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Post by Why on Sept 18, 2015 21:25:18 GMT -5
Does anyone else's students talk to other profs in the department about you/your classes but not come talk to you?
Im in my second year of a non-tenure track full time position at a medium sized regional comp and the soc majors do not come talk to me when they have questions about class material, assignments or requests. The majority go to other profs to ask for clarification, get assistance with work in my classes (Research Methods in particular) or to ask the other profs to ask me for something for them (e.g., grade changes). Last year I figured this was because I was new. I fully expected this year to be different but so far it's the same. The other profs don't seem upset at me over this, but I feel bad because they do seem exasterated with the students who, despite saying I'm nice, smart and giving me glowing evals, continue to go to them rather than come to me for help in my classes but wont ever say why.
If anyone has any insight or ideas I'd love to hear them. I did consider the possibility that I'm just not a personable person, but my colleagues, friends and family (all biased of course I'm sure) assured me I'm not a scary intimidating jerk and said there has to be another reason for this weird situation.
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Post by time cures all on Sept 18, 2015 22:18:19 GMT -5
First of all, make sure you are available to talk (i.e., regular office hours, etc).
Second, it may take more than 2 years for students to come talk to you. Research methods is likely a second year class, at the earliest, right? It means that your students have been taking intro classes with your colleagues, who they've had longer relationships with.
Finally, if your regional comprehensive is like mine, only tt faculty get to advise students, meaning that tt faculty will have a built in advantage in that regard.
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Post by Why on Sept 19, 2015 0:06:18 GMT -5
Thanks Time! You make a very good point re: advising. You are correct, I do not advise but everyone else does. Methods is a third year course so yes students have longer relationships with the other faculty; but they also go talk to the new TT AP who just began last year like me. She has advisees though so that gets right back to your point about advising and building those relationships. I have 8 hours a week of official office hours and have my door open an additional 8 that I spend grading and writing in my office so availablity isnt the issue. I think your point about advising makes a lot of sense.
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Post by Keep trying on Sept 19, 2015 10:40:01 GMT -5
Students often are afraid of methods professor, so you have find ways around that. I often do some quizzes in the start of the semester. Then remind students to see you if they are not getting the grades they expect. This gets them into personal conversations much earlier in the semester. Also, remember to show the relevance of methods early in the class. Students rarely value the importance of methods on their own, so you have to reveal the merits of the material. This often comes from moving away from methods textbooks to examples of studies that are intellectually baffling.
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Post by Why on Sept 19, 2015 20:41:15 GMT -5
Thanks Keep Trying. My chair also suggested it might be because im the methods prof, but he didnt mention that this also happened to the person who taught it before me... Methods is in a sequence with Senior Sem. Students learn and practice methods and then design their own project in my class then they conduct their research in semior seminar. I've been focusing on the importance of learning the material to make senior sem go more smoothly, but maybe that's just making it more daunting. I'll work on finding ways to show the merits of understanding methods outside of the degree requirments / academic research.
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They don't talk to me either
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Post by They don't talk to me either on Oct 8, 2015 15:32:44 GMT -5
But ... one student did approach me about what courses he should take next semester. A friend of his had given him a list of her favourite professors in sociology. And as he read them aloud to me, I realized I, with only one other (old angry) professor, wasn't on the list. I very humbly told the student that the list was great. But I've never fit in here ... e.v.e.r. ... it's a pretty teaching-oriented place and I think I might have been underplaced. I'm not just saying that either. For instance, I had a top-10 journal acceptance last year (along with a large number of others) and the Dean had a meeting with me to discuss how concerned she was with my "lack of interest" in teaching. LOL ... I LOVE teaching, I said. And her response was: "If you love teaching then why do you spend so much time publishing in journals?" B/c I thought that was our job? Anyway, it sucks not to fit in. My colleagues treat me like I'm rabid and the rumour amongst the students is that I just go "on and on" about irrelevant things. *sigh* Here's to greener pastures.
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Post by onrail on Oct 8, 2015 20:46:57 GMT -5
I don't mean to derail the thread, but I have to reply to the last poster. I work at a 4-4 institution. For a very long time, I felt I was dramatically underplaced whenever I talked to my colleagues. Most of them haven't published anything in years, don't even know when the ASA meetings take place anymore, etc. I thought for sure I'd be getting out of here in no time. And then, eventually I started to get to know more and more assistant professors at similar types of institutions (which is easy - they are the folks who dont run away when they see your institutional affiliation at ASA). Pretty much all similar 4-4 institutions in my state have someone like me: people who come from good, not great PhD programs, have numerous good, not great publications (i.e., no sole authored AJS/ASR, but coauthored pieces on SF, sole authored pieces in top specialty journals, etc) and a lot of teaching experience. I think most have a google scholar h-index of 5 or above (not that that is an indicator of quality, it does show that there are publications and that they are being cited).
I say all of this not to depress you. But to provide a reality check that you should try your best to fit your institution. Because the list of assistant professors with multiple top 10 publications trying to move up is quite long.
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Post by Why on Oct 18, 2015 23:17:08 GMT -5
thanks for the comments they dont talk to me either and onrail! im sorry you dont feel like you fit in they dont talk to me either. Ive been there, it sucks. but here that is not the case, i fit in great here. my colleagues dont avoid me, we get along great; and though I am much more research focused than they are they dont act like im wierd for it. the upper admin are supportive too, e.g., I just got funding to go present research at a conference. Rather than questioning my committment to teaching they seem really excited to get the university's name out there. its just the majority of the students have not yet warmed up to me.
as an update, i have gathered more info. a methods student came to talk to me this week on behalf of her whole study group because according to her the others were all afraid to come. I asked her why and told her I'd heard that students have been going to the other professors such as the other second yr prof for help in my classes. She said her classmates assumed the other second year prof would be easier to talk to than me. I told my colleauge this and she said a student told her that students think she is "motherly," which is interesting because we are actually the same age and both have young children the same age. My colleauge says students tell her I'm "smart" so our hypothesis is that they are making a dichotomy between smart and motherly women and since my phd is from a much more highly ranked program than hers they see me as the unapproachably smart one and her as the approachable motherly one. She also thinks that her (and all the other profs) being more culturally similar to the students from having grown up in this area, whereas I'm originally from the whole other side of the country, contributes to their perception that she will be easier to talk to than me. But I suppose we could speculate forever, we still dont know who killed Kennedy after all. Im just going to keep doing my best and hope students warm up to me before I leave and am forever remembered as that scary smart prof who was here for a few years.
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Post by Guest Name on Oct 19, 2015 5:46:01 GMT -5
This must be a troll. Feel free to watch it, but please don't feed it.
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Post by Why on Oct 21, 2015 19:06:19 GMT -5
This must be a troll. Feel free to watch it, but please don't feed it. This must be a non-sociologist, because hypothesizing about potential variables' influence on social phenomena isnt trolling, its what we do for a living.
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Post by Miss Ann Thrope on Oct 21, 2015 20:00:39 GMT -5
This must be a troll. Feel free to watch it, but please don't feed it. Don't tell me what to do.
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Post by Guest Name on Oct 21, 2015 20:01:32 GMT -5
This must be a troll. Feel free to watch it, but please don't feed it. This must be a non-sociologist, because hypothesizing about potential variables' influence on social phenomena isnt trolling, its what we do for a living. What do you mean "we," white man? -Tonto
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Post by Archivist on Oct 21, 2015 22:56:35 GMT -5
Whenever I see disparaging remarks about the presumed status or background of another poster, I know that the thread is about to go off the rails. If you feel the need to address the credibility of a poster rather than the content of the post, please avoid that temptation and move on. Let the moderators worry about and deal with the supposed trolls or sockpuppets. Above all, we want to avoid turning this forum into a flame war between anonymous personalities.
Side note: It is mid-October, and job market tensions are running high. Many visitors to this site are experiencing high levels of stress and uncertainty. Unfortunately, that is just going to get worse for most of them in the weeks to come. Let's try to cut each other some slack and not turn this forum into another source of anxiety.
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Post by Why on Oct 22, 2015 0:18:14 GMT -5
Thanks Archivist! Wanting to avoiding flame wars and off topic ad hominum attacks is exactly why I post questions here and not over on SJMR.
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