Why is college stretched over a 5 day week?

paky

if you only have a total of 13 hours a week? seems quite impracticable to me considering i work 12 hour shifts. can anyone shed any light on this farce?

Balfie

paky wrote: »

if you only have a total of 13 hours a week? seems quite impracticable to me considering i work 12 hour shifts. can anyone shed any light on this farce?

For this very reason.

OPENROAD

Oh to turn back the clock 17 years :eek::eek: and 1st year college

geeky

paky wrote: »

if you only have a total of 13 hours a week? seems quite impracticable to me considering i work 12 hour shifts. can anyone shed any light on this farce?

Erm... it's to allow time for studying, essay writing and independent reading. Packing everyone in a lecture hall and talking at them is a very inefficient way to learn in truth, and that's why colleges expect students to go off and read or research essays and projects.
Genuinely disciplined students will often treat it as a proper job, coming in at 9 and clocking off at half 5 (or whenever it gets done - just like in 'real life'!). Well, I did that in final year anyhoos.

paky

Balfie wrote: »

For this very reason.

i fail to see your point?

geeky wrote: »

Erm... it's to allow time for studying, essay writing and independent reading. Packing everyone in a lecture hall and talking at them is a very inefficient way to learn in truth, and that's why colleges expect students to go off and read or research essays and projects.
Genuinely disciplined students will often treat it as a proper job, coming in at 9 and clocking off at half 5 (or whenever it gets done - just like in 'real life'!). Well, I did that in final year anyhoos.

all those things can still be done if college was only two full days a week

Killer Pigeon

I got near 30 hours this year spread out over the week, yay.

paky

Killer Pigeon wrote: »

I got near 30 hours this year spread out over the week, yay.

i can understand that

Abi

paky wrote: »

if you only have a total of 13 hours a week? seems quite impracticable to me considering i work 12 hour shifts. can anyone shed any light on this farce?

How are your working hours relevant to theirs, exactly?

Badly Drunk Boy

You can't assume that everyone else's timetable can change just to suit you. Lecturers have other classes to give, as well as other non-class commitments. Also, rooms might not be available for you to use at your special preferred times.

Everyone's circumstances are different. You can't keep everybody happy.

Elohim

Mainly spread over several days for scheduling issues I'd imagine.

Dravokivich

paky wrote: »

i fail to see your point?

This just re-enforces his point, even though he clearly pointed it out to you.

Elohim

In your 12 hour shift are you learning or just doing? Things take time to sink in. Could probably give an entire quantum physics course in under a week but nobody would have a clue what's goin on!

MarkR

So that students don't get bed sores.

mconigol

geeky wrote: »

Erm... it's to allow time for studying, essay writing and independent reading. Packing everyone in a lecture hall and talking at them is a very inefficient way to learn in truth, and that's why colleges expect students to go off and read or research essays and projects.
Genuinely disciplined students will often treat it as a proper job, coming in at 9 and clocking off at half 5 (or whenever it gets done - just like in 'real life'!). Well, I did that in final year anyhoos.

You're doing it wrong :eek:

You're supposed to turn up to maybe 10% of lectures and then spend about 5 weeks in December/January and again in April/May locked in your bedroom crying to yourself...Well, I did that in final year anyhoos!

veryangryman

On a more serious note....


The OP has a point. Of course it is expected for the students to study/do practicals yada yada but whats to stop them doing it in their own time at home (or come into college other days if such is an option)

Anyone living (say) 20 miles from college could then just drive in the 2 days a week.

Its a complete bollokcs anyone having say a lecture at 9am and another at 3pm in the same day. Hanging around the college (only so much pool and perving one can do in one six hour spell) and lecturers wonder why nobody turns up for the late Wednesday/Thursday class

It is actually ridiculous. I was renting locally during college (and busy enough in the latter years to not be so worried about it) but certainly the option should be looked at for earlier years.

You may even be able save a few beans on lecturers wages too, hire them on a more part time basis etc.

mconigol

veryangryman wrote: »

On a more serious note....


The OP has a point. Of course it is expected for the students to study/do practicals yada yada but whats to stop them doing it in their own time at home (or come into college other days if such is an option)

Anyone living (say) 20 miles from college could then just drive in the 2 days a week.

Its a complete bollokcs anyone having say a lecture at 9am and another at 3pm in the same day. Hanging around the college (only so much pool and perving one can do in one six hour spell) and lecturers wonder why nobody turns up for the late Wednesday/Thursday class

It is actually ridiculous. I was renting locally during college (and busy enough in the latter years to not be so worried about it) but certainly the option should be looked at for earlier years.

You may even be able save a few beans on lecturers wages too, hire them on a more part time basis etc.

A lot of lecturers are doing research too so they'd still have to be paid. Although it might free up their time to do more useful things.

In my opinion there's absolutely no reason why all college courses can't be delivered online with email correspondence and discussion forums like boards to allow students and lecturers to communicate.

I never learned a thing in 4 years of going to lectures other than trying not to fall asleep. A proper set of detailed, well explained notes is all anyone needs.

Jess16

When I was in college, it was 9-6 Monday to Thursday. With the 2pm finish on Friday spent dealing with the throbbing headache that came from spending most of my waking hours in a packed, airless, dark lecture theatre, writing 8 pages of A4 per hour.

Weekends were spent hunched over a laptop writing essays whilst my friends in gainful employment partied.

I appreciate that this might not be the general consensus but I just wanted to illustrate that not everybody's college experience is the beer-swilling, partyfest it's always made out to be.

connundrum

Why does FAS take 5 weeks of one evening per night to deliver a 'Basic Guarding' security course, which can be delivered in 6 hours by a private training provider?

Because people have to prove their raison d'etre, and by stringing out a task you can give the impression that you're needed.

IrishEyes19

Also because theres a tons of other courses going on as well as yours alone. And their times have to be slotted in, and rooms used, and exams taken ect. many courses need the uses of labs, reading rooms, seminar rooms and everyone needs their fairshare, one class couldnt get to have all theirs on a monday or tuesday say and then the other courses have to wait till later. theres a system in place to cater for all

pickarooney

Dravokivich wrote: »

This just re-enforces his point, even though he clearly pointed it out to you.

I don't see it either. Is he saying that 'impracticable' is not the right word to use in this situation?

EuropeanSon

Mainly because we (college students) have to learn the material, and delivering it in a big rush is not the best way to have us learn it. Any more than 3-4 lectures per day and you won't be able to retain much of the information at all, and retaining the imparted information is what it's all about.

I generally have 16-20 hours per week of lectures, anyway.

TPD

pickarooney wrote: »

I don't see it either. Is he saying that 'impracticable' is not the right word to use in this situation?

I went and looked up the definition of impracticable, to see if it was a real word. I'm glad I didn't thank anyone or make judgements on what I thought was a spelling mistake :pac:

neil_hosey

what course has 12 hours of college a week?? my course was anywhere from 36 - 40 hours for all four years. what can you possibly learn in so little time!?!?

no wonder we are pumping out so many grads who cant get jobs!

FlutterinBantam

paky wrote: »

if you only have a total of 13 hours a week? seems quite impracticable to me considering i work 12 hour shifts. can anyone shed any light on this farce?

:rolleyes:
Good man yourself, you expect college to totally change to suit yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyour requirements.?

Like, change everything they have been doing in the past,just because you came along ? Fcuk everybody else,just suit Pakers.

I don't think you are quite suited for college ,my friend.

paky

Dravokivich wrote: »

This just re-enforces his point, even though he clearly pointed it out to you.

definition of impracticable:

impracticable [ɪmˈpræktɪkəbəl]
adj 1. incapable of being put into practice or accomplished; not feasible
2. unsuitable for a desired use; unfit
3. an archaic word for intractable impracticability , impracticableness n
impracticably adv

is he arguing that my use of impracticable is impracticable in that sense or is he pointing out a spelling mistake?

paky

neil_hosey wrote: »

what course has 12 hours of college a week?? my course was anywhere from 36 - 40 hours for all four years. what can you possibly learn in so little time!?!?

no wonder we are pumping out so many grads who cant get jobs!

Law is 13 bar the tutorials

sensibleken

geeky wrote: »

Erm... it's to allow time for studying, essay writing and independent reading. Packing everyone in a lecture hall and talking at them is a very inefficient way to learn in truth, and that's why colleges expect students to go off and read or research essays and projects.
Genuinely disciplined students will often treat it as a proper job, coming in at 9 and clocking off at half 5 (or whenever it gets done - just like in 'real life'!). Well, I did that in final year anyhoos.

those people are doing college wrong.

OP the rest of the time is to be filled with cheap cider and casual sex.


i miss college

veryangryman

veryangryman wrote: »

You may even be able save a few beans on lecturers wages too, hire them on a more part time basis etc.

Nonsense. Lecturers will have more than one group for teaching for a start along with all the other duties which take up a lot more time than lecturing like supervising postgrad students, doing their own research, endless paper work, preparing for conferences, writing proposals, trying to generate funding etc etc.

Every time I see a thread on University I'm shocked at how little even people who have gone to university know about what actually goes on behind the scenes.

Its just nonsensical to think you could pack a full weeks lectures into a day, even if it was only 12 hours or so. I used to have about 16 hours of actual lectures but I would have labs 3 afternoons per week also along with trying to learn the stuff you get in the lecture and doing problems etc.

Salty

neil_hosey wrote: »

what course has 12 hours of college a week?? my course was anywhere from 36 - 40 hours for all four years. what can you possibly learn in so little time!?!?

no wonder we are pumping out so many grads who cant get jobs!

Accounting is 12 hours a week..in first year anyway.

Parsley

paky wrote: »

Law is 13 bar the tutorials

that's cos pretty much everything to be learned in law comes from reading the absolute sh*t out of a sh*tload of books, which you should do all day, every day, if you want to be good at it.

pow wow

I only every had classes 2 or 3 days a week here. In the US I had 8am classes and full days 5-days a week.

Logical Fallacy

paky wrote: »

all those things can still be done if college was only two full days a week

That all depends, are you talking about Barber college or clown?

FlutterinBantam

pow wow wrote: »

I only every had classes 2 or 3 days a week here. In the US I had 8am classes and full days 5-days a week.

:eek:

Wow !!

You went to college in the US?

_sparkie_

because our lecturers dont just teach us, they teach loads of different classes in different courses and different years.

parker kent

neil_hosey wrote: »

what course has 12 hours of college a week?? my course was anywhere from 36 - 40 hours for all four years. what can you possibly learn in so little time!?!?

no wonder we are pumping out so many grads who cant get jobs!

The 12 hours of lectures are only tipping the iceberg. Anybody that has 12 hours of lectures are meant to use the rest of their time studying, reading, preparing etc. Also, allowing time to pass between classes allows people to learn things little by little. A dedicated student will put in a full weeks work.

Bailey Tangy Technology wrote: »

Nonsense. Lecturers will have more than one group for teaching for a start along with all the other duties which take up a lot more time than lecturing like supervising postgrad students, doing their own research, endless paper work, preparing for conferences, writing proposals, trying to generate funding etc etc.

Every time I see a thread on University I'm shocked at how little even people who have gone to university know about what actually goes on behind the scenes.

Its just nonsensical to think you could pack a full weeks lectures into a day, even if it was only 12 hours or so. I used to have about 16 hours of actual lectures but I would have labs 3 afternoons per week also along with trying to learn the stuff you get in the lecture and doing problems etc.

Amen to that. The genuine lack of knowledge about what happens in a University is shocking. That people could seriously suggest something like this baffles me:

veryangryman wrote: »

Its a complete bollokcs anyone having say a lecture at 9am and another at 3pm in the same day. Hanging around the college (only so much pool and perving one can do in one six hour spell) and lecturers wonder why nobody turns up for the late Wednesday/Thursday class

It is actually ridiculous. I was renting locally during college (and busy enough in the latter years to not be so worried about it) but certainly the option should be looked at for earlier years.

You may even be able save a few beans on lecturers wages too, hire them on a more part time basis etc.

I don't understand how somebody can think that academics just give lectures to Undergrads and Taught Masters students.

Noodleworm

My course is really practical so we spend nearly all out free time doing assignments, having group meetings and such.
Your not supposed to learn everything in lectures, they just point you in the right direction.

this isn't secondary, you don't just sit in class then go home to do homework in the evenings, you can do your work during the day.

pow wow

FlutterinBantam wrote: »

:eek:

Wow !!

You went to college in the US?

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111111one. It was ok, we had free buses all over campus so you could roll out of bed at 7.45 and still make the 8am classes on the other side of the college.

elefant

Something that I think would be very practical to employ here in Ireland, and something they do in continental Europe, is to have lectures of 2-3hours once a week, instead of 1 hour lectures 2-3 times a week.

For 2 of my years in Irish colleges I had 2 lectures in the same course on the same day separated by 5-6 hours of no lectures. I realise there are other classes to be taught and all, but surely a more sensible set-up would be to have the lectures side-by-side.

parker kent

elefant wrote: »

Something that I think would be very practical to employ here in Ireland, and something they do in continental Europe, is to have lectures of 2-3hours once a week, instead of 1 hour lectures 2-3 times a week.

For 2 of my years in Irish colleges I had 2 lectures in the same course on the same day separated by 5-6 hours of no lectures. I realise there are other classes to be taught and all, but surely a more sensible set-up would be to have the lectures side-by-side.

There are some 2-3 lectures in Irish Universities.

elefant

parker kent wrote: »

There are some 2-3 lectures in Irish Universities.

Actually I think I had one lecture before that was 2 hours long. 95% were just the hour though. Maybe it's different outside of Galway.

somefeen

we do 16 hours of lectures a week but expected to spend 3 hours studying for every hour in a lecture. Thats on top of writting reports and essays, which takes about 40 hours to write a decent one. So i'm usually working 60 hours a week on college then another 16 of actual work at the weekend.

So its a pain in the ass when they spread the lectures out over 4-5 days, means im constantly stopping and starting with maybe an hour between some lectures to do some work and it takes about 20 minutes to get your head together to write a physics report immediately after an hour or two of biology.

And why the hell do we do all the modules at once anyway??? Why not do one, exam, onto the next.

parker kent

elefant wrote: »

Actually I think I had one lecture before that was 2 hours long. 95% were just the hour though. Maybe it's different outside of Galway.

It's probably a new thing really, might just be UCD.

Dravokivich

pickarooney wrote: »

I don't see it either. Is he saying that 'impracticable' is not the right word to use in this situation?

I took it to mean the use of the word.

paky wrote: »

definition of impracticable:

impracticable [ɪmˈpræktɪkəbəl]
adj 1. incapable of being put into practice or accomplished; not feasible
2. unsuitable for a desired use; unfit
3. an archaic word for intractable impracticability , impracticableness n
impracticably adv

is he arguing that my use of impracticable is impracticable in that sense or is he pointing out a spelling mistake?

I would say yes.

There's no break down of how the hours are split. How can that be considered not feasible, unsuitable or impracticable as you mentioned?

They could be split for various different modules to be assessed individually with enough time for them to be worked on, instead of bungled up together and in effect smothering someone with a work load they weren't able to plan for, because everything will need to be due in or around the same short range of days.

languagenerd

As people have already said - the lectures are spread out for scheduling reasons. There are 16,000-20,000 students in each university in hundreds of courses and several year groups; they schedule it as best they can.

Anyway, college is not the same as school. You might only have 14 hours a week lectures, but you're supposed to do a lot of independent work. They expect you to spend at least that amount of time (if not more) preparing for the classes, reading books, researching, studying and doing assignments. For my course, I have to do at least two assignments each week (2-3 hours each) as well as 3 papers due at the end of each term (several weeks work) - and that's not including all the reading.

Yeah, it's annoying as hell when you've a 5 hour break in the middle of the day, but has to be done. Anyway, when else would you find time to drink endless coffees (or cider if that's your choice) and watch daytime TV? :pac:

pickarooney

Dravokivich wrote: »

I took it to mean the use of the word.



I would say yes.

There's no break down of how the hours are split. How can that be considered not feasible, unsuitable or impracticable as you mentioned?

They could be split for various different modules to be assessed individually with enough time for them to be worked on, instead of bungled up together and in effect smothering someone with a work load they weren't able to plan for, because everything will need to be due in or around the same short range of days.

Are there any forward gears on that fabulous back-pedalling contraption? :pac:

He can't fit in a job around the broken up timetable. He knows what he meant, even if you didn't.

Saila

because its not primary school

somefeen

but it is basically

Mike 1972

paky wrote: »

if you only have a total of 13 hours a week? seems quite impracticable to me considering i work 12 hour shifts. can anyone shed any light on this farce?

So you want fewer days but longer hours AFTER doing a 12 hour shift :eek:

Saila

somefeen wrote: »

but it is basically

I meant primary school where you have just the one teacher

pragmatic1

Lucky you. I went to an IT and had 27+ hours every week until 4th year.

paulanthony

paky wrote: »

if you only have a total of 13 hours a week? seems quite impracticable to me considering i work 12 hour shifts. can anyone shed any light on this farce?

They need to leave time during each day for lying in, watching daytime tv, playing pool, drinking, protesting, moaning etc

When you factor all these in it's more like a 60 hour week.:)