What school has the laziest professors? Forum

[BradyToMoss]

I'll start, since I think my school is likely a front-runner for this. Our professors are given an absurd amount of time to grade exams. We're finished around Dec 18th, and most professors due dates are in mid-late January for grades. The entire school shuts down for 3 weeks during break (apparently Christmas and New Year's demand entire weeks off), so even scores for exams that were all multiple choice in the beginning of december are not available to students until January.

This semester took it to another level. I had exams that were either entirely MC or mostly MC with a few short answers (literally less than a few pages per student). NONE of my professors have turned in their grades yet, including a class with less than 20 students.

Most of these professors are making $200,000-$300,000 a year for one semester's worth of teaching the same material they've taught for ages. Several working for the registrar's office take home nice fat checks despite performing work that a monkey could handle. Is it too much to ask for these people to get their shit together in less than 6 week's time?

[macattaq]

No professor I know has a life away from teaching, writes scholarly articles, attends conferences, networks, and sure as hell doesn't continue to practice law in any way, shape, or form. Hell, I'm pretty sure that no professor is actually a legitimate human being. To the best of my knowledge, they are all robots who should be at my beck and call 24/7. So yeah, I'm 100% with you on this one.

[Kohinoor]

I'll start, since I think my school is likely a front-runner for this. Our professors are given an absurd amount of time to grade exams. We're finished around Dec 18th, and most professors due dates are in mid-late January for grades. The entire school shuts down for 3 weeks during break (apparently Christmas and New Year's demand entire weeks off), so even scores for exams that were all multiple choice in the beginning of december are not available to students until January.

This semester took it to another level. I had exams that were either entirely MC or mostly MC with a few short answers (literally less than a few pages per student). NONE of my professors have turned in their grades yet, including a class with less than 20 students.

Most of these professors are making $200,000-$300,000 a year for one semester's worth of teaching the same material they've taught for ages. Several working for the registrar's office take home nice fat checks despite performing work that a monkey could handle. Is it too much to ask for these people to get their shit together in less than 6 week's time?

I'm not going to name a school. We may even be thinking of the same school. But I'm thinking it REALLY HARD RIGHT NOW.

[JPeavy44]

No professor I know has a life away from teaching, writes scholarly articles, attends conferences, networks, and sure as hell doesn't continue to practice law in any way, shape, or form. Hell, I'm pretty sure that no professor is actually a legitimate human being. To the best of my knowledge, they are all robots who should be at my beck and call 24/7. So yeah, I'm 100% with you on this one.

Sure they have outside lives, but get our grades back to us before the next semester starts at least.

[caoyun]

No professor I know has a life away from teaching, writes scholarly articles, attends conferences, networks, and sure as hell doesn't continue to practice law in any way, shape, or form. Hell, I'm pretty sure that no professor is actually a legitimate human being. To the best of my knowledge, they are all robots who should be at my beck and call 24/7. So yeah, I'm 100% with you on this one.

Sure they have outside lives, but get our grades back to us before the next semester starts at least.

You're forgetting one thing. Your break is also the Professors' break. In other words, this is their vacation too. Why the heck should they have to work over their vacation, instead of spending time with their family? Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well. Grow up and let them relax a little.

My school does the same thing. No exam grades until the last week of January. My first exam was, I believe, December 13 and I won't get my grade for six weeks from that point. Technically, the school gives each Professor exactly a month to submit grades, but they don't distribute the grades until they're all done. Is it annoying? Sure. I have a 100% multiple choice scantron test that I have to wait a month on. But the simple fact is that these guys are on vacation and you have to understand that they're probably not going to want to spend their vacation working.

[Cole S. Law]

You're forgetting one thing. Your break is also the Professors' break. In other words, this is their vacation too. Why the heck should they have to work over their vacation, instead of spending time with their family? Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well. Grow up and let them relax a little.

My school does the same thing. No exam grades until the last week of January. My first exam was, I believe, December 13 and I won't get my grade for six weeks from that point. Technically, the school gives each Professor exactly a month to submit grades, but they don't distribute the grades until they're all done. Is it annoying? Sure. I have a 100% multiple choice scantron test that I have to wait a month on. But the simple fact is that these guys are on vacation and you have to understand that they're probably not going to want to spend their vacation working.

Really? You have just outted yourself as a lazy professor trolling TLS instead of grading exams.

[caoyun]

You're forgetting one thing. Your break is also the Professors' break. In other words, this is their vacation too. Why the heck should they have to work over their vacation, instead of spending time with their family? Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well. Grow up and let them relax a little.

My school does the same thing. No exam grades until the last week of January. My first exam was, I believe, December 13 and I won't get my grade for six weeks from that point. Technically, the school gives each Professor exactly a month to submit grades, but they don't distribute the grades until they're all done. Is it annoying? Sure. I have a 100% multiple choice scantron test that I have to wait a month on. But the simple fact is that these guys are on vacation and you have to understand that they're probably not going to want to spend their vacation working.

Really? You have just outted yourself as a lazy professor trolling TLS instead of grading exams.

Shit. You caught me. Game over, man.

[samiseaborn]

You're forgetting one thing. Your break is also the Professors' break. In other words, this is their vacation too. Why the heck should they have to work over their vacation, instead of spending time with their family? Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well. Grow up and let them relax a little.

My school does the same thing. No exam grades until the last week of January. My first exam was, I believe, December 13 and I won't get my grade for six weeks from that point. Technically, the school gives each Professor exactly a month to submit grades, but they don't distribute the grades until they're all done. Is it annoying? Sure. I have a 100% multiple choice scantron test that I have to wait a month on. But the simple fact is that these guys are on vacation and you have to understand that they're probably not going to want to spend their vacation working.

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate/graduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and ever fewer teaching assistants and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

[thesealocust]

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

Often having had other responsibilities with respect to grading during the semester, to boot...

[macattaq]

You're forgetting one thing. Your break is also the Professors' break. In other words, this is their vacation too. Why the heck should they have to work over their vacation, instead of spending time with their family? Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well. Grow up and let them relax a little.

My school does the same thing. No exam grades until the last week of January. My first exam was, I believe, December 13 and I won't get my grade for six weeks from that point. Technically, the school gives each Professor exactly a month to submit grades, but they don't distribute the grades until they're all done. Is it annoying? Sure. I have a 100% multiple choice scantron test that I have to wait a month on. But the simple fact is that these guys are on vacation and you have to understand that they're probably not going to want to spend their vacation working.

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate/graduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and ever fewer teaching assistants and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

I don't know about you, but at my school, TAs don't grade exams. There is only one person doing the grading. I thought this was the same for all schools? o_O

[samiseaborn]

Sorry, I tend to switch up TA/RA because I was both at the same time for grad school. I meant RA's who are doing their research and fact-checking and a lot of the time the actual writing which frees up Profs to have more time to grade.

[macattaq]

Ahh, gotcha. That makes much more sense. Yeah, I don't know then. I mean, maybe it has to do with the Registrar's office just reopening then. I mean, if they have been closed the odds that they will be updating transcripts are pretty much nil.

I think this discussion begs the question as to why it matters when grades are received. Granted, they may be needed for applications. But if the reason for getting anxious over them is simply to have them or to give impetus to changing study habits (or reinforcing the ones you already have), then I don't think getting anxious is justified. Having them sooner won't change anything, and if you are going to change study habits, then you may as well just go ahead and do so. I think most of us have a strong sense of where we could have done better, or not slacked off. Receiving grades is not going to change that, nor will having them tell you where you should improve your study habits, if at all.

[TTT-LS]

.

[Kohinoor]

Ahh, gotcha. That makes much more sense. Yeah, I don't know then. I mean, maybe it has to do with the Registrar's office just reopening then. I mean, if they have been closed the odds that they will be updating transcripts are pretty much nil.

I think this discussion begs the question as to why it matters when grades are received. Granted, they may be needed for applications. But if the reason for getting anxious over them is simply to have them or to give impetus to changing study habits (or reinforcing the ones you already have), then I don't think getting anxious is justified. Having them sooner won't change anything, and if you are going to change study habits, then you may as well just go ahead and do so. I think most of us have a strong sense of where we could have done better, or not slacked off. Receiving grades is not going to change that, nor will having them tell you where you should improve your study habits, if at all.

Ability to enjoy vacation.

[macattaq]

The simplest answer is usually the correct one.

[NayBoer]

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate/graduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and ever fewer teaching assistants and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

Wait, UG profs have bigger families than LS profs?

[caoyun]

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate/graduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and ever fewer teaching assistants and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

Wait, UG profs have bigger families than LS profs?

Clearly.

Also, because they have smaller families, law professors don't need to spend nearly as much time with them on their vacation as they would if they had larger families. Because its quantity over quality, after all.

[samiseaborn]

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate/graduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and ever fewer teaching assistants and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

Wait, UG profs have bigger families than LS profs?

Nooo. Pointed out because this:

Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well.

was said first. I didn't understand the relevance of family status at all. Also admitting that I read that original post the first time as his prof having three kids, not 3 profs have kids. Either way I don't care how big their families are. Not because I'm uncaring, just because I don't think it should have anything to do with grading.

[caoyun]

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate/graduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and ever fewer teaching assistants and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

Wait, UG profs have bigger families than LS profs?

Nooo. Pointed out because this:

Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well.

was said first. I didn't understand the relevance of family status at all. Also admitting that I read that original post the first time as his prof having three kids, not 3 profs have kids. Either way I don't care how big their families are. Not because I'm uncaring, just because I don't think it should have anything to do with grading.

My point was that winter break is their vacation too. They have families they want to spend their vacations with. I don't expect a professor to work on their vacation. Likewise, I wouldn't want to be required to work on my vacation. Kinda ruins the whole vacation-y feel of a vacation.

[Cole S. Law]

Why the hell do some people think professors are in desperate need of a three week vacation? They teach maybe 8-10 hours/week. Most get summers completely off. Would it be cruel to ask them to set aside a 2-3 days after their exam to grade the things? Then they would still have at least a week and a half longer [strike]Christmas[/strike] winter holiday vacation than anyone with a real job.

[heyguys]

Hard to say what 'lazy' means here....I will say this: my professors work obsessively to make our classes as excellent as they can. But if we're using amount of time to grade exams, we're about to take our finals, and they're not due until the end of March

[heyguys]

Why the hell do some people think professors are in desperate need of a three week vacation? They teach maybe 8-10 hours/week. Most get summers completely off. Would it be cruel to ask them to set aside a 2-3 days after their exam to grade the things? Then they would still have at least a week and a half longer [strike]Christmas[/strike] winter holiday vacation than anyone with a real job.

You would be amazed at how much time goes into the class preparation for these professors-->from what I understand, average is roughly 8-10 hours for each hour of class time. This presumably gets lower as a professor gets increasingly settled into teaching a particular class. Also, the bulk of their work is stuff like conferences, research, etc.

Law professors definitely stay busy.

[ToTransferOrNot]

My real problem with this is that I had four years of undergraduate/graduate professors who made half as much money and sometimes had twice as much family to celebrate the holidays with, and ever fewer teaching assistants and they still managed to get it done before New Years.

Wait, UG profs have bigger families than LS profs?

Nooo. Pointed out because this:

Every professor I have is married, three (at least) have kids, who are home for winter break as well.

was said first. I didn't understand the relevance of family status at all. Also admitting that I read that original post the first time as his prof having three kids, not 3 profs have kids. Either way I don't care how big their families are. Not because I'm uncaring, just because I don't think it should have anything to do with grading.

My point was that winter break is their vacation too. They have families they want to spend their vacations with. I don't expect a professor to work on their vacation. Likewise, I wouldn't want to be required to work on my vacation. Kinda ruins the whole vacation-y feel of a vacation.

You're aiming for the wrong profession, then.

[ak362]

Would it be cruel to ask them to set aside a 2-3 days after their exam to grade the things?

With all due respect, I wouldn't want to grade 25 exams a day for a three-day period. I don't expect my professors to do it, either. My rationale is, the longer they take to grade, the more meticulous it is - and the fairer the grading. It may not necessarily lead to a better grade for me, but a process that's spread out is probably better. In undergrad, I got arbitrary grades on essay exams a few days after they were turned in (with class sizes equal to that of my current LS section) - and hadn't the slightest clue as to why I got the grade I did (whether good or bad). There were random words circled (sometimes no particular thing at all circled, off in the margins), etc.

Assuming exams were done December 18, I imagine grading will take place from Dec 20-22nd/23rd, start up again and go from 28-30th, then do a few more from 1/4-end of the week. That sounds pretty fair to me. After all, how many 4-5K word exams can you look at in a day?

[Bankhead]

Why the hell do some people think professors are in desperate need of a three week vacation? They teach maybe 8-10 hours/week. Most get summers completely off. Would it be cruel to ask them to set aside a 2-3 days after their exam to grade the things? Then they would still have at least a week and a half longer [strike]Christmas[/strike] winter holiday vacation than anyone with a real job.

You would be amazed at how much time goes into the class preparation for these professors-->from what I understand, average is roughly 8-10 hours for each hour of class time. This presumably gets lower as a professor gets increasingly settled into teaching a particular class. Also, the bulk of their work is stuff like conferences, research, etc.

Law professors definitely stay busy.

My crim prof (who is a leader in the field and publishes a ton) says that he works as many hours as a big firm lawyer. The difference, he says, is that he gets to work the hours that he chooses to -- which for him means staying up all night doing research and writing. I would imagine this isn't the case for all professors, but if you want to make money at it and be respected, the job is time consuming and certainly as much a meritocracy as a firm.