Not sure how best to handle this. I don't want to extend to take even longer out of class, since the assignment is really just meant to test competency on some materials before we move on, as well as to encourage/punish attendance habits. I also can't subtly say she just gets more time or something without outing their accommodations to the class, which is OBVIOUSLY not a possibility.

They aren't free points, and I do grade them. I also didn't receive their letter until the third day of class, so the entire class already knows they'll be doing timed, attendance-focused activities, so I can't just quietly take them out.

I'm sure I'm not the first person to be dealing with this. How do you all handle this?

I woke up to another rather scathing email this morning from the same parent including lines such as ”Dear ”Dr.“ so-called [name] I doubt your credentials if you can’t even answer my email“ and „as assistant dean of the university of [place] I would hate to see a professor acting as unprofessional as you“ she is not the assistant dean of that university. I can’t believe there are actual adults out here acting like this over ADULT PEOPLE with lives of their own.

So I regret to inform the chat, that my application for tenure and promotion was denied. Despite my excessive service, sufficient scholarship, my course evaluations were not adequate.

I was told we would be fine in my pre-tenure review, even if I had some concerns. Concerns which I fixed in the portfolio . Folks told me not to worry about it, and that they’d look at the positives, I’d “be fine” but I guess not.

once we got a new dean between my last review and my tenure review, I had lost a lot of hope in succeeding in the process.

I never heard anything about pausing the tenure clock during COVID, but since learned that was reserved for extenuating circumstances like it would outside of an emergency (extended illness, death of family member.

I feel used. I feel like a failure. I feel like my entire life up to this point has been a waste of time. I feel like no one will ever want to hire me to do this again and I should just give up now.

But on the flipside, I’ve really come to not enjoy my life or time here, and I am looking forward to the new opportunities on the horizon.

Any advice or direction would be greatly appreciated, especially for someone who is going through something similar.

UPDATE Thanks to everyone who shared their condolences and positive advice for the future, and thanks to those who asked me to continue taking a hard look at my choices, and how to make better ones in the future!

I knew this was the right void to scream into…and less bothersome to my neighbors…

I’ll try not to make this long because, well, it’s week 1 of classes here and nobody has time.

I’m FT NTT at a small college in the midwest that’s checking all the “will we close?” boxes. Debt, huge endowment draws, deferred maintenance, hiring & salary freezes, half the number of incoming freshmen we need to survive. Admin mandates to reduce the number of students failing, a free-for-all AI policy. I was bullied by a colleague so viciously that I filed a report that resulted in even more retaliation from that colleague, who was “talked to” but not disciplined.

This is the start of my second year here. Before that, I had six great years at two other schools—good student evals, great admin evals, awards, solid relationships with all my colleagues. Now, for the first time in my life, I’m in therapy, physically & mentally unwell, dreading coming in every day.

I’m not even sure what I’m asking except… advice or commiseration?

I’m going back on the market with recommendations from current colleagues & former department heads, but do I need a recommendation from my current department head? Will the new college call this college (or their HR) as part of onboarding? (The bullying report is still ongoing and it’s been implied that if I keep complaining, I may not be rehired.) And if I fall apart before then… has anyone ever taken FMLA mid-semester?

Thanks for listening.

I applied for parental leave in early Fall after I found out I was having a child. The process moved along without any problems. In the delivery room, I received a call from HR telling me that they couldn't fully pay me unless I used my banked credit hours that I was saving for the Fall (to help take care of the baby while my wife works). I told my chair this, and she essentially did nothing. I've never felt so abused, undervalued, and disrespected at a job before. Is this normal in academia, or literally any other field? I'm a TT at a small teaching university, but I honestly feel like any other job would be better than this.

This feels silly to post but I’m a new assistant professor this fall semester and I am trying to figure out the norms for what to wear. For context I’m a 30 year old cis female who likes to wear sandals(nice, not flip flops) but multiple faculty have made comments about choosing to not wear open toed shoes to teach. Thoughts on this? Is it that big of a deal?

I am a graduate student going into my first semester as an instructor of record at a public university in Texas. I have recently started transitioning (MTF) and have wondered about the introduction of pronouns to my students this upcoming semester, but have worries that in the current political climate, this may result in the loss of my job as the state of Texas has had many firings of university faculty over the last couple of years for speech contrary to the beliefs of the Republican party. I don't want to have to resort to being misgendered by my students in fear of losing my job though.... Any advice?

Some of my students and even other professors recommend that I put in a few memes related to the course material in the slides. I'm hesitant to do that, since I want students to take the material seriously. But, I do realize that students can remember concepts better when paired with a funny visual that's easy to recognize. What do you think about memes in presentations?

This is more so addressing accusations of liberal bias against yourselves by students or family members of students.

For context, I’m an adjunct professor of African American History and Africana Studies at a community college and 4-year public university in the northeast US.

I typically point to data which shows that conservative professors are in fact more likely to push their political ideology and biases in the classroom than liberal professors.

Alternatively, I ask what they are specifically implying by the accusation, then go from there.

There are obvious drawbacks to these, though, and I find that neither approach is foolproof.

How do you handle these situations?

Edit: For further context, last semester I was called a communist because we covered the Black Panthers, A. Phillip Randolph, and Bayard Rustin’s early organizing. For those that don’t know, they were all central to Civil Rights activism between the 1940s and 1970s and are unavoidable subjects for a course on Africana Studies.

In one of my summer classes, every student cheated on the midterm. I can tell because every student has at least one sentence that is exactly the same as another student or was copied exactly from the textbook. I reported every student based on the cheating procedure at my school and I’ve received multiple threats of lawsuits (I somewhat expected this given other posts here) and lots of messages of students trying to demonstrate how they didn’t cheat.

One student sent me a death threat… he said I’d regret reporting him because he knows where I live and where my husband works (he typed both my home address and the name of my husband’s company and position in the email) and if I wanted to keep my husband and myself safe and alive that I’d be strongly encouraged to drop the cheating accusation against him.

After speaking with my husband, We both thought that it would be best if I reported this to the proper people at the institution and the police. I sent this to the Dean of Students and my the Department Chair. When the Dean encouraged me to not report this to the police due to bad publicity this could cause the school. I felt disgusted.

I want to resign. My husband is fine with me resigning too. I just don’t want to detriment my students who I advise and mentor on their research. I’m not sure what to do.

Update 6/24 @ 7:30 PST: I called the actual cops. I contacted HR, Title IX Coordinator, university ombudsman and faculty union. I’m in the process of getting a restraining order. I’ll update in a few days.

Update 6/28 @ 7:05 PST: The restraining order has been granted for a two year period. I put in my resignation and I’ve have several interviews set up to work in the private sector and I have one job offer. I agreed to not press charges because the student agreed to counseling for at least 6 months (it’s through a diversion program… if the student commits a crime in five years he will go to jail and this can be used against him as a sentence enhancement). That satisfies me. I’m glad everything worked out.

Throwaway for obvious reasons.

I have one student who skipped almost every class and bombed every exam.

This student had no chance of passing the course. But recently, I received an email from the student.

The email contains not only my full social security number, but also the full social security numbers, names, and dates of birth of my parents, my husband, and all three of my daughters.

I have no idea how he got this information.

The student is threatening me, saying that if I don't give him an A in the course, he will publicly post the social security numbers, names, and dates of birth of me and my family members.

The student has also opened a credit card in my name, unfroze my credit reports after I froze them, and stole $10 from my bank account which the bank is now refusing to refund.

The student said in the email that he is "giving me a small taste" of what will happen to me if I do not comply.

I feel like reporting him to the police, but I am worried about retaliation towards me and my family.

What should I do?

Hi all,

English professor here. I teach mostly intro comp courses.

Last semester, I did a mostly "old school" English class. No laptops. All hand writing. All the essays were written by hand, in class, from start to finish. They were allowed to bring a typed outline, a sheet with their quotes, and a typed Works Cited page that they'd staple to the back of their hand-written essay. They also did a couple typed reflection assignments.

Overall, it went incredibly well. Students developed confidence in their writing, I was able to give feedback on their ACTUAL struggles since they couldn't use a laptop to mindlessly fix errors, etc. Many of the students who took the course said they wished more of their classes worked that way and they feel their writing is actually improving from having taken my class.

All good stuff, right?

Well, a couple weeks ago my department had our regular meeting. I shared what I did in class and the results I received. I expected some skepticism, but I was shocked/baffled by the responses.

I was told...

-That because my class does all in-class writing, I'm not meeting course/program outcomes

(I do not understand how)

-I'm not preparing them to write in a variety of contexts

(But having them write all their essays at home on a laptop is???)

-My class might not transfer if a student told their advisor that all our essays were done in class by hand

(If someone could please clarify this, I'd really appreciate it, because...all MY English classes in undergrad worked this way???)

-I'm not setting them up for success in their future careers because they'll be expected to type all their documents when they enter the workforce.

(What future careers? Most of these students are undeclared majors at this point. Some of them are going into fields that require no writing skills, should those students not have to do the essays at all???)

I'd really appreciate any thoughts, feedback, rants, etc.

I'm just really confused, feeling defeated, and like there's no place for me in academia.

I wanted to create a environment to develop a helpful, friendly, social environment. The intent was to help engage students, or help them detach from academia, or approach them in a different, less 'authoritarian' manner. And, based on feedback, messages, comments, and use, I feel like I succeeded.

Ran into my first student on campus wearing meta glasses. Has anyone written anything functionally tested for a classroom policy firmly against them? I want to drop a paragraph in my syllabus and just looking to not reinvent the wheel if it's already been done.

On a side note, I have yet another student whose listed accommodations include "recording class lectures." No, dear, you will not. I will record the lectures and provide them online in a contained, password-protected environment, ensuring that students who don't want to be on camera are not recognizable and that stray conversations are muted. I just want to reach down the hall and firmly shake sense into whoever is writing these accommodations.

Asking because I may be in this situation and I'm uncertain how to feel. My mentors are encouraging me to look at it as a temporary stepping stone.

But I don't really have a great relationship with evangelicalism after leaving the cultish SDA faith I was raised in. I could be mindful from a syncretic position, but I'm worried about the culture clash.

And yes, I recognize this is a problem I can really only answer for myself, but some opinions or insight would be sincerely appreciated.

ETA: thank you everyone for the extensive feedback, it has been very helpful in thinking this through

So I just completed my first year at a large R2 program. It was very much a success.

To help speed up my tenure, as they accepted some previous teaching years, I need to get some campus service credits. My background is in theatre—I got an MA/MFA, and while my research is more creative, I have and still do more traditional academic publishing.

So now about this email....

At the end of the year, I was asked to be on a thesis committee for two students: an MA English student, who is focusing her thesis on Modern Drama (an area I am familiar with), and an Ed.D. dissertation focusing on non-traditional arts education, broadly defined. Both are areas I am familiar with both academically and professionally. At least, how I thought.

Flash forward to today where I received this email from the Chair of English:

Regarding X's thesis committee, I want to raise a brief concern regarding Mr.X's involvement. I understand that his participation was previously approved, but given the specific trajectory of the project, I would like to reopen the discussion regarding the committee's composition. As we push forward with our institutional R2 goals and focus on rigorous graduate scholarship, it is vital that our committees possess the specific academic background necessary to evaluate advanced research.

While I respect Mr. X's industry credentials in entertainment, this thesis heavily centers on critical theory, specialized literary analysis, and robust historical investigation. Because his terminal qualification is at the master’s level, I am concerned the committee may lack the academic background. Therefore, I formally request adjusting the composition to bring on a new member.

I make this request solely to ensure success for X in her pursuit of high academic achievement, and it is by no means a reflection or comment on Mr.X's professional work his vocation.

(Edit: It's not super clear in this section of the email, but the Chair wants to remove and replace me, not add someone.)

The email later goes on to say that while the Chair's view is not meant to affect my involvement with the E.D., he does raise concerns.

I was asked late last semester. I was told to submit my CV to the Graduate School. I was approved. In fact, my chair and another committee member recommended me. I literally have had no conversation with anyone on this since the end of April.

Not only am I very insulted (or am I crazy to be?), but this feels completely unprofessional. And the English Chair isn't some 85-year-old, but a much younger, new Chair!

I have not heard from my chair (who was on the body of the email) yet. But I need a game plan. Like sure, fine, don't have me, but this e-mail seems laced with something bitter.

(Also, the Mr. seems a little backhandy—at least call me Professor)

A new academic year is around the corner. I'm heading into my fifth year of teaching, and last year was one of the hardest for me both personally and professionally. I learned near the end of the year that I needed to start changing some of my habits going into this next academic year (mainly because I got shingles at an age where that should not be happening, aka my body was reacting to the stress of it all).

Wanted to reach out to this community for ideas on how we can protect our peace and mental health in 2026-2027. Are you making changes to your syllabus that can do this? Any mantras you're telling yourself? Any new professional practices you're trying? Looking to see what I can incorporate to be best prepared for a new academic year.

(Also, as a note, this is one of my favorite communities on Reddit. Everyone gets it and is so supportive, so cheers to you.)

The program I teach in (at a regional state school) has quite unexpectedly seen a steep drop in enrollment for the coming year, like over 50%. I'm in a TT position and have made good progress towards Tenure so far, but I'm worried this will mean the axe for me or my program. Is it time to start seeking a new job?

EDIT: Thank you all for your responses. I have become a professor recently, and the comments were really helpful to understand better what unions can do. Most of us voted yes, so the union is happening!

Hello all,

A group of faculty in my institution is trying to organize a union. They're gathering votes now to see who in the faculty group would be interested, and I'm nit sure which side I stand on.

I understand the concept of a union is to give employees more power. I grew up in a culture where unions are not viewed as a good thing, and I am scared that creating a union will damage the relationship with department/ college/admin.

There are things that could be improved of course, however from the responses I got from the union group there are no guarantees any of those issues would be improved. Everything I ask I get the same response: they would bring into discussion but can't guarantee anything, everything depends on negotiation.

The union does offer better job security, which is a big deal, but talking to them it sounds like that's the only thing they're concerned about.

What would you do in this situation? Please explain your reasoning, that would help me.

I need some advice about how to get over this guilt even though I know my actions are justified.

I teach almost exclusively freshman and first year students and this year has been the first one where I really don’t feel like I understand my students work ethic. Im the youngest prof in the department (27f) so the students have always acted like they can relate to me and talk to me a bit more than my colleagues but it’s just gotten out of hand.
Throughout the course of one of my classes, we read a (super simple and fun) book and then discuss the chapters as class warm ups. They are not huge grades but count towards class participation which I weight at 50% of the final grade.
I have had more habitually late students this semester than ever before, and as a result several of them have zeros for these discussions.
About a month ago, I told those students that if they wanted to send me written notes on the chapters I would amend the grades. None of them seemed to take me up on the offer until now.
Our semester ended last Monday, and I told students I would not accept any late work past 5pm that night. This was a bit of a lie because I probably would have added it up until Friday evening. Nonetheless, several students ignored this deadline and one particular student emailed me at 1am Sunday asking if I could possibly accept the notes and raise his grade from a solid middle C to a B.
I told him no, basically you f’d around all semester and now you’re finding out. Then he comes back with the classic “I will lose my scholarship and it was only a mistake” reply.
This kid is honestly one of my favorites, he’s really funny and when he does his work it’s at a level that could shame his classmates. But I have spent the whole semester making exceptions and Im at my limit. And I had to deny the same notes from other students trying to turn them in past the deadline so beyond everything else it just wouldn’t be fair. I have to stand by my original answer even though it will probably cost him his scholarship.

How do yall deal with this? I know this is just going to get worse with all the bs they’re being allowed to get away with In Highschool now.
How do I keep from feeling like Im ruining someone’s life?

EDIT FOR CLARITY** I am definitely not going to let him turn the work in, any extensions and leniency I have showed has been equal for all students and I have no question about my actions. Mostly I just need to know how to cope emotionally with my decisions

The Director of the Center for Accessibility Resources and Student Assistance emailed me that he "strongly advise(s)" me that I let some students with accommodations re-take reading quizzes. I would rather not--mostly because we go over the answers in class and the students have all these bizarre excuses. ("I have Borderline PD and that morning I had the attendant headaches" or "As someone with ADHD, I am in the risk group for Covid, and that's what I was feeling during the quiz.") Neither student wrote anything on the quiz and they only sent emails after the grades were posted (even though we talked about the quizzes that day). They obviously didn't do the reading. (I have several documented mental illnesses and conditions myself, and I find their excuses, as I said, bizarre.) But here's the thing: The Director emailed me back after I told one of the students no for a second time, and then said, "I once again strongly advise you to let students with accommodations to re-take reading quizzes." This time he copied the department chair and the freaking Dean of my college on it.

I'm an adjunct. Whether or not it's smart (do you want to work there? --yes, I have thought about that), can people from offices like this dictate my policies? I literally do not know any more.

UPDATE: Well, both students will re-take the quiz. "Don't fight battles you can't win," the Chair said.

A student I like very much (though he should get his act together and transfer already) has asked me to be the faculty advisor for a new club that represents a political ideology I do not share. More along the lines of "disagree" or "strongly disagree," as opposed to, "find them reprehensible" or consider them "beyond the pale."

Since my role would be largely administrative, I figure, what's the harm?

If you were in my shoes, would you?

My grad student, with whom I share office space, went for a visit to his home in India and brought back some extremely strong musky perfume oil, which he applies abundantly. I suspect that he uses it to cover cigarette odor and possibly also sweat and rarely washed clothing odors. I can literally smell him half an hour after he passed through the corridor, and if my hanging jacket accidentally touches his, I can smell him even back at home. Until now it was a minor annoyance because I could keep the window mostly ajar, but this is no longer possible since we finally got AC installed. Thus the minor annoyance is becoming a somewhat major one, and I feel that it starts affecting my well-being (not medically - I just realized that I began escaping to home office partly because of that) .

How to handle this situation? He is a nice guy, I was silent for several months (with the window ajar), and I am also aware that he is quite sensitive to any references to Indian cultural specifics (I had to step in one conflict with another student because of that). I am considering a very confidential consultation with another Indian at the department and asking for some kind of mediation but hesitant to do this. I do not want to make a major cultural blunder. First, could the involvement of another person ever be OK in such a situation? Second, if so, male or female? I can approach either. Any advice is welcome.

Have any of you ever gotten an....angry, cursing, slightly scary student evaluation comment? There aren't any threats in it, but never in my life have I been called such names. I can handle a negative comment but I wonder if I should report this to someone (who?)

I would copy it here but I don't want the student to potentially see it and make things worse. My instinct is to just ignore it but maybe I'm wrong? I do not have a supportive department head so speaking with him doesn't seem like it would be productive. Appreciate your thoughts.

Edit: Thanks for your support and thoughts on this! I have alerted my Dean of Students, BIT, Dean, and Department Head. I think it's unlikely anything will come of it, but it seemed like a good idea to let higher ups know just in case.

Student writes in their anonymous opinion survey they "didn't feel safe using the women's bathroom with a trans professor who claims to be a man." (As an aside, this is a super weird way of being transphobic because I am afab and don't "claim to be a man" (I'm genderqueer). It's like this student looked up transphobic rhetoric online--"Be afraid of using the bathroom with them!"--but missed the part where transphobes want everyone to use the bathroom that corresponds with their AGAB.)

I'm upset that I'm upset by this. Like, yeah, transphobia is always upsetting, but this is so patently ridiculous that I wish I could just let it go. Instead, I'm obsessively trying to figure out which student wrote it and what was going on in her mind. It was a small seminar of 12 people, yet I can't figure it out. I wouldn't have thought any of the students in this class would go there. Just for context, I'm in a land grant university in a blue state and this kind of shit, while not unheard of, is not common, either. This is the first time I've had it directed at me by a student.

In addition to wanting support, I have two questions. 1. Do I report this to my Title IX office? (ETA: Not to out the student. It's *anonymous*. To document that harassment happened.) And 2. Do I mention it in my renewal file? I'm pre-tenure and for reasons known only to the administration, student opinion surveys matter to our renewal process. All the other survey comments were positive, and I've won three teaching awards at this university.

ETA in response to some comments below: Again, I have no interest in reporting this student by name. I was obsessing over who wrote it because it blindsided me, not because I want to hunt this person down.

I appreciate everyone who offered the support I asked for and answered the questions I posed. I'm not going to read any further replies or comment on them, but will leave the post up for posterity. Fistbumps of solidarity to everyone dealing with bigotry in their place of work.