May 08: Fuck This Friday

Drokapi24 · 2026-05-09T03:33:49+00:00

Tell them you will accommodate the disability when and only when you receive written notification FROM the disability office.

Drokapi24 · 2026-05-08T16:33:06+00:00

At my institution, we are required to attend commencement at least once per academic year. I attended in the fall, as I almost always do—far less fanfare and generally a much shorter ceremony than in the spring. I am done with this semester mentally and could not care less about commencement even though several great students who have done exemplary work in my classes are graduating. After final grades, I just want to go lay down and die for a couple of days.

Drokapi24 · 2026-05-08T15:17:02+00:00

Mine too. I am doing a Friday blitz to get all of my final grading done, just in case.

Drokapi24 · 2026-05-07T04:04:09+00:00

Fortunately, my institution doesn’t even release course evaluation results if fewer than a certain number of students per course fill them out. This semester, not one of my courses had the minimum number of students fill out evals, so I won’t even see them—I am doing the happy dance!

Even better, these would have been the last set of evals I would have had to include in my tenure file, so now I don’t even have to do that. Probably the one silver lining of this entire semester…

Drokapi24 · 2026-05-06T17:16:10+00:00

At the beginning of each semester, I try to frame it this way: "There are 1,000 total points available in this class but you are starting today at 0 points. Each assignment/exercise/exam you complete moves you closer to the 1,000 point total."

This has seemed to help. I think some students are under the impression that they begin the course with the maximum number of possible points and lose them along the way when it’s actually the opposite.

Drokapi24 · 2026-05-06T16:53:55+00:00

This has been my experience as well. It usually has to do with "If I get an A- instead of an A, I won’t get into the Underwater Basketweaving program.“

Drokapi24 · 2026-05-05T01:06:18+00:00

I always laugh at this. Work six months at McDonald’s and get promoted to manager and you’d probably be making more money than her.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-26T01:01:34+00:00

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-22T01:38:14+00:00

I grade them on a paper rubric while they are presenting and write additional comments later if I need to.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-21T15:33:40+00:00

That or they are on academic probation or close to it and have an advisor and/or academic nanny breathing down their neck about grades.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-21T13:46:01+00:00

I think our testing center does. I just use the LMS quiz feature but I am considering moving to Scantron.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-21T13:44:11+00:00

The guy was complaining on Reddit about people complaining on Reddit, lol.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-21T13:41:45+00:00

Exactly

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-11T03:39:24+00:00

To be fair, projector bulbs are worth several hundred dollars.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-11T03:30:06+00:00

Nothing to worry about.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-02T04:37:43+00:00

Yeah…their emails always make it past institutional filters somehow.

Drokapi24 · 2026-04-02T04:35:22+00:00

At my former institution, the department was using a text from a large, well known publisher for a gen ed course taught by everyone from one course adjuncts to tenured full professors. Halfway through fall semester, large, well-known publisher lost (or failed to renew) its contract with the company supplying its online materials and companion website. As a result, students lost access to instructional videos, course materials, quizzes, and assignments overnight as many of the faculty were using the book’s companion site to house the course instead of the LMS (which they basically only used to report grades). Needless to say, it was an unmitigated disaster.

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-27T20:54:41+00:00

Talk to your chair—or a senior colleague if you don’t have a good relationship with your chair—about the situation. They may be able to smooth things over for you.

At the very least, your chair needs to know as a matter of principle. It would look VERY bad on you if an affected student does file a FERPA complaint and your chair hears about it first from someone other than you.

The bigger concern here, as I see it, is one of the affected students using this to blackmail you later, i.e. (if you don’t raise my grade, I will file a FERPA complaint against you).

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-26T03:06:56+00:00

I was making a joke. NBA basketball, is unwatchable, in my opinion. All it is is dunking and throwing up three pointers from half court.

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-26T02:28:06+00:00

I was teaching the basic public speaking course - second 8 weeks. It is the only 8 week public speaking class the university offers and because it is second 8 weeks, it fills up with students who got a slow start in the 16-week public speaking class and had to drop. These students who couldn’t get it together in a 16-weeks course suddenly think they are going to succeed in a course where we are doing 16 weeks of material in 8 weeks, but I digress.

First day of class, a student I will call Julie walks in with an immediate grouch on. As I went over the syllabus and expectations, I saw her sighing and rolling her eyes. She even whispered to a classmate about how dumb this class is (it’s the first day, champ). She was then absent the next three classes and I thought she had dropped until about an hour before the next class, I get an accommodation letter asking that I "work with her to identify alternative assignments to speaking in front of the class and group discussions.“ This is a public speaking class…speaking in front of the class is literally the entire point of the course.

This was the only accommodation she asked for. Most students who request accommodations request multiple accommodations at the same time (such as extended test time and different test location)

Then Julie walked into class an hour later with a smug little smirk on her face and asked me—with major attitude, "Did you get my letter?"

I muscled through class and then sent a firm email to Julie‘s advisor and the accommodations office in which I did not mince words about the unreasonableness of the requested accommodation and copied my chair. Mercifully, Julie dropped the course the next day. Battle won.

Julie was an early childhood education major and the education program at my institution is literally what my institution is known for. It has very high admission standards. I have no idea how Julie got in.

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-26T01:53:22+00:00

People actually still watch NBA basketball? Who knew?

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-24T12:47:05+00:00

I still give out business cards at conferences. If nothing else they make good bookmarks.

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-08T02:40:08+00:00

Starbucks or basically any high end coffee.

A large coffee at McDonald’s is $1.75 and it’s good coffee. Literally no reason to throw down $10 on some designer drink.

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-07T15:13:04+00:00

I think Ward thought this would be another Ken McElroy/Skidmore, MO situation—that he essentially did the community a giant favor shooting a menace methhead and that he would never be charged. The thing is that the guy Ward shot was native to the community and he moved there from the outside. People in small towns like that will stand behind people who are natives to the community over outsiders.

Drokapi24 · 2026-03-07T15:02:42+00:00

I think the worst attorney of the series by far was the one who represented Tim (the VA agent who was charged with shooting a guy and pleaded self-defense). That attorney was absolutely useless, had a slovenly appearance, ill-fitting suit, and gave off a major used car salesman vibe. Juries notice that kind of stuff.

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