Lecturer cancels 7 out of 24 lectures

Cuttlefish

Just want to know what Boards.ie members think of this


Daughter is in 4th, final, year of her studies in UCC and so far this semester one of her lecturers has so far cancelled 7 out of 24 lectures!


Is this normal?

Should this be highlighted and if so who to?

Am worried that by having these lectures cancelled that my daughter along with other students taking this module will be ill-prepared for their exams

Like to know what people think

branie2

very annoying

spurious

I would expect the exam for the module to be set by the person giving it, so I am sure allowance will be made.

Contact the college if you want to report it.
Maybe the person is ill?

looksee

Its up to your daughter and her classmates to resolve this; they are adults, I doubt the college would deal with you.

I am not unsympathetic, I had the same experience as a mature student, one lecturer was out sick most of first year, and only very ineffectively appeared when she felt like it in subsequent years. We complained, sent delegations, but made no difference. In the end we pretty much got the results we deserved and expected so while it was frustrating it didn't really make a difference in the end.

Sardonicat

This should be brought to the attention of the department head.

If its a module with an extensive reading list they should be fine at this stage (4th year!) completing the reading list and being fully prepared for exams once they follow the course outline . There's plenty of students that hardly ever attend lectures but do just fine!

If there is a practical element involving skills or knowledge that needs to be directly imparted by the lecturer then the department head has to become involved. If student attendance is compulsory I'd advise the class making their own sign in sheet and handing that to the department secretary making it clear that they were where they were supposed to be but the lecturer was not.

Edit: To echo the poster above, this is an issue for the students to resolve themselves. They are final year University students, not children.

Cuttlefish

Fully understand they are adults and in their final years and this is the advice I have been giving to my daughter - I said to her raise your concerns now not after the exams

I just don't this it is acceptable to cancel almost 1/3 of lectures, if the person is ill then get a stand in

I think attendance is not the issue rather that he/ she (the lecturer) in communicating via blackboard or whatever and cancelling

Yes fully understand the college, UCC, won't deal with me, I know that. Just like to hear from others what they think. Is it normal to cancel so many classes???

Wildly Boaring

I had a lecturer missed most of a semester.

Had a guy taught us the wrong course.

Had a guy put the wrong questions on the exam paper. Was only a quarter of the paper.

Lot of lecturers once they get tenure are able to do what they want.

The class will have an elected class rep. They will make representations to the head of the course (in writing).

Essentially. It'll be grand. Lecturer will probably make last year's notes available and push on. Lot of lecturers in college pointless anyway, just reading or writing out the notes.

Esse85

I presume this is a paid course.

I wouldn't be happy missing out on nearly 30% of a service I paid for.

Cuttlefish

yes fully paid, as we know college fees amount to over €3,000

Sardonicat

No its not normal but as you can gather from the responses on here it can happen. I experienced similar myself. Some lecturers go above and beyond for their students and some seem to be able to get away with murder in terms of not showing up, assiging years out if print reading or basically giving the same lecture for 12 weeks. It does make the blood boil I totally agree especially when the students or their parents are struggling to find the money to pay for tuition, rent etc. There seems to be no accountability.

deRanged

It's definitely not normal. Depending on what you want to do you have several options - go through class rep, go to students union, go to head of department, go to head of Student Experience.

You'd have to decide what you want - do you want the classes made up, do you want tutorials put on specially, do you just want to register a complaint etc.

I'd be fuming, you've paid a lot of money for that, and the lecturer has been paid to turn up. This sort of thing shouldn't happen at all, but certainly not in final year.

Cuttlefish

Guess what he cancelled another lecture tomorrow 😮

ted1

spurious wrote: »

I would expect the exam for the module to be set by the person giving it, so I am sure allowance will be made.

Contact the college if you want to report it.
Maybe the person is ill?

Set by an external board to ensure the right level of education is achieved to reach degree status.

Cuttlefish

ted1 wrote: »

Set by an external board to ensure the right level of education is achieved to reach degree status.

Set externally!!! I assumed he would be setting it but I understand why that would not be the case.

Even more worrying so

Cakes and Ale

That's highly unlikely unless the module has a professional training component. The exam might be reviewed by an external examiner but that's not always the case either. A potential problem would be if the lecturer is teaching for someone in the department who is setting the exam - but it's unlikely that they wouldn't know about this level of absence.

Head of Department should be first port of call.

Bannasidhe

ted1 wrote: »

Set by an external board to ensure the right level of education is achieved to reach degree status.

Not unless things have changed since I lectured in UCC.
I set the exam paper for the courses I taught, they were looked over by an extern who may make some suggestions - it was up to me if I followed those suggestions or not.

Now, thing is the exam papers are set well in advance of the exams to allow for this (usually by end of 1st semester) so some of the questions will be on topics you intend to teach in the 2nd semester. A general rule is you only set questions on topics you intend to cover in a lecture.

I don't know what Dept/School the OP's daughter is in but in the dept I taught we covered absences as well as we could (we called it guerrilla lecturing - load quickly and hit the ground running).

Lectures are an essential part of how the pedagogy "works", hence the scramble to provide cover even if wasn't one's "specialist" area - the stand-in would still have a good foundation and the skill set to "cram" efficiently.

Personally, I think it is outrageous that a lecturer is missing so many classes and it is very much up to the head of dept to sort it out. Obviously, unforeseen situations arise too late to do anything but 8 times is taking the Micheal.

My advice would be to get the student rep to make a representation to dept head and insist proper cover is put in place.