Your smackdown of the day

[Ed Anger]

NYU prof nukes student:

Sent: Tuesday, February 9, 2010 7:15:11 PM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific
Subject: Brand Strategy Feedback

Prof. Galloway,

I would like to discuss a matter with you that bothered me. Yesterday evening I entered your 6pm Brand Strategy class approximately 1 hour late. As I entered the room, you quickly dismissed me, saying that I would need to leave and come back to the next class. After speaking with several students who are taking your class, they explained that you have a policy stating that students who arrive more than 15 minutes late will not be admitted to class.

As of yesterday evening, I was interested in three different Monday night classes that all occurred simultaneously. In order to decide which class to select, my plan for the evening was to sample all three and see which one I like most. Since I had never taken your class, I was unaware of your class policy. I was disappointed that you dismissed me from class considering (1) there is no way I could have been aware of your policy and (2) considering that it was the first day of evening classes and I arrived 1 hour late (not a few minutes), it was more probable that my tardiness was due to my desire to sample different classes rather than sheer complacency.

I have already registered for another class but I just wanted to be open and provide my opinion on the matter.

Regards,
xxxx

—
xxxx
MBA 2010 Candidate
NYU Stern School of Business
xxxx.nyu.edu
xxx-xxx-xxxx


—— Forwarded Message ——-
From: [email protected]
To: "xxxx"
Sent: Tuesday, February 9, 2010 9:34:02 PM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific
Subject: Re: Brand Strategy Feedback

xxxx:

Thanks for the feedback. I, too, would like to offer some feedback.

Just so I've got this straight...you started in one class, left 15-20 minutes into it (stood up, walked out mid-lecture), went to another class (walked in 20 minutes late), left that class (again, presumably, in the middle of the lecture), and then came to my class. At that point (walking in an hour late) I asked you to come to the next class which "bothered" you.

Correct?

You state that, having not taken my class, it would be impossible to know our policy of not allowing people to walk in an hour late. Most risk analysis offers that in the face of substantial uncertainty, you opt for the more conservative path or hedge your bet (e.g., do not show up an hour late until you know the professor has an explicit policy for tolerating disrespectful behavior, check with the TA before class, etc.). I hope the lottery winner that is your recently crowned Monday evening Professor is teaching Judgement and Decision Making or Critical Thinking.

In addition, your logic effectively means you cannot be held accountable for any code of conduct before taking a class. For the record, we also have no stated policy against bursting into show tunes in the middle of class, urinating on desks or taking that revolutionary hair removal system for a spin. However, xxxx, there is a baseline level of decorum (i.e., manners) that we expect of grown men and women who the admissions department have deemed tomorrow's business leaders.

xxxx, let me be more serious for a moment. I do not know you, will not know you and have no real affinity or animosity for you. You are an anonymous student who is now regretting the send button on his laptop. It's with this context I hope you register pause...REAL pause xxxx and take to heart what I am about to tell you:

xxxx, get your shit together.

Getting a good job, working long hours, keeping your skills relevant, navigating the politics of an organization, finding a live/work balance...these are all really hard, xxxx. In contrast, respecting institutions, having manners, demonstrating a level of humility...these are all (relatively) easy. Get the easy stuff right xxxx. In and of themselves they will not make you successful. However, not possessing them will hold you back and you will not achieve your potential which, by virtue of you being admitted to Stern, you must have in spades. It's not too late xxxx...

Again, thanks for the feedback.

Professor Galloway

Young people suck.

[DGuller]

I hope the student was sitting when he read this e-mail, because he won't be doing any more sitting in the near future.

[DisturbedPervert]

15 minute late window?  What a softie

[Josquius]

What a dickish teacher, all of my teachers ever have had the policy of better late than never.

[Syt]

A: It's more of a meh-down.
B: You shouldn't showcase grumbler's mails to his students like this, they're probably confidential.

[Ed Anger]

B: You shouldn't showcase grumbler's mails to his students like this, they're probably confidential.

[Grey Fox]

Student is an idiot for thinking anyone at his university gives a god damn shit what his opinions are.

[DGuller]

I thought I was the only one who thought of grumbler when reading that e-mail.  The professor is a dick, most assuredly, but it was still a quality smackdown.

[Martinus]

LOL recently a professor at a Polish university got under fire for posting the following on the website, together with the exam results:

"To all the 80 people who failed the exam, I wish best of luck, a nice job at KFC and many unforgettable moments in an unemployment office.

If any of you ladies and gentlemen, in connection with the results, intends to hurt themselves, please do it outside of the faculty building, as it's a real bitch to clean blood from the floors and they are slippery enough already."

[DontSayBanana]

Depends on the subject area and depth.  If it was something like freshman seminar, I probably wouldn't sweat a few minutes of lateness; likely, I'm only missing a roll call.  On the other hand, I have classes like mechanics of property transactions, where it's pretty damn essential that right from go, I'm following along with the slew of statutes, doctrines, and explanations of reasoning that go along with practicing law in real estate transactions.

That said, the student is an ass for pulling that kind of stunt.  At the core of it, he's still deciding his schedule after the beginning of the semester, and that raises all kinds of red flags to me.

[Drakken]

Student is an idiot for thinking anyone at his university gives a god damn shit what his opinions are.

I'm not that surprised. And I can perfecly understand why more and more teachers are fed up of students who enter colleges thinking these are a diploma mill to breeze through.

Basically came with the change in perception among students, from people who are there to actually learn something worthwhile, i.e. students, to people who pay to acquire a piece of paper that will allow them to work in such and such fields, i.e. customers. And thus yes, of course their opinion is important - else they'll go study elsewhere and bring their money with them.

My teachers used to call them "étudiants mélamines" (melamine students). Because you see them only at the exams, when they come to beg for their courses' notes, or to whine about their B-.

Thus, many students behave like customers in a store in some free market, totally uncaring about the course and the teacher and focusing instead of making it easier to pass with the least effort possible to acquire their diploma. After all, they pay for it right? They are entitled to pass. Who the teacher think he is to flunk them? He is there to provide a service - the course - to allow them to get the damn diploma.

They shop around the courses in the first weeks, to see if they like the teacher and the content of the course (by that I mean, easy enough), and when they finally stay, they pressure the teacher into putting his notes in Powerpoint or printed and available, so they don't need to actually attend the classes, and even passed exams to study the answers. Nowadays, personal notes are sometimes even permitted into exams, which of course includes the notes printed directly from the teacher's PP presentation.

And (from experience) they lash out at assistants for any grade they deem insufficient for their papers that they think is so stellar when in fact it is full of grammatical errors (because they don't actually review their own text, it costs time, so they use automatic correction) and circular rhetoric (because babbling around a subject without getting to the point still gives some points, right?). And our teachers pressure the assistants as well, because they have an average ratio of good grades versus bad grades to respect so that they pass their own internal evaluation.

I took only one such contract as corrector, because I saw very quickly that I was too hard-ass (i.e. a good corrector) to do such a job full of shit, and I tend to punish ignorance rather than reward it. When the work was good and I saw the student made a worthy effort in his or her argument, however, I was very generous with the grades, so it evened out.

[Strix]

Student is an idiot for thinking anyone at his university gives a god damn shit what his opinions are.

He should be happy to get such a fine life lesson for free.

[Drakken]

Student is an idiot for thinking anyone at his university gives a god damn shit what his opinions are.

He should be happy to get such a fine life lesson for free.

That's the problem, it isn't free. The student pay for the service, he is a customer, so I expect a complaint to the college's ombudsman within 48 hours.

[Caliga]

That said, the student is an ass for pulling that kind of stunt.  At the core of it, he's still deciding his schedule after the beginning of the semester, and that raises all kinds of red flags to me.

Some schools encourage or even require their students to do this IIRC.  I think Harvard College might actually do this.  You have like a week at the beginning of each semester to audit any course you like (that fits a requirement or elective for your program) and then at the end you actually enroll in each course.  They call it shopping for class or something like that.

[DisturbedPervert]

When I was in college you could add classes without the dean's approval up to the 8th week or so.  It was pretty common for students to be adding and dropping classes during the first few weeks.  For some classes it was impossible of course.