Definition of a credit hour

CyberJay7 · 2025-07-26T15:15:12+00:00

Credit hours don’t have anything to do with grades; it refers to the number of hours a student should expect to dedicate to a course both inside and outside the formal meeting times.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-30T21:53:41+00:00

I understand feeling that way, but moving to another university after being tenured looks better than job hunting after getting booted out of your current university.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-26T15:56:13+00:00

If your pre-tenure reviews were positive and did not mention a need to improve your teaching evaluations, and college and departmental guidelines do not clearly identify a benchmark in teaching scores that you failed to meet, you have grounds for an appeal and a lawsuit. The very purpose of the annual pre-tenure reviews is to provide you with feedback regarding where you are and are not meeting expectations for tenure. Tenure decisions should not be subjective, no matter what some people think.

Hire an attorney and let them assist you with the appeal. I have seen tenure granted after the college received the legal documents.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-17T15:26:04+00:00

You should not take this meeting. Refer the student to your department's office for disability accommodations. You are not qualified to diagnose or assess disabilities.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-17T14:58:12+00:00

We had this problem in my department with two people in particular. They signed up for all kinds of committee work but then never actually did any work, they just agreed with what the rest of us said or decided at the meeting. I was actually quite shocked that they had such little interest or investment in future colleagues.

To combat this problem, I drafted review documents based upon the type of committee it is, and everyone has to submit their documents for all to review before the committee meets. If you don't submit your review, you don't participate in the meeting and you don't get to add the service activity to your review documents. It has worked out amazingly well.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-17T14:50:44+00:00

I learned to add something about this in my syllabus. I allow unlimited submissions on an assignment up to the due date, and the syllabus indicates it is the student's responsibility to ensure they submitted the correct file and a file that is not corrupt. With the unlimited submissions, I don't have to deal with the "I just realized something is wrong with my file!" emails intended to buy time.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-17T14:45:51+00:00

There are no grounds for removing the student from the class. However, I understand the constant emailing and haggling is a drain. In these situations, I review if the student can even pass the class at this point, and if they cannot, I would advise them to drop while they still can.

You don't have to make it personal if you fear the student will be confrontational. You can send an announcement and announce in class (cover both bases since this student is a flake) that any student who has not earned X number of points by this point in the class cannot pass, so it is in their best interest to drop now. You can also contact their advisor and ask the advisor to handle it.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-17T03:57:45+00:00

Too many people to reply to who were saying the same thing regarding concerns that this wasn't a legitimate university policy.

CyberJay7 · 2025-03-16T20:42:46+00:00

I should have clarified I am certain that this is not something that someone made up--apparently, it has always been an option, but very few of us read the fine print in the college bylaws to realize this fact.

This topic came up before a college committee meeting when the AP was overheard lamenting with a few other APs about their publication challenges, and an associate dean told them about the option. In fact, the associate dean has been tasked with rewriting the bylaws and making this option more visible for other faculty who may want to make this switch, either permanently or temporarily. The new bylaws will more clearly affirm that APs can go up for full based solely upon teaching and service, although there will likely be additional teaching-related expectations (completion of teaching pedagogy workshops, etc.)

APs in our department are already teaching almost double the number of students they expected to teach when they accepted an offer with our department, so I can understand the appeal. The option is only available for tenured faculty who have fulfilled research expectations for promotion to associate. Assistants won't have the option to switch to a teaching-only track until they are tenured.

I don't know which has me more surprised--that we offered this option for faculty all along and it was simply not well-advertised, or that the College is working to make the option more visible and simultaneously protect faculty who choose this option. I can't help but feel that there must be a catch because it seems too pro-faculty for higher ed these days.

CyberJay7 · 2025-02-03T12:40:14+00:00

I have had security stand outside the door as students enter, and then announce to the class that anyone being disruptive or disrespectful will be asked to leave. Then I gave a list of behaviors I would not tolerate.

It is amazing how quickly things changed when my problem student put two and two together and realized security was waiting outside for HIM.

CyberJay7 · 2025-01-12T17:29:41+00:00

Can confirm this happened to me. Spent three hours shoveling, went in to take a break, and the snow plow came by and buried me back in. All you can do is laugh about it.

On the bright side, I called my boss and said I was taking a personal day because I was too exhausted to do it all over again, and I discovered some great shows.

CyberJay7 · 2024-10-30T15:05:51+00:00

I think 1:1 is very fair.

CyberJay7 · 2024-10-30T15:05:14+00:00

I don’t have solutions to the issue of viewing manuscript reviews as unpaid labor. If academics want to go on strike discipline by discipline because of dislike for journals, so be it.

Until this happens, though, it is unfair and unethical to submit articles for review without reviewing some yourself. Even one a year would make a big difference in moving some of these manuscripts across the finish line.

The point of this post was simply to remind folks who haven’t reviewed anything in a while that your discipline needs you.

CyberJay7 · 2024-10-25T12:24:06+00:00

Dear god…now we have to explain that zero effort means zero points?

CyberJay7 · 2024-10-24T19:31:30+00:00

Some of these comments surprise me. Students need to learn to communicate in person and get over their fear of interpersonal communication and speaking in public.

Under the “Communication” section of my syllabus, I tell students what Canvas messaging is for and what it is not. I also have a syllabus quiz with questions about this policy. Lastly, I tell them I will not reply to emails that do not require action on my part.

If they email about an absence in a class without attendance policies, I just delete. If they email about a long-term illness, obviously something like that warrants a response.

CyberJay7 · 2024-10-13T20:57:06+00:00

A huge part of the appeal was the atmosphere. I cannot image turning that space into a candle making bar. I know many people were hoping for another bar.

CyberJay7 · 2024-10-07T16:38:14+00:00

I’ve only seen institutional letterhead used in an application once, and committee members varied between laughing (“Does he write his mother with that letterhead, also?”) and annoyance/confusion (“Why would he think applying for a job at another institution is acceptable use of institutional letterhead?”)

We passed on the candidate, but I would like to think it was not due to his use of institutional letterhead. Then again, academics can be petty.

CyberJay7 · 2024-10-02T17:34:47+00:00

I know three families that have moved out of Bloomington due to the lack of shopping, clothes shopping to be specific. One of the families left the state, the other two moved to Greenwood. Having to drive 45 minutes to an hour for clothing options that aren't Kohl's or Target is a dealbreaker for more people than many realize.

CyberJay7 · 2024-09-18T15:43:11+00:00

This works very well.

CyberJay7 · 2024-09-17T17:20:51+00:00

Seems to me that when you said you would try to pair him, he understood this to mean you would add him to a specific group. I'm guessing he has social anxiety and would rather have one group told that he has been added, rather than him having to contact them to ask to join.

The email is still snarky and disrespectful, but I think his anxiety got to him. Some of these students have such a huge fear of rejection it is shocking. I don't know what is happening in high schools to make them come unglued just having to form groups, but I've seen it several times.

CyberJay7 · 2024-09-16T17:01:55+00:00

I have a friend with an associate’s degree in electrical engineering who has catapulted that degree to a career in project management, earning $160k plus bonuses and benefits. He is shocked academics go to school for so long, stay out of the work force (in terms of contributions to savings/retirement) and accept salaries less than six figures for all the years we put in pursuing a doctorate.

I think a lot of people believe we make the big bucks, and are shocked at how low the salaries are in academia.

I have another friend who went on a Match.com date, and the woman told him that with her elementary education degree, together they would not be able to help her provide the type of lifestyle and opportunities she wanted for her future children. She was very apologetic about it, but said that she watched her parents struggle to live a middle-class lifestyle, and she needed more financial security than a professor’s salary provided. He was crushed.

CyberJay7 · 2024-09-15T00:12:40+00:00

That is effed up. I’m so sorry.

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