Are College Professors Sadists?

Daniel Koster

Daniel Koster

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sadist: noun
someone who obtains pleasure from inflicting pain on others




I have a class that is convinced that professors are by nature and definition sadists. They like to make students work hard...suffer...go through strife...they prefer hard exams over easy ones...they like to give extra homework over the weekend/holidays...and so on.


While I do indeed do such things.... :D :foot: ...I'm not sure that makes me a sadist.


What do you guys think?


Were your teachers sadists by-n-large?
 
i cant say my profs are like that. they give a good amount of work, but they also dont demand things like a 10 page paper in two days time. they give you the time to work on it. i like them. plus they are crazy and most of them carry knives :D
 
Lazy students always think that they are being dumped on by the teachers. It has always been so, it will always be so. Those that choose to work never complain. They just do the work. I only had one college course where homework was mandatory (physics), and for the rest of them I did it if I felt like it. I always thought that professors were a bit too lenient when it came time to assign course grades. Some of the curves were off of the wall. My time as a TA confirmed my suspicion that professors are too lenient. Talking to the TAs here at this Ivy league institution of higher learning (I'm a postdoc at a school that begins with Y) has enlightened me to the fact that professors are lenient because TAs are mean and students need to be coddled and have their noses whiped for them.

A professor here actually told a graduate student/TA that the quiz he was writing for an organic chemistry lab was too hard and to go and make it easier. The questions were straight from the lab procedure that every student was to have read, internalized, and written down into their lab manuals before the class (and, hence, prior to the quiz that was designed to determine whether the students had read the lab procedure).

Teachers are not, by nature, sadists. Students are, by and large, whiners, cheaters, and slackers.
 
I've met more profs who are out of touch than sadists. They're experts in their field, and spend a good 22+ hours a day thinking about it. They completely forget how to approach the topic from a beginner's perspective. Many also don't know much about teaching (since their primary jobs are research and grant writing). Often, lectures and homeworks focus on small facets of the problem, rather than the big picture. Students would be better off if the prof would think about what students should be able to do after a particular lesson (i.e. what kinds of problems and exam questions should they be able to complete) rather than lecturing on something and then coming up with semi-related questions. These observations were made mostly from math/science/engineering professors.
 
I always thought that assigning any work over holidays was lame, but had no problem with it during the regular time period.

Andy
 
Daniel Koster said:
sadist: noun
someone who obtains pleasure from inflicting pain on others




I have a class that is convinced that professors are by nature and definition sadists. They like to make students work hard...suffer...go through strife...they prefer hard exams over easy ones...they like to give extra homework over the weekend/holidays...and so on.


While I do indeed do such things.... :D :foot: ...I'm not sure that makes me a sadist.


What do you guys think?


Were your teachers sadists by-n-large?
Click to expand...
Dan what specific subject do you teach?
 
hlee said:
Lazy students always think that they are being dumped on by the teachers. It has always been so, it will always be so. Those that choose to work never complain. They just do the work. I only had one college course where homework was mandatory (physics), and for the rest of them I did it if I felt like it. I always thought that professors were a bit too lenient when it came time to assign course grades. Some of the curves were off of the wall. My time as a TA confirmed my suspicion that professors are too lenient. Talking to the TAs here at this Ivy league institution of higher learning (I'm a postdoc at a school that begins with Y) has enlightened me to the fact that professors are lenient because TAs are mean and students need to be coddled and have their noses whiped for them.

A professor here actually told a graduate student/TA that the quiz he was writing for an organic chemistry lab was too hard and to go and make it easier. The questions were straight from the lab procedure that every student was to have read, internalized, and written down into their lab manuals before the class (and, hence, prior to the quiz that was designed to determine whether the students had read the lab procedure).

Teachers are not, by nature, sadists. Students are, by and large, whiners, cheaters, and slackers.
Click to expand...

What he said. I used to think I wanted to be a professor, until I was a TA for a couple years. Dealing with lazy and/or stupid students convinced me rather quickly that I should consider a different career path. Most professors are not sadists, though a lot of them are petty, egocentric, sheltered fools who either don't know or don't care about the real-world application of what they purport to teach.

I spent a lot of time in school, and rather enjoyed most of it, especially towards the end. But there is a lot of truth in the saying: "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach."
 
Sado-Masochists I suspect...

The work they hand out has got to be MARKED handed back and gone over with the student equals time-consuming!
 
Go to class and actively participate.

Do your research.

Don't snap under long term pressure.

Live with less sleep than needed and work weekends (correlated).

Accept poverty as a lifestyle for years.

Be incredibly excited/amazed/intrigued and at times terrified by the experience.

If you dare to challenge a prof in a lecture theater and the prof chews you up and spits you out, learn to eat your own crap as you brought it on to yourself.

I had little time to worry about a profs attitude, some were personable, some aloof. I simply expected a demanding workload, as was the case with the majority of my classes.
 
sixstrings101 said:
Dan what specific subject do you teach?
Click to expand...

I am teaching CAD and Graphic Design courses right now.


I guess I do torture my students....I gave them a test today and made them finish by a certain time...for every minute past that time it was due, I deducted 5 points. :eek: There were only 2 students that got it "on time".

Yes...I'm rethinking the deduct 5 pts thing...:D....but it wasn't an empty threat...it was more of a challenge for them to whip themselves into shape...work under pressure...meet deadlines.



I guess I operate under the delusion that each and every student of mine wants his/her money's worth and I give them as much of me and my stuff that they can handle. I can't say whether or not people like me...or if I'm a great teacher...but I do care about making sure the students understand me and the material/concepts/etc. :thumbup:
 
Daniel Koster said:
I am teaching CAD and Graphic Design courses right now.


I guess I do torture my students....I gave them a test today and made them finish by a certain time...for every minute past that time it was due, I deducted 5 points. :eek: There were only 2 students that got it "on time".

Yes...I'm rethinking the deduct 5 pts thing...:D....but it wasn't an empty threat...it was more of a challenge for them to whip themselves into shape...work under pressure...meet deadlines.



I guess I operate under the delusion that each and every student of mine wants his/her money's worth and I give them as much of me and my stuff that they can handle. I can't say whether or not people like me...or if I'm a great teacher...but I do care about making sure the students understand me and the material/concepts/etc. :thumbup:
Click to expand...
Not to be trashing on your teaching methods but thats kinda brutal. Not every student takes tests in the same method. Any many require more time and concentration than others.
 
It doesn't sound like you're being a sadist, but it does sound like your expectations were a little bitt off. Tests are ad hoc affairs and it can be hard to think like a beginner so sometimes it works out that way. What separates you from the sadists is that you seem realize that some accommodation should be made, even if you don't let students off the hook entirely.

I always liked tests (hated essays) but still I find that they are an artificial situation that's never really duplicated in real life (not mine at least). There are lots of people who fail to live up to their potential on tests but do just fine under 'real world' pressures and deadlines. Tests are an incredibly unnatural experience and beginners react differently under these pressures than more experienced folks.

When I TAed a large 2nd year class the only practical way of assessing them was through tests. 600 essays? Uh.. no thanks. There were some people who came in for help that were clearly on the ball as far as the material went but it just wasn't reflected on the tests. Sometimes (not always) the only advice I could give was to relax and not take the tests so seriously, to treat them like the sunday crossword puzzle or something like that. One of two things would happen: either their grades would improve when they stopped pannicking, rushing through the questions, and second-guessing themselves, or their grades would stay about the same, but they wouldn't be so stressed and in two years nobody would give a rat's backside about their 2nd year grades. I gather it was decent enough advice, because a few of students tracked me down to tell me it really helped them improve their grades.
 
Or at least you sound like it.

I don't know what your test covered but at least it isn't such an esoteric subject. If the students had to show they could make the machine do a certain type of curve or something and it wasn't all wild and frilly it was probably a good test. Those that didn't finish on time: why? Did they not know the material as well as they should have? Were the questions too involved for the time allotted? etc., etc., etc.

I have had the organic chemistry professors that you could not understand for their accents and a calculus professor that was great with the sixth year engineering students but couldn't come down to the level or first year students.

I also had a calculus prof at a community college that was known for tests that were out of this world difficult - unless you pulled back, looked at the forest instead of the trees, and remembered your equivalents or whatever they were. If you knew your material and took a couple minutes to look at the overall question, everything factored out rather quickly. If you were like me and didn't get your study time in or your homework time in and didn't learn the material - you spent all day trying to crunch the equations and come up with an answer.

Another factor some of the students may not admit to is poor planning on their part. They may be taking too many classes (work required - not credit counts) to give due consideration to each class. My first semester at Sacramento State I was a forensic science major. I only took 14 units of classes but it was the equivalent of 70 hours a week of work to get everything done. It was a recipe for disaster. Good counseling goes a long ways.
 
Dan,
What are you teaching? What type of test was it. If it was multiple choice i.e. guess then most time limits are manageable. If it was problem solving essay, I would flunk. I stopped at 3 degrees and now I am a plumber (human that is).

Lester
 
Some are awfully rigid. In my undergraduate days my university had a finals week divided into 3 hour slots for those long tests. At the end of the week they even had one slot at 8:00 AM Saturday morning. It was extremely rare for a prof actually to hold a final in that slot, but back in 1973 my quantum mechanics prof insisted in conforming to the schedule. I asked him if there was any way that I could take the final on another day, even if that meant (gasp) taking the final early. He was absolutely appalled at the suggestion. So I stayed up cramming for that stupid exam on my wedding night and delayed starting my honeymoon to accommodate the prick. I wish we could have adjusted our schedule, but when you are both working and going to school there are very few windows where you can take off a week.
 
Good points, guys.


I think it's ok to divulge this stuff online...hope it doesn't come back to bite me in the rear. :foot:


Today's test was 3 parts.
The subject is Design.

Part 1 - Question & Answer

Technically, not timed. But I did get them a rough idea what they should shoot for in order to be done with this section. Those that finished early got to hang out in the hallway until everybody was done.

Part 2 - Essay question (open book)

This was timed. 45 minutes. Fairly straight-forward compare/contrast essay. Most people got theirs in on time.

Part 3 - Art project

This was the brutal/torture test. They had 25 minutes to come up with a design on the computer. When I say only 2 people made it....everyone else (except for one) had theirs in within 2 minutes after it was due. So, it wasn't like I had unrealistic expectations. I was just imposing a deadline.

In the design fields...you live with deadlines every day. Sometimes if you miss a deadline, you lose a million-dollar client.

We have a policy for classroom presentations in our classes that the door locks when we begin and if you're not ready, you don't present.

I'm trying to reflect the real world as much as I can...within the theoretical bubble that school exists in. I feel like this is ok...because unlike many fulltime teachers...I spent 8 yrs in the business before I got into teaching. So, I have a strong sense of the practical side of things.

Don't get me wrong...I love teaching...and enjoy being with students. But I refuse to pander and molly-coddle. It's my experience that when I do....the students walk all over me and the class runs amuck. This way...the kids are always on their toes and they do turn out excellent work.

I should also mention that I follow a "work hard, play hard" system. We had a party and watched The Matrix in class last week (and, of course, had a related assignment).

:thumbup:
 
hehehehehe,

I had my share of sadists, that really enjoyed seen kids cry, and also hada my share of tough professors.

just remembered college a time when I was happy and did not know it.

Memories

Alejandro
 
Daniel,
You obviously care about your students and their learning. You also know your field and I ASSUME you convey your enthusiasm for the subject matter, because nothing hooks students like enthusiasm! I think of tests as part (class questions/answers/discussions, body posture, assignments fall in there too) of a feedback loop - and use them, with the other components, to inform classroom adjustments with the primary goal making the teaching and the learning more effective. Being sure to set realistic expectations is part of your job and meeting them is the student part...nothing sadistic about that! Steve
 
Dan,
That sounds like a fair test. I had an old professor that would cut a suture on a big vein and see if you could stop it from bleeding in less than 3 minutes. That is what I consider a sadist.
Lester
 
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