a 90 a B+ instead of an A-.</p>

<p>I didn’t play then and I’m not about to start now that I have a kid in college.</p>

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<p>Back when I was in college, I remember that the physics department classes all had the same exams for all sections. And professor A would grade question 1 for all of the students, prof B would grade question 2, etc. I makes some sense for it to be done that way.</p>

<p>However, it doesn’t make any sense for the parents to be that involved with the University as to be communicating with them directly on this issue. I think parental involvement in this situation should be limited to a suggestion to the student to read the RateMyProfessors reviews about the profs and consider that when choosing what sections to take next semester, or perhaps counseling the student to consider withdrawing from the class.</p>

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I teach physics and pre-engineering courses and never curve my grades. Try not to overgeneralize. :)</p>

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When I was a physics TA, all the sections got the same exams on Saturday mornings. They were graded by a team of teaching assistants, not by the professors themselves. We were lucky if we got pizza and pop to ease the pain of 8 straight hours of grading after the 3 hours proctoring the exam.</p>