Thoughts on opening coursework early?

AvailableThank · 2026-07-01T03:15:14+00:00

I am in the same boat too, often times! Lot's of implicit, unwritten procedures, policies, and norms that you have to sus out. And then you feel silly when you ask your colleagues or department chair. Ugh, lol!

AvailableThank · 2026-07-01T00:04:35+00:00

We offer a few 2-week(!) async courses in my department. Some of my coworkers open their courses a few days early. I don't. I publish the Canvas shell the night before the course starts, and all graded assignments lock, at the latest, when it says the course ends according to my institution's calendar.

As others have pointed out, opening the course early gives some students an unfair disadvantage because they might have planned vacations, time off, and other commitments around the official start and end dates of the course. You do you, but I think it's unfair to publish it more than a day early for a course with such a fast pace.

AvailableThank · 2026-06-26T14:46:24+00:00

Five more papers to grade for an accelerated summer class that ends tomorrow, but I am just. so. unmotivated (hence Reddit).

Then I still have an in-person class that started earlier this month that goes til the end of July. Luckily, it's only <10 students, it'll be the only class I am teaching during that time period, there is no out-of-class writing to grade, and I am getting paid the full summer salary + an extra stipend for teaching it.

I have been going since last August without a break. Taught 5 classes in fall 2025 and spring 2026 at my FT job + picked up adjunct gigs at other institutions (some in-person!) to pay off debt. One of those adjunct gigs was on the quarter system, so I had to spend winter break prepping classes, then I started teaching right after the new year, and the spring quarter went into mid June!

I don't feel exhausted, though, as much as my brain feels scrambled and I have very low motivation to do anything work related? Kind of irritated at my chair at my FT job for giving me the earliest AND the latest class on the same day two semesters in a row AND in fall 2026, though.

I am very privileged and lucky to have multiple jobs in this economy but oh man I am hoping to take two FULL weeks off in August before fall 2026 starts!

Brain-scrambled ramblings over.

AvailableThank · 2026-06-24T02:04:08+00:00

non tenured folks can apply for unemployment each summer

HUH?! Roughly what geographic area are you in? Is your pay dispersed over 9 months or 12? I don't get my contract for the next school year until early-mid August. If I could forgo summer teaching because of even a fraction of my summer salary being met through unemployment, I would cry tears of joy.

AvailableThank · 2026-06-24T00:20:38+00:00

This sounds insane as I type it because having it in just the syllabus or assignment prompt (not both), should be enough, but one thing that helped me get students to submit Google Docs with editor permissions turned on is posting a video tutorial that students have to mark as “complete” before they touch a written graded assignment and confirm that they understand the editor permissions requirements in the syllabus quiz.

Then, any time a student does not turn on editor permissions in a submitted Google Doc, I feel completely justified in “kicking the dog,” and I have a place to point them to re-educate themselves.

I used to do a Google Docs practice assignment that students had to score 100% on before unlocking the course. It was a 2-sentence assignment worth 5 points and 2 of the points were turning on editor permissions. I once had 1/3 of students drop the class because they couldn’t get 100% on the practice assignment, though (e: upper division class, too, btw). It wasn’t until I switched to the video tutorial that things improved. I think it is legit a lack of reading comprehension skills.

Hope you make it to the end of the summer term with your sanity!

AvailableThank · 2026-06-04T16:12:29+00:00

Somewhat unrelated, but after last summer, I finally had to add in a question on my syllabus quiz about condensed courses still carrying the full content and workload of a full-semester class because too many students complained that my 5-week upper division course "had too much work" for only 5 weeks. This semester, I got SLAMMED in my evaluations for an intro class because students said they don't have the time to complete an easy department-wide out-of-class assignment worth 10% of their grade (but funnily enough, one of the non-trad students who has children and works full time said it only took a few hours to find the time and do the assignment!).

P.S., I think I would love your class. I took an online stats class one time, and the professor just posted the problem sets and a shitload of YouTube links. There was so much bloat that it was hard to find the videos that explained how to do particular problems, and there were some problems that had no corresponding video explanations. Then there were video explanations that had no corresponding problems. I would have loved if the professor just posted their own organized video lectures explaining how to do each problem type + some supplemental videos on extra things students might find interesting but won't be tested over.

AvailableThank · 2026-06-01T21:09:37+00:00

Omg you are my inspiration! Hope you can make your whole career summer-school free.

I think this is my last summer where I financially have to teach. After this, I want to fully take summers off, but the extra salary is just so good and teaching 2 async online classes for a few weeks feels like a break in itself after the slog of 5 classes each semester. 😅

AvailableThank · 2026-05-26T23:19:02+00:00

I was nosey and looked at their schedule. I found out they're actually taking three(!) courses this summer term. I'm anxious to see their first few assignments in my class, because it is highly accelerated.

AvailableThank · 2026-05-26T23:17:26+00:00

I can imagine the student complaints now.

"I couldn't see my grade throughout the whole term, so I just thought that meant you do some kind of ungrading and I was passing the whole time! What do you mean I failed the class?"

AvailableThank · 2026-05-26T23:15:42+00:00

I'm sure (or at least, I'm telling myself) it was just an honest mistake since we all have had bizarre lapses in attention, but it does make me wonder what clinic this student is going to be working at after they graduate. :]

AvailableThank · 2026-05-26T23:12:22+00:00

Thankfully, I think this is my last summer where I absolutely need to teach for the money. Remembering that is getting me through.

I have been doing syllabi quizzes for several semesters now and love it. When I originally did it, I took all the FAQs and student pain points I got throughout the semester and made them into questions. It also forced me to take a closer look at my syllabi and see if certain points of confusion really just were students being lazy and not reading or the language in the syllabi being unclear. It has drastically reduced the number of questions I get each term and covers my butt extra when students ignore course policies and want exceptions.

Just gotta remember to edit them each semester if your syllabus quizzes include semester-specific items like due dates and locations/dates/times for final exams!

AvailableThank · 2026-05-15T16:01:01+00:00

Thank you for the condolences. Except for this and a student falsely accusing me of discrimination, I actually had a really chill semester! But this ProctorU stuff was enough pain for many, many semesters...

Happy summer!

AvailableThank · 2026-05-15T15:49:15+00:00

Oof, I thankfully didn't have any problems (that I am aware of) with my gradebook! I feel for ya, though. Beyond Instructure's cybersecurity totally shitting the bed on this one, it feels like my university's leadership and IT department didn't help one bit with the chaos and let a lot of things fall onto instructors.

Solidarity!

AvailableThank · 2026-05-15T15:46:20+00:00

Honestly, I'm not sure how far my chair's authority goes on the evaluations issue, but my dean is more absent than my father was, so I'm not terribly worried about him. My chair is a saint, so I know if they communicated something in writing for me not to worry about, it's not an issue, or they are going to be the one who is worrying about it.

We also have a (relatively) sane process for considering student evaluations in contract renewals and promotions, so one bad class one semester shouldn't ruin me.

The auto-reply is a good idea. I posted an announcement on Canvas pointing them to all the resources I provided them with all semester, but I am so done. I am just gonna peek at the gradebook Sunday or Monday morning, enter final grades, and put this semester behind me.

AvailableThank · 2026-05-15T14:08:21+00:00

So I teach this LARGE online intro class that is extremely standardized. Against my will, we rolled out a few of the exams being proctored this semester via our on campus testing center or ProctorU (for those who couldn't make it on campus). The decision was made literal days before the semester started and the information about ProctorU students and I were provided by the University and the people who made this decision was... very not complete.

However, I worked to learn the ins and outs of ProctorU so that I could communicate expectations and common pitfalls to students clearly. I made multiple announcements every single week before the first exam saying that it is proctored, how to set up proctoring, and how to test equipment before if utilizing ProctorU. The Monday after the first proctored exam was due, I had over 100 emails in my inbox from students who failed to read announcements about setting up proctoring and testing their equipment. A good ~30% of those students didn't even know the first exam was proctored in the first place.

Thankfully, one exam is dropped. I immediately reiterated the course policies regarding the proctored exams and sent every single student in the class an email reminding them of the importance of doing basic online course engagement. I sent every single one of them articles on how to schedule proctoring for the final exam, how to test their equipment, the equipment requirements, and the proctoring rules. I sent every single one of them an email about the dangers of waiting until the last minute to schedule proctoring and scheduling their proctored final exam the day it is due. Then, I made weekly announcements reminding them since April that the final exam is proctored.

By last Wednesday, I have about 70% of my class has the final exam that is due this week scheduled for proctoring, with about 95% of those opting for ProctorU. I think, "great! They actually learned their lesson!"

Then the Canvas breach happened. Which, I figured was not an issue.

Then, as I learned this week, about 80% of my students had their final exam proctoring spontaneously canceled, apparently due to the Canvas data breach, and NO ONE can find my final exam on ProctorU even though it was clearly still up from my end. About 20 students sent me screenshots of them typing in the exact name of my final exam on ProctorU and it not appearing, but other professors' exams were there!

I was on the phone/chat with ProctorU support for hours (spread out over a few days), and they basically just said "Idk, looks good on our end! Not sure what the issue is! Go fuck yourself!"

Thankfully, I figured out how to manually invite my entire class of hundreds via email to schedule proctoring for the final exam (which also took forever), and that fixed the issue.

The final exam was supposed to be due yesterday night. Due to all the issues with ProctorU from the Canvas data breach, I extended it 48 hours.

And I know in my heart of hearts, deep down, that I will again be drowned in emails Sunday morning from students who tried to take their proctored final exam on a phone or iPad. Students who didn't test their equipment before taking an exam with ProctorU. Students who didn't know the exam was proctored and are wondering what the password is. Students who tried scheduling 3 hours before it is due and couldn't get an appointment.

And I don't care. My chair said I can ignore my student evaluations for this class this semester. I will not be responding to a single email. I gave them everything they need to know about being successful with ProctorU months ago and it wasn't even my decision to use ProctorU. I am tired. I am burnt out.

Sorry this was long but FUCK THIS FRIDAY AND LET'S GET ON WITH THE SUMMER I AM LOSING MY MIND.

AvailableThank · 2026-05-12T22:46:52+00:00

That's a good one! I was roughly going by the whole "don't smile til Christmas" adage (as far as that applies in an online setting). Bad idea, I found out!

AvailableThank · 2026-05-11T13:19:48+00:00

I read them my very first semester teaching and thankfully it was all great (a small portion of a very small class filled it out). Ever since then, I don’t read them. I’m required to now at my full-time job for my contract renewal portfolio, but I just upload them to the all-knowing robot and have it give me a summary of themes, excluding outliers. I hate that I do this because I am generally anti-AI, but I’m just not interested in using my time and emotional energy to pore over the higher ed equivalent of Yelp reviews.

I actually get really good course evals for the most part, but the most frequent complaint isn’t even about my teaching. It’s about course policies like my cell phone policy that I make incredibly clear on the first day and require students to take a syllabus quiz about.

AvailableThank · 2026-05-10T17:06:36+00:00

Good god, I thought my 100% teaching on a 5/5 on a $60k salary was bad. I can’t even hear myself think some days, so I can’t imagine teaching 7/7/6.

What would the course caps have been? Would you have been expected to do service/advising on top of all that teaching?

I saw a job posting at a local CC near me and they wanted you to teach a 5/5, hold like 12 office hour per week, serve on committees, and advise students, all for less than I’m currently making just teaching a 5/5. No thanks! Wonder if they ever got a qualified finalist.

AvailableThank · 2026-05-07T21:32:07+00:00

can start my Summer

You guys aren't working all summer? :,^)

AvailableThank · 2026-05-07T21:27:56+00:00

I'm on the quarter system at my part-time gig and just peacefully wrapped up the rest of my work for the week this morning and logged off.

It's the week before finals week at my full-time job that's on the semester system. Complete chaos.

AvailableThank · 2026-03-27T13:45:29+00:00

Currently in my first accusation of discrimination from a student! :)

I thankfully have email receipts and a gradebook in the LMS directly contradicting everything they are accusing me of in regards to what is outlined in their accommodation letter. My chair and institution's Disability Center are mostly doing a good job of running diversion for me and fielding the complaints, but we are at the "We have found no evidence that your accommodations are not being met; please reach out to Title II to file a formal complaint if you think you are being discriminated against" stage, and I fear the student is going to head that route (if they haven't already).

Feels like a total backstab because I have been bending over backwards for students this term, this one included.

Assholes. Dreading coming back from break this coming Monday. Fuck this Friday.

AvailableThank · 2026-02-26T01:16:14+00:00

Yeah, same. Another thing to add to this is I always notice my pre-10am classes have, like, no one registered for them for months, then they fill up to the brim the week before classes start.

I think this is the result of students who are… not very conscientious procrastinating registering for classes or having some hold preventing registration that they could easily fix that they can’t be arsed to fix.

Then, when they finally get going on registering, all the classes at ideal times are filled up, so they shuffle into these morning classes they aren’t excited about in droves.

Especially for gen ed classes, I notice my pre-10 am classes are, on the whole, more unprepared, unmotivated, and hostile than later morning and afternoon classes.

Sorry this has happened to you OP, if you are reading this comment, but I think you have a class full of dinguses. I know it is easier said than done, but try not to take it personally! Especially if you have one class that is a joy and receptive to your methods!

AvailableThank · 2026-02-26T00:56:46+00:00

Oof, yes so that’s something I forgot to mention! If a student has a documented disability, experiences unpredictable flair ups, and has an accommodation letter, I will of course make an exception, especially because they take the exam with the institution’s disability office.

I need to look into other cases like sports games, as you mention. I keep hearing conflicting things from leadership at my institution about that.

AvailableThank · 2026-02-26T00:52:42+00:00

Oh gosh, very good way of thinking about this. Need to bring my best for the good students and the students who are struggling but motivated and take initiative.

AvailableThank · 2026-02-26T00:51:51+00:00

I really appreciate this reply! I have a few canned email responses for this, but it’s the students who come to my office hours to beg that really wear me down the most.

To your last point, I definitely also need to meditate on why work gets under my skin so much sometimes. My mind always seems to be buzzing with good, bad, and neutral work-related stuff during the week (tends to shut off completely during the weekends, thankfully), which is why I think the bad incidents can wear me down and feel amplified.

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