You’re extrapolating a lot from an rmp posting. But I’m sure blaming the professor makes everyone feel better about the situation.
^^ No, I don’t think I’m extrapolating alot. My DS’s report of a prof telling him to not bother coming to office hours if he hadn’t posted a question there first sounds outrageous to me, based on my previous experience. Never did I have a prof say, “Don’t bother to come see me if you haven’t asked other students about it first.” And with the availability of the internet, why is it not standard practice to post the solutions to tests/homework online? Why are detailed solutions less easily available today than they were 30 years ago? I’m not completely blaming the professor … I am saying that the professor can make a big difference. And certainly the way things are conducted now vs. then I think is a huge difference.
I don’t understand why things are so different now, though. The size of the school hasn’t changed. So what are profs doing since they’re no longer grading tests and homework?
"I don't understand why things are so different now, though. The size of the school hasn't changed. So what are profs doing since they're no longer grading tests and homework?"
Research and grant writing. Lots of grant writing. Teaching was traditionally close to the bottom of the totem pile of faculty duties, but with reduced state funding and federal research funds, it may have fallen even further down. There may just be more pressure to get the grant money and publish research.
Also are these tenured or tenure-track professors, or are they adjunct lecturers paid by the course?
runningmom, I don’t know why they are different, but they are. You are not extrapolating anything. I will say that my son has also had wonderful experiences at his university, but there are also many like the ones you have described. And I am not being defensive or making excuses for my son; I don’t need to - he has done quite well. It’s just a fact that these big public STEM universities do handle testing in this way now. Why that is, I don’t know.
My personal experience with chemistry profs was very diverse. I had one I really liked and learned much from. But my organic chem teacher, the only o chem prof at the school, was horrible. A year of hell. He’d say crap like that. He’d have fun trying to humiliate students in front of the class. He taught us very little and expected original ideas. It was very frustrating. Thankfully, I have worked with PhD chemists who were brilliant, so I know they’re not all that way, but also know, some are just different.
I’ll also say I have personal knowledge of profs in other disciplines whose regular response to students’ questions is “read the syllabus”, but the syllabus they show me does not answer their question at all. It infuriates me, not only because it’s just wrong, but because the students are now hating a really important part of their experience. They’re learning to hate a research process that will be important when they get into the workplace.
I would be just as aggravated as runningmom2. My own D will be a FYE student next year. We have repeatedly told her it will be the hardest thing she’s ever done and to get ready for it (we both know from experience). But that said, it CAN be done.
I prefer that students have access to hand-grading of assignments and exams if they are at a brick and mortar school and sometimes this is offered as an honors college “perk”, but in the case of machine graded homework and exams I think it is not unreasonable to expect that solutions will be online after the due date; that is usual procedure in STEM classes, from what frazzled kids have told me.
Maybe you should write an email to the Dean to complain about the heinous professor. You’re paying his salary, you should get better service than this. If S is not taking more chemistry courses, he probably doesn’t need to waste time retaking the D+.
@mfamum – Did you read the original post? I posted to get some perspective from other parents who have been there/done that on reasonable paths forward to discuss with DS. He’s not paying for his education independently, therefore, yes, we have a stake in it and are providing him with guidance as he makes his decisions, but hearing other perspectives is helpful to us as parents as we formulate what that guidance is. What has he done? Not much yet. He’s asked us for advice … which we’ve given him. He’s 300 miles away from school; he found out the day before a holiday. He’s said he’s going to email his advisor on Monday, he’s looking at options for changing his schedule for next semester, and he’s mentioned spending some time in his last 2 weeks of break previewing material for the next semester. Sorry but I get annoyed when people imply that somehow parents are out of line for posting questions about how to handle situations with their college-age adult kids. Doesn’t mean I’m handling it for him, but I’m new to this parenting-an-adult thing just as he’s new to being an adult, and I do have a stake in it, so it is not unreasonable for me to ask for other perspectives when issues crop up. Glad to know your kid was completely functionally and economically independent at age 18 and you never had any questions. The other stuff about the prof was just a side comment/discussion. No, I do not plan to in any way contact the school, because I know they really don’t want to hear from me, even though I’m paying the bill; if DS wants to complain, he can complain. I’m still allowed to have an opinion about his education even if I don’t act on it.
Presumably your son’s classmates didn’t all get D+ or below in the course.
With all due respect to everyone’s personal opinions, and personal experiences with their own kids and college, I think it is unfair to jump all over runningmom for posing a reasonable question. Her son is a freshman in college. Adult or not, he is a young person who is experiencing something difficult (and possibly career-changing) for the first time. And it sounds like OP is, herself, dealing with her first difficult college parenting experience. OP is asking for advice from other parents who may have had kids in the same situation. I have seen many such threads on this board.
The information she provided as to how this professor handled this class is instructive to other parents looking at colleges. There are, indeed, many large schools handling things differently than many of us experienced when we were in college. This is the type of thing that a parent should investigate before allowing a son/daughter to enroll in such a school on the parent’s dime. Information is power. OP has sought information from this board, and also provided some interesting information to this board. Take it or leave it, but no need to criticize it.
@runningmom2 Please don’t worry about the snarky comments. There are a lot of positive, helpful comments, but there always seem to be some very critical, unhelpful comments mixed in. Just ignore them and don’t take it personally.
This has been an informative post, starting with a parent asking a calm and rational question. From the beginning post that talked about getting a good night’s sleep before discussing it with their son, which led me to think the parents are handling this situation without invoking hysteria, threatening to march down to the dean’s office, or insist that a professor be fired.
Asking questions, gaining knowledge from others faced with similar circumstances, and trying to see things from several viewpoints…that’s what this forum is all about. And I am gaining knowledge that might be useful in the future.
OP, I hope you can overlook the negative comments and continue to interact with those ready to offer more constructive suggestions.
What AP physics did he have in high school? Note that if he had AP physics 1 or AP physics C mechanics over a whole year, he should realize that these high school AP courses cover material at about half the speed of actual college courses. (The same may apply to AP calculus AB and AP chemistry.)
Statics usually has a physics (mechanics) prerequisite, doesn’t it? It would be a bad idea to take it before completing the physics (mechanics) course in this case. He may want to choose some other course that has no prerequisites or which he fully has prerequisites for, and which fulfills something useful (e.g. prerequisite to another course that is required for the major, major requirement, or breadth requirement).
If he is not required to get a higher grade in chemistry, and there is no grade replacement for retakes, it probably is not worth retaking it.
Here are some recent exams in introductory STEM subjects at a big public university that are not purely multiple choice, as counterexamples. Obviously, reliance on multiple choice exams is not universal.
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/4060/download/ (calculus 1)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/4266/download/ (physics mechanics and wave motion)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/4444/download/ (civil/mechanical engineering solid mechanics)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/817/download/ (electrical engineering introductory electronics and circuits)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/4568/download/ (materials engineering introductory course)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/4566/download/ (computer science introductory course)
However, it seems that the chemistry and biology departments has gone to purely multiple choice exams in the introductory courses, although that appears to have been true for quite a while.
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/4151/download/ (general chemistry)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/1230/download/ (general chemistry, fall 1995)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/4360/download/ (introductory biology)
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/exams/2185/download/ (introductory biology, fall 2000)
Regarding the prof’s suggestion that students use the online forum to get help from each other, I assume that online forums such as moodle or blackboard didn’t exist or were not in wide usage when the OP was in college. So one thing that is different is technology.
The creation of online forums as part of a class is recommended to professors as good pedagogy. Students can start to feel like they are part of a community, students who have questions can learn that they are not alone, and students can become better learners by helping others. These are all good things. The professor wasn’t making this recommendation to make use of the online forum. It is hard to imagine that asking for questions and helping others online would be harmful to the OP’s son.
^ missing words in the second to the last sentence — meant to say that the professor wasn’t making this recommendation to use the online forum because he is lazy or unconcerned.
It is funny that the OP’s son and some posters here scoff at the idea that asking questions on an online forum might be a helpful learning strategy while the OP’s mom comes to an online forum because she finds it useful.
How many students were in this Chemistry course? At a large University intro courses can get pretty unwieldy. Were there Teaching Assistants?
Again, just wondering why he is in engineering. Does he like it, are his main aptitudes in STEM, or is he doing this because he/you think it will bring financial stability? He can certainly stick with it after learning from this semester, but now might also be a time to step back and consider if the engineering program is the best fit for him.
IMO, online forums are recommended as “good pedagogy” because universities have invested in them and want to show they use them, not because they’re actually good pedagogy for every learner. They want to look progressive and tech savvy. I honestly thnk that is about the extent of it. Online “stuff” in general has changed the professor’s job because now they’re expected to respond quickly and be available well beyond office hours. As someone in the biz, I know this is hard to manage with the other demands of research and service. Beyond that, the demands this new online world places on the student are immense.