The contractors I work with sometimes think 8 am is a good time to call me, though I’ve trained most of them to wait until 8:30!
@mathmom It is an early start business for sure!
I was a TA numerous times and we never went to class (nor were we expected to). We were already expected to work X hours per week as it was, so there was no way they could add on more. In some instances, attending THEIR classes would have conflicted with our own. We had to do the assignments ourselves, so we knew what was being covered. For some courses I (or the team if there were more than one of us working the same course) met with the instructor weekly to review the homework. We held recitation sections, graded things, and held office hours. Two semesters I was on teams which were working multiple 180+ person sections.
OP’s S is a sophomore, so this is still primarily intro material. Any grad student with their act together should be able to deal with the student questions.
My D always goes to class. Smaller classes take attendance and it counts. Her larger classes have also had reasons to attend. In her intro Poly Sci class last year, the tests were on what the prof covered, not what was in the reading. She said the people who didn’t go to class had no idea what was going on. D had an intro to psych class that had periodic pop quizzes. If you weren’t there you got a zero. She’s just a sophomore, but I don’t think she’s had a class yet that she felt comfortable skipping.
I had several undergraduate classes where you could attend live or watch the streaming replay. My retention was a lot higher in-person, and you could ask questions afterward (the prof. typically stayed for 15-20 min). It was well worth the 30-45 min travel time.
In grad school attendance was mandatory. You were expected to make arrangements in advance if you could not attend.
The answer has to be “it depends.” It depends on the school, on the class, on the prof, and on the student. I skipped three classes in their entirety in college. I showed up to get the syllabus and I showed up for exams. I made two A’s and a C and the C was really because it was my graduating semester, I had a job, and I had senioritis.
Now, none of the classes were in my major, all were prof’s known not to add much in the lecture, and I read every page and worked every problem set, if applicable. For me it was opportunity costs. I worked 20 hours per week, had more difficult courses than the three I skipped completely, and something had to give. Sometimes it was the little free time I had, sometimes it was sleep, sometimes it was class.
As to work, no I would never skip work and I’ve taken less than a week’s worth of sick days in nearly 30 years. But everyday I decide what I’m going to do and what I’m not going to do because there is more work than time. I do what is most important, most urgent, what align’s with my supervisor’s priorities, and what I can’t delegate to someone else. Some things get moved to long term projects for slower days, perhaps around holiday times when the easier. Some things get an 80% solution and so on.
Why a student is skipping and what he or she is doing with the hour gained matters. And of course at the end of the day, academic performance must not drop or skipping was a wrong decision.
For what it’s worth, I told my D to skip a few classes last Spring when she had a major project and was getting 4 hours of sleep a night while working her butt off. I just said choose wisely what you skip.
I once helped a friend’s son with a legal problem. Part of the (very standard) plea bargain had conditions like no firearms, no skipping school, no getting into trouble at school, etc. Well, first he wanted to go hunting with his stepfather, so I asked if that would be okay, and it was approved. Then he wanted to know if a paintball gun was a ‘firearm’ but I refused to ask as I kind of thought it was supposed to be a punishment and missing paintball seemed to be a just punishment. The he wanted to know if he could skip the regular amount of classes allowed at the high school. What? Turns out he could miss EVERY class up to 3 times, unexcused, without it affecting his grade. Again, I refused to ask the DA for clarification as I said “Go to class!” His father said “To be fair, they do repeat a lot of things in classes, and sometimes just show movies.” I said “You know, I go to the same meeting EVERY WEEK at work and it is the same over and over again.”
This kid graduated, got into the flagship engineering school, and lasted one 9 credit semester.
My kids never missed school in high school, never skip classes in college. Good habits continue throughout life.
It depends on the class. My kids middle and high school classes often had “participation” grades which can give your grade a boost if you are an active participant but not as great a test taker, just as homework grades can. I spent years prepping my kids that when they got to college their entire grades would based on their tests, essays or project grades and there would be no easy boosts from “participation” or homework. Then my son came back from his first semester at a highly ranked LAC and told me two of his four classes had participation grades, LOL. Not in my day, but these days it apparently varies…
@twoinanddone There is another way to look at it. The habit of consistently completing projects on time with excellence is a pretty good habit for life as well, work and school. It doesn’t look like OP’s son is doing that but it’s possible to do that and make the decision sometimes that skipping a class is OK. You describe a kid working every angle to be irresponsible. That’s not the same thing.
I think it’s not a big issue. This thing only depends on which type of class your child skip. If they skip math class or they didn’t good at all so, I think there is a problem.
This is a great discussion…and valuable. But the OP seems to have left the room…hasn’t been active in this site since Oct 6 when he started this thread.
I know that we can’t say that correlation equals causation, but I just gave my class an exam and the average for students having more than 75% of the attendance points was 79%, while the average for those having less than 50% of the attendance points was 61%.
Thanks for your interesting insights. I did not leave the room. I am listening.
I shared the ideas posted for my previous thread (poor grade) with my son. He took some steps and his grades improved.
I open this thread to get insights to the issue, because skipping classes should not contribute to slip in grade.
He wanted to work with a specific TA, who has good chemistry with him. This TA and his classes are on same time.
Thanks for sharing.
That is YOUR opinion.
My kid teaches college courses. His college has a policy on missed classes…and if you miss more than a certain number…your grade drops…and at a certain point…you can actually fail the course.
EVERY term, he has had to fail at least one student because of attendance. Oh…and they have appealed…and lost.
Attendance CAN very much contribute to a slip in grades.
Is your son telling you the ONLY time he can meet with this TA in the whole week is during class? If so…I’m pulling the B.S button. That is just poppycock. Your son is making this choice. Choices choices…but don’t expect the faculty member teaching the course to think meeting with this TA is a valid excuse for missing class.
It isn’t.
Are you sure that this is the true explanation? As others have said, TAs for a given class commonly sit in on the lecture, so that they know the context of what students may ask during the discussion, so that time block is not generally available otherwise.
" skipping classes should not contribute to slip in grade."
How can it not? He’s missing instruction, feedback, practice. Even repetition helps material to be learned. If you mean there shouldn’t be an additional penalty, remember that these policies are likely a way to encourage students to attend, and to get the same benefit of isntruction as all his fellow students. Not attending class is agood way to set yourself up to fail, long term (even when you feel a specific class isn’t helpful.)
The TA is ancillary support. The class should be the first priority.
DS was always careful to read the material, and as a CS major, did every pset even if it took him forever (and some of them did). Because of some things unrelated to the thread topic, he missed quite a few of one teacher’s classes, but he got the psets in on time. So he went to her office hours to explain his absences, and she admitted that teaching class wasn’t really her strong suit and that he seemed to be “getting it.”
Punchline: she asked him to be the TA for the course the next year. He did so.
Excellent for your kiddo!
But to the OP…this does NOT mean your kid should be skipping classes.
- Has he discussed missing classes with the class professor? And has this professor said it was OK to skip classes?
- Have you and your son looked at the college policy on missed classes? Some colleges have those!
- Have your and your son carefully reviewed the syllabus for the class(es) he is missing? Attendance requirements are likely there too!!
@thumper1 , I lost track of this thread a bit. OP, I wasn’t suggesting that your son should skip classes, I was responding to some of the “shocked, shocked I tell you” posts about attendance being next to Godliness.
Sorry, I didn’t intend to confuse the issue.