Issues with a professor

Hmmm.  Yeah, this is a frustrating situation.  But, not all that uncommon.

I've gone months without receiving grades on regular assignments before.  It depends a lot on the professor, some just don't put much emphasis on small assignments and therefore tend to push them to the side.  

How far into your semester is this?  The problem here would come in the situation where you have students who are not feeling very good about their performance in the class, and they are approaching the date at which students are still able to drop or withdraw from a class without being given a bad grade.  All schools have a limit on how long you can stay in a class before dropping, and still be allowed to withdraw and have it erased from your record (alternatively, if you wait too long and still drop the class, you could be given an incomplete or simply failed).  In this scenario, if a student was considering dropping the class, but had no idea what kind of grades they had been getting so far... it could make the decision hard.  What if a student thought they were doing well in the course, so stayed in, but then found out a month later that they had failed every assignment and have no chance of getting a good final grade but are now too late to get out of the class?  


This is an extreme example, but one that would make this situation important.  I have taught undergrad classes before, and we have strict guidelines about ensuring that all students know their grade standing prior to the drop date for that course.  That way, they have better information to base their decision on.

Granted, this may not be your situation, but it's one of those illustrations of why it's important for professors to keep you up-to-date on your class progress.  At the very least, the fact that he didn't even respond to let you know that he had received your assignments is inexcusable.  Sure, reading 30 written assignments multiple times each week can be a lot of work- but answering emails from your students should be something simple and quick that could be done every day.

Is there any way for you to go visit this prof in his office?  I would try sending your prof one more email, reiterate your concern that you do not know if he is receiving your emails... and then if he still does not respond, try asking your advisor for advice.  This is especially ridiculous, considering the course itself is online. 

Talk with the head of your department, and then with the dean of the school.  Do so in as polite a manner as possible.  What you have described is inexcusable.    The department needs to know what is going on.

 Madmathemagician, D.Sc.

If he's tenured, then nothing much will come out of this.

I don't want the guy fired or anything like that. I just want my f#$ing grades. I think I'll send him one more email next week and if i not heard anything from him I'll contact my advisor.

Do you have any sort of student representation? Student senate? Department liaison? When I was in graduate school, we had issues getting our grades from professors, and for us foreign students those grades are critical in keeping our funding and visas valid. So we talked to our student gov't rep, who was designated per college (so for me, Arts) and by section (postgraduate/undergraduate). We also contacted our student union reps (in Britain, some su's handle disputes like this in conjunction with the university governance). Got the situation ironed out and sorted, turned out to be a miscommunication/misunderstanding/ mis-staffing. Not sure if that is an avenue for you or not but it might be something else to try.

First if he is a pis poor [prof why not want him fired?  I am rude here but poor teacher need to be removed. Ok with that said you have the email records of your contacts if he posts a grade below what you expect you have very solid grounds to appeal.

After contacting the instructor one last time, contact the dept chair and report the unprofessional behavior. The instructor is getting paid to give you feedback! Staying quiet about it just makes him do it again in the future. I bet there are more students in the class who are also affected. Talking to your advisor will not do anything, except put her/him in an awkward position. The people who can do something about this behavior are the chair and up from there. At my school, the chair keeps a complaint log, talks to the students and instructors, and if several complaints pile up within a certain time frame or if it's the same behavior with the same person over and over again there are ways to address that.

Tenured profs? No consequence? Try again. If this is repeated behavior then it will be reflected in the prof's personal file. Universities don't trade gossip but don't think nothing goes on behind the scene. Be glad you don't know about it all! Profs might get reassigned to other classes, more duties, not get a merit raise next time there actually are any raises, will get less liked service assignments, etc. They don't need to lose their job to be miserable.

ETA: I am a tenured prof... but not miserable!

Edited by SauseEnte 2010-05-09 4:40 PM

Students tend to not have any power.  Your only influence is through teacher evaluations at the end of the class if the teacher doesn't have tenure and the college/university cares about what students have to say. 

After sending  this prof an email regarding an assignement-basically forcing him to get back to me, the grades are finally posted as of about 10:20 this morning. I still don't think much of the guy, but I've got my grades. I'll try to stear clear of his classes in the future.

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This user's post has been ignored.

Can he really be considered a "professor" if he's not saying anything? Sounds like a misnomer

There is defintely a delicate balance here. It is very unlikely that anything you say will directly lead to him getting fired. If he really is experiencing some life issues then it is wise to cut him whatever slack you can. OTOH - if you are not doing well on your assignments, you need to know so you can improve before you have submitted to many.

Now that you know how you are doing, I would be as patient with him as you can. If it seems that this is his standard MO, then a polite factual discussion with your advisor or department head should be effective in communicating your perspective.

Be careful of emails, because they are often simply forwarded to the offending party with a message "Please respond to this student..." which isn't going to be in your favor.