I met with a student I am co-supervising yesterday. He gave me the first draft of his final year undergraduate project report. He was meant to collect data from experiments and analyse them. In the end it turned out that he had conducted one experiment (one subject) and run a visual abstraction on the data (the number goes up) and written it up as a statistical result and proof of concept!

This is the sort of thing that makes me not want to be an academic. I can't count the number of times, we had told him of the importance of ecological validity. How do you deal with undergraduates who just don't want to put in the effort?

I talked to the course administrator and in her experience, apparently some undergraduates aim for a C and are happy with it even when they are capable of doing more. Is that true? I would have thought that the undergraduate project is something you choose based on your interest and therefore reflect you at your best.

The undergrads in our lab vary greatly - some are really motivated and have led their own projects, and have contributed lots of great ideas. On the other hand, we also had some students that just couldn't be bothered and never showed up to do lab work till the last minute. If they put a bit of effort in they'd be fine, but they don't care if they only get a 2.2 rather than the 2.1 they could have potentially got if some oomf had been put into it.

I put so much more effort into him though. I have two other guys and they are brilliant and sometimes teaches me a thing or two. One of the other two guys is actually the brother of the one I am complaining about. It just seems like I could have spent my time to write a chapter in my thesis instead of bothering to help this one undergradute to such length and realise that in the end nothing got through!

I can understand how some professors I know treat their undergraduate like dust. For instance one of the professors won't see his student even if the student is 1 minute late to the meeting or if the student did not solve a problem assigned to him in the last meeting.

I don't want to become that kind of academic but it really does seem like the best way to go now. If the student doesn't care, why should we?

Undergrads get down over their studies just the same as PhD students feel down from time to time. I come into uni sometimes and barely do any work, and sometimes I don't even come in. When I was an undergrad, I didn't feel that enjoyed the course 100% of the time, and so missed lectures, got drunk and missed even more lectures.

Thats just the way it is. Some students start uni and just stream straight through the degree without any problems, and some don't. Thats life, but DanB is right, it is up to the student to find their motivation and sort themselves out.

You should care, but only to a certain extent. Try helping them at first, if nothing works then say 'I will only help you if you are going to put the effort in'. If nothing happens then, just give the student the bare minimum of help, that way you can do your own work or help other students that will put effort in.

I would also warn that you should talk to your colleagues about this in case the student complains to them. That way they can also say to the student 'what2donext has tried to help you several times and you haven't bothered to put the effort in'.

Also you should check with the student that there isn't any external problems such as financial difficulties (I know this one affected me a fair bit).

Oh and I also went on a course which encourage supervisors to be nice to students and told us never to tell students that they are wrong.

leave them, if they dont want to do work proporly and in a very good quality, that is their problem. Spend more time with those who are more than keen to learn (and there are plenty of them in University). Dont waste your time on those who wont appreciate your effort;)

I normally dress up as a dominatrix... so maybe I should try dressing a bit more demure?

Are you allowed to use a a taser?

With reason. and consent.