Student Excuses

I think I have heard a better one:

“I missed class because my parakeet had diarrhea and I had to stay home and change the paper in the cage every time an “accident” happened...my mom’s a neat freak.

john christesen, Professor of Management at SUNY Westchester, at 8:39 am EDT on September 21, 2005

Hm, I don’t know.

Some excuses are legitimate. Some relatives do die, printers don’t work, things happen. I’ve certainly heard my share of excuses, but we’ve got to approach each case on its own merits. Above all I feel a need to respect the students, even if they don’t respect their teachers sometimes, because I remember clearly how it felt to be on the other side of this, feeling guilty and frustrated and underslept.

I’ve read this article with the requisite grain of salt, and it still makes me uncomfortable. It’s disrespectful of circumstances which sometimes are, indeed, hard.

Vika Zafrin, Brown University, at 11:44 am EDT on September 21, 2005

Excuses

And my personal favorite..."I didn’t meet the deadline because I couldn’t find matching socks.”

JMcD, at 12:00 pm EDT on September 21, 2005

The lessons of satire

It’s amusing, and not altogether unexpected, to see the responses from readers who have clearly missed the satirical intent of this “semiotic” reading of student excuses (of course, this same approach could be taken with professors excuses for not returning student work or administrators excuses for not approving chairs requests—this is one of those “Who many ______ does it take to screw in a lightbulb?” sort of jokes).

The concern for the legitimacy of student excuses is, no doubt, heartfelt, but it misses the point of this lighthearted satire.

Timothy Stevens, CUNY, at 12:12 pm EDT on September 21, 2005

warding off lame excuses

Yes, hearing the same lame excuses will make you cynical, and I realize the author is making light of every instructor’s unwanted chore: to decide who is lying and who really needs a little extra time for good reason. Because I have a big heart but hate to be taken advantage of, I have a few policies that have considerably cut down on the lame excuses. First, I tell students in writing and orally that in fairness to students who turn in their work on time all late assignments will be marked down 1/3 of a letter grade (i.e. B+ to B) for every day it is late, regardless of the reason short of a proven hospital admission. I stress that the reason an assignment is late is irrelevant; that the lowering of the grade will happen regardless. The rare student who then petitions with an excuse nonetheless generally tends to have a valid excuse (or at least a more creative one). As a result the past two quarters I’ve received only a handful of late papers, and the students did not complain or offer excuses when they received lowered grades. Since I’m not a scary ogre, I assume they simply took responsibility for their lateness rather than were in fear of approaching me. At the same time I give the Draconian consequences for late work, I drop a veiled hint that I am inclined to give extensions on the due date only if they approach me BEFORE the due date rather than on or after the due date. This allows for students who really do have issues in their lives to be treated kindly and separates them out from the empty printer cartridge group who simply decided to party the night before. And yes, I realize my policies make students prioritize my class and as a result my colleagues get the brunt of the lame excuses I don’t hear, but setting priorities is an important part of preparation for life, and my colleagues have the means of solving the problem as well.

Reader, at 12:37 pm EDT on September 21, 2005

fav excuse

My favorite excuse was the student whoes grandmother died (I extended her assignment due date), a month later an aunt died (I was suspicious), when a second aunt died I started wondering aloud at home ... turns out my husband worked with the student’s father; he hadn’t taken any time off for a plethora of dying relatives.

Like many instructors I don’t want to be punative — my job is to teach. However, over the years I too have decided that the majority of students don’t really have a good excuse for late papers.

GMS Community College Faculty, Faculty at Cochise College, at 1:30 pm EDT on September 21, 2005

Learning Disabilities

Hey Gang—

Please take my comments for the lighthearted satire they were meant to be. But to clarify one thing is a very serious way, as a former colleague who deals with LD *always* reminds, it’s actually against the law to *assume* an LD or to act as if one existed *unless* it has been documented by professionals whose job it is to assess such matters.

We should *never, ever* accept a student’s plea of a learning disability unless such a condition has been documented and the student *chooses* to make that information known to us. (Many, many students with LDs do not *want* to have them disclosed and do not *want* any special consideration.) If you’ve not seen the documentation, you should absolutely not be making any sort of LD accomodation for a student.

By the way, students *must* ask for LD consideration in advance of assingments, exams, etc., not ex post facto.

Rob Weir, at 7:05 pm EDT on September 21, 2005

Occasionally, very very occasionally, a student misses a deadline because he has, in fact, been working maniacally but the overambitious ideas he’s been grooming simply haven’t come together yet.

After missing a deadline on a Milton paper by three weeks, I received back the following note:

“Grade: A. This paper was well worth the wait. However I do not wish to wait for anything from you ever again.”

I got the message.

DS, at 2:33 pm EDT on September 22, 2005

re: late assignments

Here’s what works for me. Let’s say, I give students three weeks to complete an assignment. I don’t assign a drop dead ‘due dead’. I tell students the assignment is due any day ON OR BEFORE the final date. I actually say to them — I know you can come up with a great excuse the day before the assignment is due. However, I challenge you to come up with an excuse that lasts for three straight weeks. This really works because the message is don’t procrastinate. Manage your time and budget in extra time for personal emergencies. You will have to do this anyway when you get a job so start now.

Deirdre Verne, Prof. at Westchester Community College, at 9:34 am EDT on September 23, 2005

As a CS undergrad, I once faced the opposite problem. The summer before I got married, I took a math class dealing with topics specific to computer science. Because of the distraction of pending nuptials, I didn’t do all that well during the term—but I pulled things together at the end and aced the final.

Result: the prof called me in and accused me of cheating (with no more evidence than the fact that I did so well on the final). The fact that I was attending on a National Merit Scholarship, had scored 800 (perfect) on the Math Level II AT entrance exams, etc., cut no slack. Beyond that, I don’t think I had ever cheated in a class in my life. He only gave me a ‘B’, even though my final score entitled me to a higher grade. Still rankles a bit 30 years later. ..bruce..

Bruce F. Webster, Reverse effect, at 2:55 pm EDT on September 26, 2005

I actually found this looking for a semiotics 101 primer for my class earlier this week, and it’s quickly made the rounds of my professors and fellow teaching assistants and peer facillitators (undergraduate TAs). Consensus is that this is one of the funniest things we’ve seen in a while.

When I started teaching a year ago, I immediately thought about my own issues with deadlines, and told students that as long as they kept me up to date about their progress BEFORE class, BEFORE the deadline, and they didn’t abuse it, they would find I’m incredibly sympathetic to life happening. In that time, I’ve had exactly one student try to take advantage... so I consider it a pretty good track record.

Kelly, at 9:45 pm EDT on October 7, 2005