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I read every posts you wrote here and I will be honest. Your posts are all over the place and it makes it hard to piece together anything. I think everyone who posted just skimmed through your posts and just got out that you failed and your professor asked if you were mentally ill and its obvious everyone's first reaction will be to say shes in the wrong and sympathize with you cause everyone has had their experiences with terrible teachers.
From what I got I think you are at fault just as much as her. Its your responsibility to keep track how you will be graded and your current grades, figuring out where you stand. You did not, thus you are surprised at what you got. A student should never be surprised of their final grade if they make an effort to keep track of their grades. You were surprised and you admit you didn't take part in it as much as you should. You should have done something earlier to have prevented failing the class.
I think you should make your case to someone higher up. It something you should have handled a long time ago and there is still a chance you can get your grade changed but more than that its to get someone else involved to sort things out. You're a bit too unreliable for me to really conclude anything from your posts besides that something is wrong. I do think your professor made some mistakes too so she should at least be aware of what she did wrong too and its important to hear her side too.
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On April 29 2012 03:59 Ilikestarcraft wrote:
I read every posts you wrote here and I will be honest. Your posts are all over the place and it makes it hard to piece together anything. I think everyone who posted just skimmed through your posts and just got out that you failed and your professor asked if you were mentally ill and its obvious everyone's first reaction will be to say shes in the wrong and sympathize with you cause everyone has had their experiences with terrible teachers.
From what I got I think you are at fault just as much as her. Its your responsibility to keep track how you will be graded and your current grades, figuring out where you stand. You did not, thus you are surprised at what you got. A student should never be surprised of their final rade if they make an effort to keep track of their grades. You were surprised and you admit you didn't take part in it as much as you should. You should have done something earlier to have prevented failing the class.
I think you should make your case to someone higher up. It something you should have handled a long time ago and there is still a chance you can get your grade changed but more than that its to get someone else involved to sort things out. You're a bit too unreliable for me to really conclude anything from your posts besides that something is wrong. I do think your professor made some mistakes too so she should at least be aware of what she did wrong too and its important to hear her side too.
You just said everything that was already said.
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On April 28 2012 06:00 Torte de Lini wrote:
I'm the only one to have failed my class...
Sad to say, it's probably all on you. Having taught at the tertiary level in a number of institutions, I can say it's pretty troublesome to fail people. You have a whole bunch of paperwork presentations to do in order to justify this person failing, not to mention having to put them through a retake of the module or remedial classes or whatever it is that needs to be done. If the prof is bad in the sense that they are incompetent or simply don't care, you would typically get a 'C'. This is the grade that is by far easier to fit into the prescribed bell curve and results in no extra overhead.
This means either your paper totally missed the point, was just plain wrong, or she simply hates your guts. All of this can be solved simply by communication. Not hostile communication ala demanding a grade, but genuinely trying to understand how she thinks and where she's coming from. This is much the same in working life. You always meet with more success giving people what they want, rather than what is clearly right or superior in your mind. Of course, they will never tell you exactly what they want because most of the time, they have no freaking idea what that is either. (Can't make things too easy)
By going through the "channels", you might get what you want, but if you simply connect with people and learn to understand them better, the path thereafter will be much smoother and may even yield unexpected benefits.
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On April 28 2012 21:26 Recognizable wrote:Show nested quote +On April 28 2012 21:19 StarStruck wrote:
Yes, we only have your take of the situation but I would definitely send in an appeal and it sounds like she was passing a lot of judgement on you. When you go against the grain especially with a paper they have every reason to fail you on it because you didn't do what they asked you to do no matter how revolutionary it is.
However, she never gave you any proper feedback and as you said. She always appeared to be very hostile to you so I question her bias. I find this so retarded with education nowadays. But whatever, anyway. She seems crazy.
I was one of those people who walked on a thin line trying to break borders and boundaries especially when it came to my writing. It was a total nuisance for many of my teacher's, but I always met with them beforehand to let them know what I wanted to do and they would let me submit a sample to get their approval to make sure I was on track.
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Can't wait to see what happens. If you have to go through SS then that will suck. I've yet to fail a class except for once but my teacher bumped up my grade to a D because she liked me overall, it was just my work ethic that sucked at the time. But with a teacher that doesn't already like you you'll need to really look at things from her point of view. Also, remember to stay calm. Good luck, I fear you may need it.
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On April 29 2012 18:08 e-Goh wrote:Show nested quote +On April 28 2012 06:00 Torte de Lini wrote:
I'm the only one to have failed my class...
Sad to say, it's probably all on you. Having taught at the tertiary level in a number of institutions, I can say it's pretty troublesome to fail people. You have a whole bunch of paperwork presentations to do in order to justify this person failing, not to mention having to put them through a retake of the module or remedial classes or whatever it is that needs to be done. If the prof is bad in the sense that they are incompetent or simply don't care, you would typically get a 'C'. This is the grade that is by far easier to fit into the prescribed bell curve and results in no extra overhead.
This means either your paper totally missed the point, was just plain wrong, or she simply hates your guts. All of this can be solved simply by communication. Not hostile communication ala demanding a grade, but genuinely trying to understand how she thinks and where she's coming from. This is much the same in working life. You always meet with more success giving people what they want, rather than what is clearly right or superior in your mind. Of course, they will never tell you exactly what they want because most of the time, they have no freaking idea what that is either. (Can't make things too easy) By going through the "channels", you might get what you want, but if you simply connect with people and learn to understand them better, the path thereafter will be much smoother and may even yield unexpected benefits.
I didn't know that part [the extra steps to fail me]. I might just ask her why I failed, but I don't want her lamblasting me.
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I dunno, Torte. You are not a bad guy, but everyone you got to read that first paper was not impressed. It didn't give me the impression you even knew how to write a paper. You can't complain about StarCraft or whatever keeping you busy either, because 'being proactive' is a matter of spending 2 minutes after the class talking to the prof. Matters such as how well you are doing in the class, the exact nature of an assignment etc are things that take 30 seconds to reply to. Heaven forbid, if you got warning signs in those 2 minutes you could go to her office hours for help.
The part about claiming you have a mental illness was inappropriate, we pretty much unanimously agreed, but if that is your usual output of work and your professors think you're a genius there is something seriously concerning with your faculty.
ratemyprofessor.com comments sound like typical intelligent-prof is liked by intelligent students, loathed by slackers and egoists alike. In my first year classes I'd always loved it when there would be a really dumb student with OPINIONS ABOUT STUFF who would get shot down by the prof. Now I realise that these students never actually learn, they just write angry reviews on ratemyprof.
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On April 30 2012 05:10 Chef wrote:
I dunno, Torte. You are not a bad guy, but everyone you got to read that first paper was not impressed. It didn't give me the impression you even knew how to write a paper. You can't complain about StarCraft or whatever keeping you busy either, because 'being proactive' is a matter of spending 2 minutes after the class talking to the prof. Matters such as how well you are doing in the class, the exact nature of an assignment etc are things that take 30 seconds to reply to. Heaven forbid, if you got warning signs in those 2 minutes you could go to her office hours for help.
The part about claiming you have a mental illness was inappropriate, we pretty much unanimously agreed, but if that is your usual output of work and your professors think you're a genius there is something seriously concerning with your faculty.
ratemyprofessor.com comments sound like typical intelligent-prof is liked by intelligent students, loathed by slackers and egoists alike. In my first year classes I'd always loved it when there would be a really dumb student with OPINIONS ABOUT STUFF who would get shot down by the prof. Now I realise that these students never actually learn, they just write angry reviews on ratemyprof.
The first paper was new ground, rough draft and done from a new idea. I can write adequate papers or my track record in my other sociology classes or any awards I've done in Creative writing in addition to getting into my professional writing minor says nothing at all. I'm not Hemmingway, but I can write something remotely better than a failing grade.
and I was proactice with the teacher in that sense: I asked for two clarifications on the assignment before I wrote the first paper and I also told her it was new theorectical stuff to which she said it was ok (and that she'd need to see it before-hand). Well, I gave it to her before-hand but then I get shit on for it despite still having a week to rewrite before presentation (and thus 4 weeks before it's actually due). Even if my paper was shit and I totally slacked on it, I wrote the whole thing weeks before the presentation (It's 11 pages, so I must be trying really hard to slack off -- the minimum was 4). Most people were unfinished by the presentation date and thus finished it in the following weeks. Doing all my shit before knowing errors would come in addition that more work would swing by is just smart planning (though in the end, I still crumbled).
The office hours was the "help".
That's how I view ratemyprofessors. I still do in a way, that only angry people write those reviews and by default, it's bias (if you had an ok class, would you go out of your way to write a good review on another site than in the school's evaluation survey? I don't think so).
I'm not a slacker and only a comparison between how I was in high-school and its grades to my university grades can attest for that.
It doesn't really matter if I am wrong or right, you have to consider the following: 1. I have to instill doubt that her grading methodology could be faltered or bias towards her personal view of me, 2. Her remarks adds doubt that how she graded was fair and thus a re-evaluation of my papers with another teacher following her grading sheet will give me another chance
Regardless whether I pass or fail after the second re-evaluation hardly affects me anyways. I would let this go given I have the time to redo the class anyways, but it doesn't hurt to try and change it.
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United States10467 Posts
If this makes you feel any better torte, I think I'm gonna fail a course tomorrow. There's a very high chance I will and unlike with you, this is entirely my fault. I didn't hand in any problem sets except the first which I did horribly on. Problem sets are worth 30%. I slacked off too many days where I did nothing this semester when I had things I could have been doing. Some people are ok with slacking off because they still get what they need to get done, done, on time. I can't.
And I don't think I can repeat the course either. I doubt it's offered in the summer so I'd have to take it in fourth year. But I can't overload on classes. So then I need an extra year to graduate.
That or I can try to take an arts and science course over the summer if any of them are being offered, and then take this course next year. But then I have to stay here for a summer.
Or I can try to retake the course during my Professional year if I find a job near my University then.
Or I can try to find an equivalent course offered at another university over a summer but that's practically impossible. It also means I can't take human nature. A course I really wanted to take -_-
Or I can take an arts and science course over the summer and try my best to take the course I failed next year.
I...
am very very stupid. This sort of thing happens too often. >.>
I've got to start reading everything on syllabi. Test dates. % mark on every assignment/lab/test and to keep this information on my PDA and in my head. I've got to stop slacking off on other things too.
It's not even a hard course given 30% assignments. QQ
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On April 30 2012 05:10 Chef wrote:
I dunno, Torte. You are not a bad guy, but everyone you got to read that first paper was not impressed. It didn't give me the impression you even knew how to write a paper. You can't complain about StarCraft or whatever keeping you busy either, because 'being proactive' is a matter of spending 2 minutes after the class talking to the prof. Matters such as how well you are doing in the class, the exact nature of an assignment etc are things that take 30 seconds to reply to. Heaven forbid, if you got warning signs in those 2 minutes you could go to her office hours for help.
The part about claiming you have a mental illness was inappropriate, we pretty much unanimously agreed, but if that is your usual output of work and your professors think you're a genius there is something seriously concerning with your faculty.
ratemyprofessor.com comments sound like typical intelligent-prof is liked by intelligent students, loathed by slackers and egoists alike. In my first year classes I'd always loved it when there would be a really dumb student with OPINIONS ABOUT STUFF who would get shot down by the prof. Now I realise that these students never actually learn, they just write angry reviews on ratemyprof.
I think for the first time in history, I agree with Chef 
In my four years of college, I had some really really terrible professors. I had one professor for a business class (back when I still thought I had a chance of getting into the Business School), Management and Human Resources 300: Organizational Behavior. Literally all he did through lecture was shout buzz words at us. His explanations of things like management models were simplistic and vague, and at review sessions when students would ask him to further explain things; he would simply repeat the exact same simplistic and vague explanation from lecture. We had one lecture on "cutting the fat", which is of course about increasing organization efficiency. The lecture consisted of him bringing a steak into class, cutting the fat off of it, throwing the fat into the air, and kicking it into the corner (seriously not joking about this). Even stranger, the book we had (which was written by him) didn't seem at all to match course material.
Going into the first exam, I didn't think it would be so bad given that his lectures were simplistic and vague. Holy motherfucking shit was I wrong. The test was filled with in depth complicated questions of these business management models, things he never even mentioned in class were on there. There were also written questions giving specific situations asking how you would respond based on X management model. And there were a ton of these stupid management models.
I can't remember if there were 2 or 3 exams in the class, all I remember is that I did horribly on the first one. Like a CD or something. Even though the exam was stupid hard, all of the exam questions were answered in his rather thick book. When the final came, I buckled my ass down and studied. Hard. One of the few times in college that I actually did that. (lol) I ended up doing pretty well on the final, I think I got an AB or something, and ended up with like a B or a BC in the class. Not great, but still managed to pass.
The lesson here is, even with a horrendous profession; one who is insane, weird, and everything that comes out of his mouth was utterly useless; if you bust your ass you can still manage to do okay. Obviously everyone else in the class managed to pass, so clearly it wasn't impossible. Even assuming you were correct and she graded you more harshly that the other members of the class, do you really think she would take you from a C to an F? In my experience, faculty normally want their students to succeed, not the other way around. If you really feel like she graded you unfairly, by all means go through the process to have other faculty review your work. If anything, more feedback on what you did wrong/could have done better is always good; that's how we get better at things.
Believe me, I've been there. As I said before I failed a class where the TA could barely speak English, the book was horrible, and the professor spent half of lecture telling bullshit stories (like the time she was living in the Bahamas 20 years ago and she fell off her moped and her skirt got ripped off. Yeah, great, that's really helping me learn  ). I get it, your first reaction seeing the grade is anger, after all she was a shitty professor. That's normal. But eventually you have to realize that ultimately your failing was your fault. No one else. My advice is to accept that and move on. It's unlikely challenging the grade will get it changed anyway.
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Hm I know its already been asked but you should 100% post one of your papers on the board lol (sorry if you already did, couldn't find it)
I'd like to know what you mean by
"My papers were always the White Rabbit of Wonderland, obscurely running away from the actual point as if I need to say everything that needed to be said in order for you to get my point of view and yet to deny its validity is to question your own understanding of material as if you trust my judgement of the subject (an illusion of how I word paragraphs and thesis?)."
super super interested xD
From your posts that i've read (admittedly, two :p), it certainly doesn't come off that way, you seem fairly eloquent and concise.
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On April 30 2012 07:06 Half wrote:Hm I know its already been asked but you should 100% post one of your papers on the board lol (sorry if you already did, couldn't find it) I'd like to know what you mean by Show nested quote +
"My papers were always the White Rabbit of Wonderland, obscurely running away from the actual point as if I need to say everything that needed to be said in order for you to get my point of view and yet to deny its validity is to question your own understanding of material as if you trust my judgement of the subject (an illusion of how I word paragraphs and thesis?)."
super super interested xD From your posts that i've read (admittedly, two :p), it certainly doesn't come off that way, you seem fairly eloquent and concise.
When the hell did I ever write that? o.o
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On April 30 2012 07:12 Torte de Lini wrote:Show nested quote +On April 30 2012 07:06 Half wrote:Hm I know its already been asked but you should 100% post one of your papers on the board lol (sorry if you already did, couldn't find it) I'd like to know what you mean by
"My papers were always the White Rabbit of Wonderland, obscurely running away from the actual point as if I need to say everything that needed to be said in order for you to get my point of view and yet to deny its validity is to question your own understanding of material as if you trust my judgement of the subject (an illusion of how I word paragraphs and thesis?)."
super super interested xD From your posts that i've read (admittedly, two :p), it certainly doesn't come off that way, you seem fairly eloquent and concise. When the hell did I ever write that? o.o
From the blog post you linked!
http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?topic_id=302492¤tpage=13
Anyway, care to share ^_^?
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I messaged you privately.
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On April 28 2012 13:18 Torte de Lini wrote:Show nested quote +On April 28 2012 10:04 ninjafetus wrote:
Do you have any more info on your grade breakdown? Specifically what you got in each category? You have a right to know what grades you got on the different categories. Ask her. She's bound to the syllabus as much as you are.
With rewriting papers multiple times, nagging for clarification, etc. you should (hopefully) have a high grade for participation. If not, ask her what her judging criteria was. Ask if other students were judged on the same criteria. Let's even assume you have a lower grade... it probably shouldn't go below 50% if you did that much.
Even if you got 5/10% on participation, 20/30 on the research paper and take home exam, SKIPPED the seminar, and got 10/20 on the film review, you should have a D in the class by her scale.
For your appeal, you need to GET ORGANIZED. Records of everything!
Do you have email records, any other info where you've recorded that you asked for clarification on things? Has she ever handed back graded work? Has she ever given indication on how she judges the categories? How did other students do in the class? If you have some friends in the class, maybe you can dig up evidence that the teacher is judging inconsistently. Not necessarily because of bias, but because of laziness or just "winging it" for the grade.
SHOW that you made an effort. SHOW that you turned in work. I have a feeling that she has a 0 in some category that's unjustified (maybe she lost something, it happens!). Because otherwise I have no idea how you could do so bad to get a 0 unless her grading is extremely harsh.
If she is missing records, then dispute that you're punished because of it. If she can, and she just grades that harshly, well... you probably should have been more tenacious getting feedback. But usually harsh grades have to be justified by some concrete reasoning. If she can't justify her grading, and never gave stuff back, and is inconsistent, you can probably show you were a victim.
Good luck. No, there is no more about the grade breakdown or how she really corrects them. The syllabus is not as relevant as it was before because some of the things on there were never graded or used, she changed it a little I think due to time. Records of emails: yes No other record of me asking to clarify things, just three copies of work with corrected shit on it. She's never handed back graded work, no indication on how she judges the categories, maybe verbally. I have the grade spread if you want it, I'm the only one that failed, which is 100% surprising. My only thought right now is that I handed in the work for the assignment at 5PM of the day it was due. But she never specified what time it was due and thus that shouldn't be an issue. Plus, I saw a lot of other papers were handed in as well at the same time, so she must have not picked them up. Thanks for the tips.
Yeah, absolutely check to see if that assignment was counted. If not, find out why. If others who turned it in at the same time were accepted, you have something you can fight with.
Also, if she changed the syllabus, was a new scale given? Was it clear? I don't know about your university, but at the one I taught at, the syllabus was a big deal. You had to follow the grading scale you gave, or give very clear notification of the change. The reason for this is that it makes the grades objective, and a teacher can't just decide they "don't like you" at the end of the semester and fail you.
FIRST THING TO DO: Request all your grades from the teacher. Ask for your whole personal gradebook. She should have this. Tell her you're surprised at the failure and want to make sure something didn't get missed, or forgotten to put in the book. Also, check your university policies before this conversation... she probably HAS to give you the grades.
If she doesn't give it, then GO THE THE DEPT HEAD and tell them the same thing. Tell them that looking at the worse-case-scenario for the breakdown on the syllabus, you have no idea how you failed, and that the teacher is refusing to give you your grades.
Your grades have to be justifiable. It's a huge problem for the department if they aren't. Get this info.
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United States10467 Posts
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You can submit for a grade review at Concordia, so there's a chance you can pass the course from that.
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I like that in America you can just complain if your professor flunks you.
In this case, your teacher sounds like a cunt, but I don't understand why you think it's her fault.
Obviously she tried to correct you, maybe your first 2 assignments (both the 12 pages one and the 4 page one) were wrong or w/e.
To understand why I am saying this (which is basically my reason as to why should just accept it and move on), I want you to hear what others go through.
I choose my bachelor in business administration to have an IT toning. I read about the classes, I read about the content, I think, hey that sounds good.
First class, professor speaks ONLY ENGLISH. No mention of this, ANYWHERE, also, he speaks bad English. Me, being raised on the internet thinks, well, as long as he speaks just somewhat understandable, he doesn't. So here I am, new class, doesn't understand anything my professor says. So even though he has 3 masters and a Ph.D, I get squat from his lectures. Good luck taking an ORAL exam with that guy..
Also, reading your posts in this blog it seems like you are much like w/e I can pass this class, I just think I am being treated unfair, life is a lot like Teamliquid.net (Your definition of fair hold no value to us)
TL:DR: Get over it, get moving and GL in your future endeavours, in SC2 and real life.
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i was in a similar situation a couple of years back. i didn't fail, but as a result of 0 feedback and informal instructions i received a horrible grade on a paper worth 50% of a grade. worst of all, i ended up getting badmouthed to just about every high level administrator at the school for being lazy, immature, and disrespectful.
i let it slide. apologized when given the opportunity, and fought hard to show that i held no grudge. if you can absorb the blow, i say absorb and plan on being farther ahead of the game next time.
my only other advice is be as nice as possible to the teacher you dislike.
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Oh, can I also be pm'ed a paper? ^^
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EPT
