<p>
</p>
<p>Tenured profs can pretty much do what they want… not sure a department chair would have any influence. And the student should start with a direct conversation with the professor – it is almost always best to take your issue up with the person you have an issue with first. Before going to the disabilities office or the department chair, or buying some additional technology. She can do those things later if she can’t resolve it at the first stop with the professor.</p>
<p>Fwiw, in my experience, profs like this tend to be leading classes that are very discussion based and don’t require notes… or very, very minimal notes. </p>
<p>Just have your D go to the prof and tell the truth about her difficulties. If he/she doesn’t bend, then it’s on to the disabilities office.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Second going to the disabilities office if other tacts don’t work. They are in the business of helping in these situations. Two of mine have used that office effectively.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Moreover, the department chair position varies in power greatly depending on the college and department. </p>
<p>In many cases, it’s little more than a glorified administrative position that few senior Profs really want as it is viewed as an administrative distraction from their main priorities…research/publications & mentoring grad students at research universities…or teaching/mentoring undergrads and some research/publications at respectable/top LACs. </p>
<p>Moreover, in some colleges/departments, it’s a rotating responsibility/chore each Prof must undertake every so often which could further undermine any power of that position.</p>
<p>^cobrat has the dept chair position nailed</p>
<p>In my department, if the department chair informally called a prof in and asked him/her to consider making an exception about the no-electronics policy, any fulltime or parttime faculty member would probably comply.</p>
<p>The only people who think tenured faculty are free range liberals are probably listening to too much talk radio. In my experience (at a public LAC with generally reasonable people on both sides of the aisle), everyone wants the student to succeed. If the student has a legitimate need to use technology, we will make it happen. (However, I already had to call people out about texting in minute 3 of day 1 of class this week!)</p>
<p>Your D should check if notes are available online. I’ve heard of students printing the course notes before class, then annotating them as needed. That takes far less writing than full note taking.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>so the solution is to watch/listen to the lecture multiple times? that doesn’t seem realistic… </p>
<p>sounds like a professor with a self-stroking ego</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Dunno who spit in your tomato soup this evening, sylvan 8798, but who said my D was intimidated? She will most certainly speak to the profs and is fully capable of pleading her own case. As a serious student, she is very upset that she may be unable to take good notes or may have to change her schedule. And I posted because I was looking around for a plan B for her, in case one or both profs stand their ground. After throwing down that kind of gauntlet, I anticipate that they will be loathe to backtrack for one student for fear it will set a precedent. I hope I’m wrong. And as a paying customer, I have every right to unhappy with profs who set arbitrary rules after people have already registered for their classes. I think it’s perfectly acceptable for profs to ban internet usage in their classrooms and toss anyone who doesn’t comply. Banning all electronic devices is just throwing their weight around.</p>
<p>Regarding the advice to seek help from the disabilities office, they will understandably not serve a student without an official diagnosis of recent vintage. We looked into this process when D enrolled, and decided that the several thousand dollars it would cost to re-test her was just not worth it. She had minimal accommodations in high school, and really felt she didn’t need any in college. And she was right, until this nonsense popped up.</p>
<p>For those who tried to be helpful, thanks so much for the suggestions. I’ve passed them on to D. I’ll let you know how it turns out</p>
<p>Here is my prediction: the profs will let her take notes. </p>
<p>It is really difficult in today’s college classroom. While the great majority of students do what they are supposed to do, a few mess it up for everyone. It is easier to make a blanket rule. On the other hand, for every rule there is an exception.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I went to college when the internet was not only not ubiquitous, it was nonexistent.</p>
<p>If you couldn’t take notes yourself, there were note services. You bought the notes for the class from a professional service. Some people liked these because they felt they could focus better on the lecture without having to write so much and hope you caught everything. </p>
<p>I personally found that I took better notes than the professional note takers, so I never used them. Only if I was sick and couldn’t make the class (rare) did I ever utilize a note service. Not to mention I was always broke.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Not necessarily. It may sometimes may be a calculated pain/benefit ratio which caused the Prof. concerned to feel that the level of disturbance such devices cause for the class is such that a blanket ban is the best of a series of non-optimal solutions. </p>
<p>The seemingly commonplace tendency of students to forget to set their phones on vibrate or worse, to even text/take calls in the middle of lecture was such several Prof/instructor friends have actually mandated the turning off of all cellphones on the syllabus along with the penalty for noncompliance. If the ringtone/usage came up in lecture…the offending student risks getting tossed out of the lecture, getting marked absent for the day if attendance is taken, and getting a negative class participation grade for causing a disturbance. </p>
<p>Upon getting tossed out a few times and noticing the negative impact it may have on their final grades, most either complied or dropped the course. </p>
<p>As for laptops, I actually had an undergrad Prof who barred me and some other students from bringing our laptops to take notes after a few sessions because the keyboard sounds were disturbing to the Prof and several other students in the class. Granted, this was back in the dark ages before taking notes on laptops was commonplace.</p>
<p>cobrat, I have to know, how much was a laptop in the 90s? I thought everyone was OBSESSED with not showing their wealth and therefore would be mortified to have something as upper class as a laptop O.O</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Computers…including laptops were viewed as academic tools so they were viewed in the same light as buying course texts or required lab tools. Especially for those of us who were taking CS courses for majors.</p>
<p>
As an instructor, it’s things like this that really get my hackles up. Other than suggesting that your D doesn’t take this premise into her discussion with the professor(s), there really isn’t much I can say that would be more than futile.</p>
<p>And as a paying customer, I have every right to unhappy with profs who set arbitrary rules after people have already registered for their classes</p>
<p>This consumerist attitude towards college education is so irritating. You have every right to be unhappy, but your tuition dollars don’t mean you can dictate what professors do in their classrooms. I understand your frustration as a parent, but as a graduate TA for several classes, students playing around and distracting other students on Facebook/Twitter/whatever is ubiquitous. In the classes I’ve TAed (especially large ones - 50+ students) the students who brought computers were far more likely to be playing around on them than taking notes.</p>
<p>Registration isn’t set in stone - every student has the right to discuss these matters with the professor prior to the first class if they are concerned, or directly after, and then choose whether they are willing to abide by the professor’s guidelines. I can understand if it were something completely unreasonable, but banning Internet-connected devices not arbitrary. It is becoming increasingly common in classrooms because so many students abuse them. However, I’ve worked with several professors who are sympathetic to students even who don’t have official disability letters/releases, so I encourage communication with the professor.</p>
<p>My dad used to throw chalk at students who read the newspaper during class. I should ask him what he does these days!</p>
<p>Another time, a student fell asleep during class, and he led the rest of the class out of the room very quietly, so the guy woke up by himself.</p>
<p>
I think the “consumerist attitude” is exactly the right one when purchasing a very costly product like a college education. Perhaps educators at the college level like to think they’re operating on some exalted plain, but they’re just delivering a service. And while neither students nor parents get to “dictate” how the service is delivered, any more than I get to “dictate” how Cablevision packages its programming or how Sears fulfills its warranties, I can be dissatisfied with services I pay for. </p>
<p>On the subject of electronics in the classroom, I fail to see why there can’t be a school-wide policy developed in concert by the administrators and teaching staff and conveyed to students and prospective students on the website and in the course catalog. Better yet, figure out a way to block wi-fi access in classrooms and remove the issue altogether. Then students will be able to waste their educations in the traditional ways, by doodling and daydreaming.</p>
<p>The problem with a consumerist attitude toward education comes in when part of satisfying the “customer” means making sure that their kids get inflated grades.</p>
<p>In this particular case, don’t blame the prof until you talk to him. I banned computers from my discussion section last semester, mainly because I wanted people to be looking at and responding to each other rather than hiding behind screens. In any event, I told students to come and see me if the no computers rule was an issue, and certainly wouldn’t have asked for a formal diagnosis before allowing a student to use a laptop. </p>
<p>I probably wouldn’t ban laptops from a lecture, but I don’t think it is totally unreasonable as long as the professor is willing to make common-sense exceptions.</p>
<p>The disabilities offices don’t always have to have a diagnosis to talk to you. They have to have one in order to pursue official accommodations, but they can sometimes help with other tactics or coping techniques that could be available. The offices vary widely by campus but do not discount them out of hand as useless. I would still encourage checking in with them for resources unless you already have done so in previous years.</p>
<p>Well, if you must take a consumerist approach to something that many don’t see as a product, think of it this way–the professor feels that a better educational atmosphere occurs when students aren’t all busy checking FB or texting–thereby improving the “product” you’re paying for.</p>
<p>I don’t ban electronics in my classroom, but it wastes the class’s time and my energy to have to monitor who’s doing what behind their screens.</p>
<p>I don’t, thankfully, find it a huge problem, but it at times is a distraction.</p>
<p>I like the recording idea. then she can listen to the class and take her electronic notes at home.</p>