Rude Classroom Behavior
 

One of my daughters is taking summer classes at an Atlanta college and has been astounded by how rude many of the students are. She said they take phone calls in class, chat with each other while the professor is lecturing, and frequently just walk out.:eek:

I've never encountered that in any of my classes. About all I've had to deal with has been the stupid costumes the former local groups used to make their pledges wear and I started throwing those kids out of class after the first year. (Try lecturing while girls in leprechaun outfits with deelybobbers are sitting right in front of you.)

Do many of y'all see this on a regular basis? I'm horrified. I wouldn't tolerate it for a minute and can't believe that this professor does. Coincidentally, my daughter says that the only people in class who haven't done something rude are she and the other 2 Greeks (2 Tri Delts).

When I read that, I immediately thought about when I took a class a few years ago at a community college near my home and it was so different than Auburn. People would just walk out of the room to answer their phone, come in very late and leave early. I thought it was disrespectful!

I'm taking a night summer class & what you described is normal in my class. There are a group of girls, about 4 of them, that will talk when the teacher is talking, never put their phones on silent, pick up their cell phones when they ring (and say, in a whispered tone "I'm in class, what do you need?") & leave on our breaks & never come back. I'm more frustrated than anything that the teacher never does anything about it.

People always came late and left early at my school. I thought this happened at most schools. I usually came and left on time, but I was the queen of bathroom and drinking fountain breaks. :D I loved the privelege of not having to ask the instructor everytime I wanted/needed to leave the room, unlike in high school.

People would eat in class too...I had everything from McDonald's to pizza to ice cream. I even had classmates who brought in chinese food and stinky fish sandwiches. It was soooo distracting.

The undergraduate kids at my community college seem to believe that school is a club. They're off for the summer now, but when they were here, the student lounge blasted dance music pretty much all day. Often, it would spill into the study areas. At the end of last semester, a friend of mine was working on an assignment in the computer lab, and a kid comes in, pops in a CD, turns up the music and starts dancing. HELLO??? Have you heard of headphones?

There are two students in the statistics class I'm taking that leave on breaks and never return. I keep wondering if they think when he lets us go that class is over??

There's a guy that sits behind me that always has something very inappropriate to say and he also says out loud EVERYTIME his phone buzzes (when it's on vibrate) "Damn, who's calling now!" I'm like, playa you ain't foolin nannbody.

Then there's another girl who had quite a little comment on the first day. The professor had us all write our heights, weights and gender on the board. I thought it was highly inappropriate, but I kinda don't care myself.

So, me being a BBW (not to mention the oldest person in the class) - after we wrote our info on the board, the prof was asking what different combinations we could have. Some people said tall men, tall women or something of the sort. This girl looked DEAD at me, smiled and said "short fat women" - which is extra weird since I'm not short.

It was always up to the professors to set the tone for class.

Some (Especially in the smaller required classes - like Freshman comp and Discourse) were real strict, took role, and conducted it like a HS class, with the exception of not having to ask to use the bathroom.

The small classes at the upper levels in your major (For me it was usually only about 20 - 25 people per section) you knew everyone and the professors knew you so it was a mutual respect thing. You respected (and sometimes feared) them. You would never do anything that would get them upset - you wanted them to remember you in a good way at grade time. If you had a 89 average, your 'professionalism' could turn that 89 into a 90. I can remember a few of these classes I had with my best bud and also my little brother. On occasion, we'd get to laughing at something and one of us would leave to get the laughter out and not cause a disturbance.

All the rest of the required classes were usually lecture, and at my school, that meant anywhere from 250 to 600 people in your class. 99.89% of professors could have cared less. In fact, I only went to my Economics class four times; first day of class to get the syllabus and the three test dates. Got a B.

Only had one professor (a tenured one and full of himself) who threw someone out of class because the dude had his ball cap on backwards. The exchange went like this:

Professor, "You need to turn your hat around."
Student, "Why?"
Professor, "Because I said so."
Student, "Why do you care?"
Professor, "Because I have to spend an hour three times a week looking at you."
Student, "Not anymore." Where he got up and left the class for good.

I dont think ANY of us even breathed wrong for the rest of the semester in that class.

I always made sure to have my work (at that time) cell phone on silent or vibrate in my bag. Only one time was it on a tone and went off in class. I apologized profusely and made sure it never happened again. To this day my phone is never NOT on vibrate.

At FSU this is a common occurence. I had a prof who just transferred from Berkeley and would get so upset when students would come in late (its hard to find parking). One time, he just cancelled class when a student did it again and was livid. I think he got used to it after a while though.

A lot of students especially in big classes wait for their name to be called out in roll call, then head out. I have to say that I think the trend is opposite-I see more Greeks do this than non-Greeks.

during the last three springs, i've taught a night class at the local community college. yes, many come late. but they have family and personal issues. sometimes, they brought their kids. generally though, they listened well.

Hmm. My take on it is, as long as you're not disrupting class, do what you want. We're talking about college, not high school.

Cell phones were not nearly as ubiquitous when I was in college as they are today, and I can't say I've ever been in a lecture that was disrupted by a ringing cell phone. When you went to lecture, you were simply unreachable by phone for an hour (what a concept!).

As for stepping out of lecture... if ya gotta go, ya gotta go... but if you're just "taking long breaks" during lecture, yakking on your cell, arriving late, or leaving at break time and not returning, frankly, you're only hurting yourself by missing the lecture material.

Maybe it was planned? ;)

This is how it's always been for me at school. At university and at community college. Professors and teachers will tell my classes that if you need to use the facilities, go quietly. Don't disturb the class, and disturbing the class includes asking to go to the washroom everytime. Also, most of my professors/teachers couldn't care less whether you return to class. To them, "it's our dime" and if we don't want to work, they're not going to force us. I've left classes and never returned. I will always wait for a break to do it so I won't bother the rest of my classmates, but no one cares.

Like PM_Mama00 said, talking class and talking is completely disrespectful and should not be tolerated. But I've never run into a professors whose actually complained about students leaving classes early.

I do believe that most professors, were they to see people leaving early as a regular thing--or in groups--would make sure that a lot of the next test was about material covered after those kids left.

Leaving to go to the bathroom is one thing--just leaving is another! One's phone ringing in class is one thing--answering and chatting is another! It's hard to believe that students would actually disrupt a class. Boy, have I been lucky.

This is the only thing that bothers me. Your phone shouldn't be on. Period. Why do you need your phone on during class? Are you going to answer it? I should hope not. If you're phone's off, a caller can leave a message and you can get back to them after class.

People in my classes leave their phone on vibrate and a)you can still hear it go off and b) they will still pick up their phone to see who called and then proceed to play with the phone during class. That's just as bad as answering it.

This isn't direct solely at you, but to everyone who does it.

Of course, I wouldn't expect anything less. However, they won't ever stop you from leaving or make a big deal about students leaving the class room. My professors and teachers don't care because we're paying for the class. If we're not willing to learn, it's our problem, not there's. That's why they don't care about students leaving classes or not coming back from brakes.

In undergrad, I can't remember a single cell phone going off. Most of my classes, however, were held in cavernous stone buildings--so maybe cell service wasn't that great. I didn't have one at that point.

In grad, most of our classes were in basement-level auditoriums. Again--no reception. There was no reception in our studios, either.

At both schools, there really wasn't the problem of people leaving and not coming back.

Whats worse is that the girls in my class will come into class early the next session & ask to borrow your notes. There is nothing that I hate more than someone who doesn't pay attention in class or leaves early/comes late & then wants to borrow my notes.

Maybe she is the short, fat, woman? ;)

When I was at IU the second time around it seemed like everyone on campus had a cell phone. In my astronomy class (a large lecture) it was fairly common to see people answering their cell phones when they rang and having conversations, calling others, etc. I thought that was extremely rude! I generally turned my cell phone off during class time, although I forgot to do it one time and of course my then-boyfriend called. I just turned the phone off but it was really embarrassing.

When I was at IU the first time around (early-mid 90s), it was extremely rare to see people with a cell phone.

Maybe I'm what she fears most...a voluptuous and luscious beauty with high self-esteem. I know little insecure girls don't understand people like me so they try us CONSTANTLY. Just don't catch me on a bad day...:cool:

On the cell phone thing, well, once I thought I had my cell turned off. Turns out, it wasn't :p Here I am in a class of about 30-40 w/my phone ringing and me like, "Mine's off, don't look at me" Yep, looked in my bad and it was ringing like crazy.:o Thankfully my prof laughed his butt off :p

On classroom behavior, people here on average come and go as the please. But, with some prof's you can't even think about it *nods* Since the school is small the prof's know who you are and most of your schedule so it's just better off doing what they tell you :)

I think a lot of college students subscribe to the "The prof works for me, since I'm paying to be here, and I can do as I please." school of thought. This is not a new phoenomenon, since I can recall things like this going on when I was in college; at least in the lower level courses.

Contrary to my undeserved reputation as a sorority party puppet, I was serious about college and felt fortunate to be there so my behavior in class was probably more high school-like than college-like.

As for cell phones....not an issue since they, um, weren't invented yet http://www.handykult.de/plaudersmili...sad/ponder.gif

Being an Art major, its really different. In studio classes, we play music, we talk, we can take breaks whenever we want, we can drink (eating only during the 10 min break we get (hey, it's a 4 hr class!). I've left class to answer my phone a couple times, but mainly because I was expecting a call from a) my endocrinologist or b) my dog's veterinarian. Sorry, my puppy is more important than your lecture :-p. But it was always on vibrate, and I just excused myself and came back.

The food thing...I make a point to tell my professors at the beginning of the quarter that I'm diabetic, and occasionally I may have to leave class to get medicine or to eat something. I generally try to keep this at a minimum, but if I have a choice between a hypoglycemic coma and being rude in class...then I'll take being rude.

Like I said before, this isn't just a student mindset. Many professors also feel the same way.

I went to a really huge school, so my smallest class had 40-50 students, and the largest one was probably 250-300 students. It was a normal occurence to see people come in later, leave early, go to the bathroom, etc. Cell phones would ring almost daily. I had a FORTRAN prof who would answer her phone and hold conversations while she was lecturing! :mad:

Overall, it never bothered me though. Generally my profs only were distracted by the people in the front, or if people had to walk past them to leave early.

The cell phone ringing has to be the most annoying thing in a class. I always make sure mine is on vibrate.

My friends and I have been guilty of texting each other during boring classes. How else are we supposed to stay awake?

I think it all comes down to attitude really...

If a student's phone rings (or vibrates loud enough) and they either excuse themselves or are apologetic - hey no problem we all make mistakes or have emergencies. If the student filpantly uses the phone and disrupts the class - then they are gone with me... simple as that - they may be paying for the class, but so are all the other students that are being disturbed.

As for leaving classes early - that I see all the time, and as long as it's not the front row or so I don't mind (heck I do it every now and then too). On a large campus you may have to leave early in order to make it to your next class - sure the school gives you 10 minutes, but it rarely enough to make it across campus, particularly in winter... other reasons for leaving at the break is usually work or another class - I've seen students having two classes at the same time, and attending half of one class and half of the other.

As for talking - if I can hear it when given a lecture or tutorial then I'll stop and ask what's so important - I find shame and/or peer pressure can work wonders.

Of course this is all dependant on the size of the class - with most of mine falling in the 20-24 person range; you just know each other's habits... and besides at the more specialized or selective courses you pretty much want to be there already and are attentive. I larger classes I can see some drift or distraction as normal... the worst of course being the big three here at UofT (1st year Poli Sci, Psych, or Sociology) in Convocation Hall - with around 600-1000 students in the class something is always going on (though I gotta give props to the crew that managed to film a short porn during class in an upper balcony).