“Don’t take absences so seriously. If a student doesn’t come to class it will show! They will fail themselves if too many are missed.”
I find this to be completely true. As a student, I despise the fact that some professors assign reading to the class, and then lecture in the next class as though none of the students read the material. Students who both read the material and attend the lecture have the benefit of dual exposure to the material but in my personal opinion, the purpose of a class discussion on a topic that has already been read should be supplemental. The discussion should analyze and delve deeper into the material rather than summarizing the text for those that did not bother to read. Classes in which this is the case, in order to do well, a student must both read the text and attend class. However, many classes are of the first type and offer no additional inisght into material. If a student already has a full understanding of the text, it does not make sense in my mind to enforce a policy by which they are required to “learn” the material twice. It baffles me that students who completely understand material could be given a grade similar to those who did not read or understand simply due to attendance. If professors continue to summarize the texts, while there should be an attendance policy in place in order to prevent students from simply never coming, it should be flexible and to an extent, biased towards those who obviously understand the material. However, the attendance policy is not what is at fault, the teaching style is what should in fact be remedied.
Another topic of hot debate among the suggestions is the foreign language department/requirement. Some students ask for more funding and more opportunity to take classes whereas others simply want the requirement removed. I tend to agree with an increase in funding and maintaining the reuirement. A big portion of students who complain about foreign language requirements are most likely those who have been “burned” by the current situation. A personal example: I am currently in Japanese 101 with the intention of taking Japanese 102 this upcoming semester. However, I also intend on taking advantage of the school’s study abroad program which will preclude me from taking Japanese 201 the fall of 2009. Unfortunately, 201 is only offered in the fall therefore I will have to wait until the fall of 2010 before I am able to finish my foreign language requirement. This means there will be a year of downtime between the classes in which I will most likely be forgetting a great deal of material. For many students, who haven’t the time or inclination to continue studying independantly, this would be a huge handicap. Another personal problem I have experienced with the foreign language department is that there is only one teacher available for my language of choice. If a student has an issue with a professor or even learns in a style which they don’t necessarily teach well towards, that student will have significantly more difficulty and also does not get the advantage of hearing different dialects and seeing different teaching methods. Therefore, it makes sense to me to continue to require a foreign language becuase it is an important part of education, especially a liberal arts one, but to make efforts to improve the quality of the languages being taught.
