TEACHSOC: Re: Institutional Support for Adjuncts

[Del Thomas Ph D]

Oops.  Below the comments are what was missing from the original message.There are strange commands that have taken over :-) Picking up on the other hand.... the printed rules are like the stop signs that people ignore.  At the time of the incident below I had complete rules.  They could have been better but how big do you have to make the stop sign to get full compliance?  Any way the elimination of in class exams will help solve some of the problem....I found that assignments that can build to portfolios helps.  Class time is too valuable to use on tests.  The world and student demographics have changed.  In this area  all of the 4 year schools are supported by the special programs.  They lose money on the traditional programs.  We should be adaptive and move away from the mechanical approaches.... they never worked that well any way.  Perhaps we can move from teacher/preacher models to educator models. Del  ..... mostly :-) Del Thomas Ph D wrote more but some how deleted a major section: It can be very tough in some schools.  This because they need to fill the seats.  Also you can lose a lot of time on these small matters. Several years ago I had a incident where 5 students turned in identical papers except for the names.  I got calls from everyone.  Two deans and the prez were involved.  When I mentioned the incident in class without any id one student self identified and then complained to the chair that I had embarrassed him.  Several months later at a hearing I mentioned that his name was spelled differently on different papers.  He replied, they are always spelling my name wrong.  At the end of the three hour hearing the committee directed me to give him a make up test. The test was never taken.  He disappeared into the system, graduated and has a 6 figure income for a company that spells his name correctly.   Got a very good view of the "latent" rules that run the university and the rest of the world.   So it is this kind of time use that Dean's want to avoid.  It can be bending..... or a time use issue.  So you may have to pick your battles. Having everyone work in a group worked for me as far as coming and going.  Although, you may find that other faculty lower the bar. Del Eileen Ie wrote: I'm a new adjunct at various community colleges (just finished my master's a year ago and started teaching immediately). In my very first class I had a "problem" student and the situation was resolved only when the dean of our division stepped in to mediate. I wasn't particularly thrilled with the way it was handled. This semester, I have another situation and again my dean has stepped in and has enforced a resolution I don't support.   In both cases, the student's rarely came to class and when they did they either came in late or left early. With the present situation, the student came in 45 min. late for the final and I didn't allow her to take it. She went to the dean and filed a complaint. I get a message from my dean that says I must allow the student to take it.   What are the rules regarding this?   Please help. Is this just the way this profession is? Students make complaints to the higher ups and professors must bend? Am I being too idealistic about standards? How low will we go? Check out Yahoo! Messenger’s low PC-to-Phone call rates. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Teaching Sociology" group. To post to this group, send email to teachsoc@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/teachsoc -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---