Obviously I don't mean all undergrads are demanding and arrogant. Overall most of the students I have this year are great. However, some are pretty difficult to deal with. One of them talks in class as if he deserves a nobel prize and talks to me like I am some kind of idiot if I don't know the answer to every single one of his questions.

Another two seem to think all I am on the planet for is to be their tutor and therefore they can demand, demand, demand - have answers to their email in 20 seconds flat, email several times a day in detail as though they want me to just write the essay for them.

When I was an undergrad I had so much respect for my lecturers and tutors, and I was always encouraged to think independently instead of expecting all the answers to just be fed to me. I'm pretty sure most other students I was in class with were the same (although this may be an idealistic memory).

Anyway I just felt like a rant! Anyone else got any challenging students or is it just me?

Slomo - sounds tough!! I am older with 20 years commercial experience so it tends to be a bit different. I have seen younger teaching fellows just crack down on it. If I have talking in my class I just stop and address the students talking and say to them that we can't hear what their classmate is saying and stay quiet till they stop talking and this usually works. I know people who just ignore it as they don't want the hassle.

Welcome to my world - I teach in a post 92 uni and we have very demanding students. Talking and texting in class are common place, students never do any work before classes and many expect to learn everything they need from teh class. Very different from my experience 25 years ago as an undergrad:-(

I was teaching last term and some students were just talking and talking (throughout the lecture time).
I didnt know how to deal with them.
satchi

When I have an undisciplined, noisy group, I stand, silently in front of the group, just waiting and they usually stop after a while. With a rally big group, like a lecture sometimes there are a few stragglers who keep chatting, so I ask them if they are giving the lecture and what it is they have to tell us all, ask them to speak up so we can all hear them, or some ther sarcastic teachery comment, and that usually works.

I agree that students have less respect and are more demanding, perhaps this has to do with resentment about paying fees and them suffering the effects of shrinking departmental budgets, perhaps.

Hi Slowmo

As per the earlier comments, I also lecture in a post 92 university and experience a myriad of problems with my undergraduate students ranging for talking in the class to a blunt refusal to purchase essential texts to actually participate in the classes.

I have now come to the view that 75% of the students want to be spoon fed because the school system did this in the pursuit of results.

I have now adopted various approaches to deal with the problems I experience, in terms of talking in class, I just stop the lecture until they either finish or leave (I do give them the option to talk outside my classroom).  If they don't bring the required equipment I refuse to allow them into the class in the first instance and I set them homework in the form of reading, failure to read the required materials will reduce their ability to participate in the class and therefore impact on their ability to actually pass the module

Although this is a hard stance, I now have the respect on the students they don't talk in the classes and most will actually read the material I ask them to read, given this I am more than happy to deal with any questions they have within the timetabled tutorial sessions, although I often answer them with a question of my own, again this neutralises the attitude problems the student exhibit as they realise it will not have any effect.

In terms of e-mails I advise them at the start that I will not answer e-mails favouring the "peer support" process facilitated by the VLE - This really does work and allows me to post as I think I need to and puts the onus back on the group.

Hope this maybe helps?

I don't teach but I have seen this happen to my friends so many times. 99% of undergrads are rude and arrogant and the other 1% is demanding over the limit. They like to be spoon-fed and hate to work for that. I also did have a lot of respect for my teachers and understood that others need to learn as well even if I would have liked talk and ask questions. This generation lacks empathy maybe its how the world has changed.

My bit of advice is stop teaching if they are noisy and ask them to share that with all the class. Maybe ask other students what the majority would like as a solution to this problem-like no questions during lecture but reasonable time at the end.

At the start of semester I establish rules with students (well, they come up with some and I do the rest), and I write these on the board - you know, things like, respecting each other, no talking over other people, no sexist, racist language, no texting etc. Then if they break a rule during semester, I point this out, point out that the class developed the rules etc etc. I also get teachery! It seems to work.

As for emails - we only had one central person who received all student emails, so they could say the same thing to all the students. Could they email the course co-ord instead of you?

Students do demand more than we did, probably as they pay so much they think they have a right to behave like that...

Oh dear! I'm an undergraduate and I'm certainly not rude or arrogant and I hope I'm not too demanding. I get just as annoyed as lecturers when people are noisy in classes and I fully support the tough stance that some of them take. I also find it infuriating when people don't bother to go to lectures or prepare for seminars, I remember going to one seminar before Christmas and I was the only student who bothered to turn up! To be honest if I go to lectures,do the required reading(or at least some of it) then I find I don't need to ask for too much help when it comes to essays.

But, there is another side to this. I've got seven essays to do this year, some of them were handed in before Christmas and I won't get any of the marks back before the last one is due to be handed in after Easter. That means if I am going wrong somewhere I won't know about it until it's too late to do anything about it and my whole year's marks may be affected. I handed one essay in last week and received an e-mail yesterday from the marker saying that we shouldn't expect any marks until the end of May as he's so busy with international teaching etc. Well I'm sorry but I'm paying for this, the Uni states that essays should have a turn around of four weeks-in reality it's at least ten.

In my opinion this is because we just have too many students,class sizes are way too big and the only individual attention we get is via e-mail and through essay feedback-perhaps this explains why some students seem demanding.

Like I say not all students are a problem I have some really excellent under graduates too. In terms of your work and the marking of it I have to agree with you.  As a senior lecturer I promise to at least give some generic feedback to ensure any significant issues are dealt with (as the majority of people make generic errors). Although I can relate to the problems your tutor outlines. I think sometimes students do unfairly suffer as a result of the large workloads given to academic staff to overcome the problems universities face with the stretched resources they have.

I hope you do manage to get some feedback from the tutor though as this is an important part of the learning experiance.

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hey Oldwoman, I totally agree about the poor service students get. I often look at my students and think 'you poor blighters, and you're paying for it!'. I am not allowed to dicuss essays with my students, outside of the 5 minutes each they have for tutorials (that includes email requests), and essays are never back on time, usually die to admin errors, and then a build up because when the essays do find their way to me the next term has started and I have a host of other, immediate things to tdo like run seminars and give/write lectures. I am usually working the equivalent of a full time week for my teaching during term time, and I barely make enough money to live on - I think it's horrendous that students are being taught by people in such a position, their education is too important for that. Sometimes, I think if they knew the truth about the pitiful amount of resources the universty pay out for their actual teaching, that they'd be outraged and something might change, they would very likely stop blaming us as individuals. Myself and a couple of others have started to be more open about what we, tempotary staff, get paid, and for what duties, and the students have been totally shocked.