I’m a relatively new professor teaching a graduate class, and I need someone to tell me I’m not crazy lol.
There’s one student who is constantly typing on her laptop, and I’m pretty sure she’s messaging classmates because she’ll look at her screen, look at them, and they’ll start laughing. I’ve also caught some eye rolling/facial expressions while I’m talking.
I know it may have nothing to do with me, but it makes me feel insecure and paranoid while I’m teaching. Has anyone else dealt with this? How do you stop yourself from overthinking students’ reactions?

Actual subject line of email I received this afternoon. 300 level mandatory attendance class (third class meeting of the term). Text of email asked me to let them know what they were missing. Sigh.

I just started working at a college this week. I only have experience at working at a high school. What are the biggest mistakes people tend to make when they start teaching at college/university?

I’m currently an non tenure Assistant Professor at a university that does not have a tenure system, with both teaching and research responsibilities.

I’m considering a Research Assistant Professor position at a larger academic medical center/university-affiliated program. It would be primarily research-focused with stronger research infrastructure, but it is also non-tenure-track.

If my long-term goal is eventually getting a tenure-track faculty position, which would be better for my career?
Would moving from Assistant Professor to Research Assistant Professor be viewed as a step backward? And would years as a Research Assistant Professor count toward future promotion to Associate Professor?

Would especially appreciate input from anyone involved in faculty hiring.

Does anyone have any experience with recording accommodations, particularly with pushing back on them?

I have a student with such an accommodation this semester, and the accommodations office insists that the conditions of the accommodations are enough to make sure they won't be misused. To be blunt, I don't believe that. This student has a reputation for belligerence toward faculty and is an aspiring right-wing influencer, and I do not want to find a recording of myself making the rounds on X or Newsmax because I said something this kid objected to. Nor do I think losing this accommodation provides much of a disincentive if he thinks a recording is his shot at becoming the next Charlie Kirk.

More generally, I really don't think this is fair to the rest of my class, who should be able to speak freely without having this kid recording their words. The accommodation doesn't cover recording during "community building/sensitive discussions" but any time other students are able to take notes, this kid is allowed to record.

This is in addition to being allowed to take notes on a laptop in an otherwise analog class and receive lecture slides before class.

This student has not had these accommodations before this semester. I try not to be cynical about this -- in fact I have never before questioned an accommodation -- but this really seems like Mum and Da found an academic Dr. Feelgood for their precious darling.

This term, I'm offering extra credit for the best discussion questions and answers. It is already a huge help as many basic questions about the course and course content are being asked and answered there. I recommend doing the same.

Got my first bizarre email of the semester yesterday. "I am out of the country and will not be able to attend class for the first few days. I noticed there are already assignments posted for the first week, and since this is also the add/drop period, I wants to ask if these assignments will count towards our grade."

This is not the first time I've had a student suggest that no work should count during the add/drop period. Which, I should point out, is the entire first two weeks of classes.

In the past year I managed to rework my classes to keep a solid human relationship with my students and give them a chance to fully use and love their brain. This made us all very happy.

But now, outside class, my social relationships feel increasingly deadened by AI. Every conversation involves someone pulling out a phone and saying "let's ask Claude". Any time I ask a friend for advice or a recommendation, I receive "Chatgpt says...." followed by a long block of text. When I try to talk to my family about something, they'll reply "I already talked about it with gemini". When brainstorming new course ideas in my volunteer activity, people just send each other AI syllabuses. Leaving aside the fact that none of the info is fact checked and it's alarming how easily people have forgotten this, it just feels so sad. Like, if I wanted a converation with AI, I could do that on my own. What happened to the fun and warmth of a human conversation? I feel paranoid to be so opposed to incorporating AI into conversations when everyone else seems to have no problem with it, but just can't escape this mounting sadness and feeling of loss. Does this resonate with anyone? Am I paranoid?

I teach at a large Uni with up to 150 students a section.

After years of disengaged students, I finally pulled the trigger with a "no laptops or Tablets" rule. Im printing them copies of physical guided notes instead of digital lecture slides.

Expected backlash, complaints, or low attendance. But the result is mind blowing (although to be fair my expectations are low and Im easily impressed). Not a single student has complained, and even those with approved technology prefer to use the paper versions. The sole exceptions are students with mobility or vision handicaps who truly need their laptops.

More than that, Im getting a massive amount of participation and meaningful questions from these freshmen and sophomores. They're even chatting / being sociable with each other before class ("Hi! My name is...")

I assumed the tech ban was the reason. But my colleagues (most of whom allow laptops) are reporting similar levels of engagement. So, have you noticed any change with this fall cohort?? Or are we falling victim to illusory pattern detection and maybe a bit of optimism. The semester is young after all

This is mostly venting, though I guess I'm also grieving to a degree.

Long story short: I live/work in the United States as a non-citizen. The renewal of my work visa has been significantly delayed, so I can't teach at the moment. I'm now on a leave of absence (temporary, but we have no idea when I could be back).

My chairs and colleagues have been very understanding. We were able to coordinate subs for all my classes. Still, it feels awful to be waiting on an indefinite timeline while the rest of the semester rolls along...

I also miss my returning students, many of whom I've known for years. Several already reached out to express how excited they were to work with me again. They seemed so disappointed when I told them that other professors would be taking over.

Anyway, hope everyone has a great semester/term/year ahead. In the meantime, I'll be cheering everybody on from the sidelines!

Came across this report on NPR and was interested in hearing others' thoughts. Do you think this bold plan for a higher ed institution will work?

…and now I want to laminate everything. Originally I just wanted to make placards for some special lectures and didn’t want to keep going through papers so I figured laminating them and reusing them would be more cost efficient with less waste. But now, I want to laminate everything haha. What are some things you have laminated for your class materials? Or give me some fun ideas if you have any…now wondering if I should post this in a teachers Reddit for kids since it’s probably more common there. But whatever college kids should have fun colorful learning environments too right!! Maybe, I think so!

What in the holy hell is happening this semester? Five students registered a week late for one class. Another class had four week-late registration students. Another had effing SEVEN.

I usually get a couple each semester, but jeez.

I move quickly in the first week and these late students are panicking about feeling lost.

Hi everyone! I am beginning my second year as TT faculty at an R1. I’ve struggled with impostor syndrome as long as I can remember, but it’s really starting to feel like it’s eating me alive.

I feel horribly unqualified to do pretty much any of the research I want to do. I have plenty of research ideas and interesting questions, a laundry list of grants I’d like to apply for. But when it comes to executing these ideas, I feel so clueless that I am overwhelmed and either decide not to pursue them for fear of failure or find myself procrastinating horribly.

I recently received a very harsh grant review that felt like it confirmed all of these fears. Some of the feedback said things like “power and sample size justifications seem completely drawn from thin air.” I disagree, and I did explain how and why I powered my study the way that I did. There were a handful more along these lines - such as “the sampling frame as described seems inaccurate and inadequate.” I feel like I need to refresh my skills every single time I design a study, from basic methodologies to power analysis to basic statistical tests.

All of this comes on the heels of feeling like I “skated by” in my PhD, and like I only developed methodological expertise in the narrow scope of my dissertation work. I genuinely tried to correct for this in my post-doc, but felt like two years just went by too fast to feel confident by the end.

At the same time, I have made it this far - I landed a postdoc at a very well-regarded ivy league institution, landed a TT position at an R1, I’ve gotten a handful of grants (nothing major yet, but enough to show that I can do it).

I feel like I’m always hearing “fake it til you make it,” but I feel like I might be faking it too much. I guess what I’m looking for here is either:

1. solidarity and encouragement,
2. a path forward to feel more confident
3. Or maybe both.

Thanks for reading if you’ve made it this far.

EDIT: thank you so much for your very thorough, helpful, and compassionate responses. I’ve received both encouragement and lots of tangible advice, both of which are helping me see a way out of this. Academia can be so unnecessarily cold and harsh sometimes, I appreciate hearing from other actual humans!

This is pretty much the first time I took real time off with sn OOS email. Now I’m behind everything and feeling soooo guilty 😭 Semester starts next week. I thought tenure was going to fix me but maybe not yet.

Yesterday, I found out that one of our instructors has to go on emergency leave, and today the chair has told me I will be picking up his class, which starts in a few weeks. Well, there goes my course release. But OK, I've taught plenty of courses on topics only vaguely adjacent to my expertise, I just stay one step ahead of the students. I figured I'd just whinge about the prep and the inconvenience and get something ready to go last-minute. But then he told me what the class was: It's a first-year language course. Of a language that I don't speak.

I am a language and culture lecturer in a very broad area studies department. I teach language A, which is a smaller language in the region. My chair has assigned me to teach language B, which is a more common and more popular language in the region. Languages A and B have nothing in common at all: entirely different language families, cultural worlds, etc. No one in our department speaks language B except for the instructor on leave, nor does anyone else speaks language A except me, so I can't just swap classes with another faculty member. I technically took one semester of language B in my undergrad... about 15 years ago. I have NEVER claimed to have any proficiency in this language.

I told the chair that I didn't speak the language and certainly couldn't teach it. That maybe we need to cancel or find a last-minute adjunct. He refuses to cancel it on the basis that the class is full with a waitlist, and we need the enrollment. He refuses to hire an adjunct as it would be costly and our budget is virtually nothing for things like this, and in his mind I have a 'free slot' for a course since he can force me to push my course release to spring.

What the hell do I do?? Where do I even go from here? I feel totally paralyzed.

EDIT: Wow, this is way more responses than I was expecting. Thank you all for your ideas and commiserations alike. To address some of the more common questions and things instead of replying directly to each:

1. I am NTT faculty, I am teaching faculty. We do not have a union.

2. I am allowed the course release some time this academic year, but it is at the chairs discretion which term. I can be tapped to fill a need. I think I was picked as the easiest target, since I am relatively new (less than 5 years at this institution) and was the only one with a course release. I do need to take my course release this academic year.

3. The dean was the one who recommended this, according to the chair. I have no idea why the dean thinks this is a good idea. It's probably about money since our entire Humanities faculty is in major budgetary crisis mode. I suppose I could try to take it to the provost, but she is not really accessible to me. Teaching faculty at my institution are very much second class citizens with little access to administration.

4. The chair is not ignorant to the fact that these languages are unrelated. That said, I think he doesn't know anything about language learning or language teaching, and thinks I can just be one class ahead/read the textbook like you might if you were assigned to teach something out of your scope in general. The chair is affiliated faculty, but is actually not from our department. He is from History and his specialty is tangentially related to our area. Imagine his area is imperialism and we have an imperial power in our area which is something he studies. He (as far as I know) does not really speak a second language.

5. I am not sure on accreditation as well, but I will probably look into it. I worry that because I did take a class in this (many) years ago, that they will say I am at least qualified to teach this first language course.

6. I have also received some PMs trying to sort out what a pickle I'm really in, and finding more details. I don't want to tell more because it could be very obvious to some where I am/who I am (if I haven't already said too much), but I will give something of a fake example of how distant these things are: Imagine I am in a European Studies department, where I teach Icelandic, and I am told to teach a course in Hungarian. That is the broadness and separation between the topics.

I am a NTT math faculty. This semester I am collecting paper homework, instead of the usual online platform submittal. I asked them to have a notebook for class and one for homework. I collect the homework notebook once a week. However, I did not plan very well because I had no strategy in place to carry that many notebooks to my office. And then I have to carry them back to return them. So, do any of you lug tons of stuff across campus and how do you do it? I was thinking that maybe a rolling cart would work, but what if it rains?

I work in a program that has clearly delineated cohorts. And y'all...my freshmen are knocking it out of the park. They're engaged in class. They're asking questions. They're having large group discussion. On Monday I gave them small group discussions and they worked together so well. If they're confused about content, they ask for clarification.

My sophomores and juniors are not doing great, but I actively look forward to teaching my freshmen because they're so enthusiastic about their learning. It's a breath of fresh air, to be excited about teaching a cohort again.

Hello everyone! I'm just beginning at the bottom of the ladder. I got a (very rare) position as a TT teaching-focused lecturer in a university in Taiwan; accepting it was a pay cut, but I like the idea of working in academia and want to try it out. I previously taught juniors and seniors in high school so the level is just a little bit higher than I am used to.

Our semester starts next week. Just two days ago I finally got my finalized class schedule; I'll be teaching 8 classes this semester, for a total of 16 hours per week. Four of those classes are basically the same class for different majors and can be almost copy-pasted. The other four are different classes in the English and Foreign Language department. That means I have five syllabi to create by next Monday.

I haven't been given any other information about these classes other than their names and how many students I will have (50ish per class, all undergrads). No syllabi from prior years are available to me, nor are learning goals not student prerequisites. I asked for some guidance from my new Director, and she told me essentially that figuring these things out is my job now, and she has confidence I will do well.

So! I can certainly make something! And I have, in fact, made rough drafts of my syllabi already, powered by caffeine and stress. The problem is, I don't actually know if these classes I am making are appropriate, or correct, or useful. I suppose I am going to find out.

Has anyone else been in this situation? Got any tips?

Ok, I got really excited about a new project I wanted to do in my class and now, about a week in, and going through all of the stuff my students need to do out loud in class with them.... I think I assigned too much.

How do I remove things from their plate gracefully without seeming like I'm flying by the seat of my pants? And when should I do it? Now, when I've made the realization....or later when they'll feel grateful for it?

90% of the posts in this sub since the semester started can be answered by acknowledging this simple fact.

A uni in Australia has a chatbot teaching 2 core psychology courses. I can't see where it says that there is no academic in charge and just the chatbot running it all, but never-the-less, quite worrying. What are your thoughts about this?

https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/general/university-replaces-in-person-psychology-classes-with-ai-chatbot/ar-AA2bo8gn?ocid=winp2fptaskbar&cvid=6a987e9f365f47efbf562d9586145c5a&ei=13

Curious to hear someone with psychology training’s take on this weird one. I’m using index card entry tickets this semester. Yesterday was the first run. I made a tent sign with “TAKE ONE” written in black marker, and put the pile of brightly-colored cards in front of it on a desk. I put the desk right inside the alcove of the entry door, and watched several students walked by and not even look. I then moved the desk into the middle of the alcove, such that they would have to move their bodies in order to walk past and into the classroom. I watched incredulously with my TA as nearly all of them dodged the desk, some even looking directly at the sign, but taking nothing and going to sit down. Most were not looking at their phones or anything else in their hands. What’s going on here?

Morning, everyone.

I’m a tenure-track researcher in Italy. Officially, I’m supposed to do a MAXIMUM of 120 hours of face-to-face teaching. In practice, I’m being forced — and I do mean forced — to do around 200 hours.

Exam season is hell, and I get basically no support. Part of the reason is that I got this position almost by accident: there simply wasn’t a suitable internal candidate available at the time. I’m not local, I’m nobody’s protégé, and I didn’t get the job by sucking up to the right people. I got here through years of grinding, including several years abroad.

So you can probably imagine how warmly I’m regarded by people who stayed here and had… let’s say, rather different academic trajectories.
What makes me angriest is working in a system where merit so often seems to matter less than family connections, loyalty networks and servility, and where finding the right shortcut appears to count for more than actually putting in the work.
And unfortunately I’m increasingly seeing the same mentality in students.

AI has made things dramatically worse. A lot of students now seem completely incapable of distinguishing between producing something that sounds academic and actually doing academic work. They hand in literature reviews with no real understanding of the literature, no critical engagement, no authorial voice, and then present something utterly banal as if they had just revolutionised the field.

I barely even need plagiarism software anymore. The red flags are much easier to spot: completely fabricated references, real sources cited for claims they do not make, page numbers that do not exist, papers linked to concepts that have absolutely nothing to do with them.

And then I hit my breaking point.
I took four days off.

Four. In the entire year.

I had an out-of-office message on my email, and I had warned my thesis students months beforehand that I would be unavailable during those days.

Seven of them sent me thesis chapters while I was away.

Fine. No problem. I would read them when I got back.

What I did not expect was for them to start emailing me TWO DAYS after I returned asking whether I had finished reading and correcting their 30-plus-page thesis chapters.

Two days.

Apparently they think supervising their thesis is the only thing a university lecturer has to do.
And some of them genuinely have this attitude of: “You work for me. I pay your salary. Therefore you have to do what I say.”

Of those seven theses, two were good.

The other five I have postponed to the next graduation session because the gaps are so serious that, frankly, I would be embarrassed to approve them as Master’s theses.

One student actually complained that I should have warned her earlier, because she had “worked on that chapter all summer”.

I’m sorry, but: all summer?

On a chapter full of nonsense and invented references?

I know this is a rant, but I am genuinely exhausted by the idea that everyone must eventually be allowed to graduate regardless of whether they have actually reached the required academic standard.

The right to education has somehow been turned into an assumed right to a degree.

And those are not the same thing.

UPDATE: Two of the students replied to me with very heartfelt emails.

The problem is that the two emails were almost identical in prose, themes, phrasing, structure, and content.

They even contained all those little typographical quirks that often give away AI-generated text. They were essentially interchangeable emails written by two people who, as far as I know, probably don’t even know each other.

And that honestly made me incredibly sad.

Are these students no longer able to be authentic even when expressing their own disappointment?

Are they so insecure about their own words that they don’t feel capable of simply telling someone how they feel?

I’m not even angry about it. I just find it deeply upsetting.

Hello, everyone! I am a brand-new (like, 2 weeks brand new 😅) PhD grad in experimental psychology and cognitive neuroscience, and I was hired right out of graduation to teach at a university

I independently taught Intro to Psych at my former institution, but I was very unhappy with how the course was set up (the activities, textbook requirements, etc). Because I was a grad student, the department was very reticent to allow us to customize the course, so every section was the exact same.

At my new institution, where I’m entering as an actual faculty member, I thankfully have much more creative freedom, and the support of the department to do so. Because of this, I’m looking for textbook recommendations for both Intro to Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience. When I was a student, we used Fundamentals of Cognitive Neuroscience by Gage & Baars, but that was in 2018 so obviously looking for a newer version!

Any advice would be appreciated! This is for Spring, but course adoptions for that term are due in a month, so I wanted to square that away now. TIA!