To think Uni students are a right moaning pita compared to when I went

[ohtobemoanproof]

Im a lecturer.

When I went to University-we went to the lectures, took notes from the board or overheads, went home, studied, did the exams etc, got our marks whenever they were ready and went away. No bothering the lecturers ( ever), no having their emails and demanding appointments, no arguing the toss over coursework marks, no moaning and complaining.

Now, I feel almost "bullied" by some of the students (not high fee payers, in fact some are on a bursary). They constantly moan (about everything, not just me in case anyone suggests its my module leadership in question), are always at the door, send email critiques about the quality of highly appraised visiting expert speakers, threaten to sue if coursework is returned a day later than you suggest it will be back, blame the lecturer if they get lower marks than expected, demand formal public apologies if they dont receive central messages about "one off" timetable changes, bitch if lecture notes aren't on module spaces a week before the lecture is held...it goes on. Bloody nightmare.

Aibu to think this is a new breed and we just weren't like that "in my day".

sniffs and has some more gin

laptopdacer whatever training you organise? In a thread complaining about students needing hand holding and being told what to do and not being able to perform independant study, you say you need your university to provide specific training?

Mind you, fred, If you look at the qualifications in that description you will see there is no requirement for experience or training in pastoral care so I am, indeed, qualified by the standards laid out in that (somewhat junior to my post) description.

This wont happen fred, the failing comes from above.

Compos hat-that is interesting about the students turning up with their parents.
It might have to do with the "consumer thing", but it also might be to do with the apalling state of public transport these days! Or maybe the fact that 17/18 year olds can no longer navigate said public transport.

I like what cory says, and would like her to be one of my lecturers.
OP, I think maybe you should do a different science job that doesn't involve people.
After all, most jobs involve some amount of inane personal chat with people.
Maybe you could find a job where you are holed up in the lab all day and hardly have to interact, other than to record results.
Surely industry would pay you more than university?

Public transport ime was worse in the 80's when very few prospective students ime turned up with parents. tbh I think it is far more to do with thed over protectiveness of parents today. For example, the number of younger children walking to school by themselves has plummeted over the same period.

DP is a lecturer - just finished marking 140 submissions (had to all be marked within 3 weeks). The standard of some of the stuff submitted was ing. There is huge pressure on Unis to make sure students pass exams, so they are given much more credit for stuff than we ever were. Re pastoral care - we would never have gone to a lecturer with personal issues (maybe to SU or similar). And when you've got about 200 students in your lectures its just not practical to be able to know them all. DP says that he doesn't know any of the 1st years, that by 2nd year if they are very good he might recognise them, in 3rd year if they are very bad he might remember their faces and that by 4th year he actually knows some of their names.

Also - lecturers are just "lecturers" these days - there is a huge element of research in most jobs, so teaching isn't always top priority.

But then again they don't get away with stuff as much aswe used to either - it was common place to find an obscure book and just plagarise it, but with new software used by Unis you just can't get away with that any more.

Thats the thing gin. I love teaching but I cant "know" all my students. There are too many.

That's definitly not true in my region lesley.
For example, every bus and train service in my town has been cut and cut and cut since the 80's.
The bus I would like to get to work runs once an hour (less in the rush hours!).
Ten years ago it was every 20 minutes.

And I think the kids walking to school thing is directly related to the massive increase of cars on the road. The maniacal way drivers drive at school run times is what scares me as a parent anyway.

Sorry-derail.
Turning up at Uni with your parents is something I have only really seen on American films tbh. Maybe people are infuenced by that?

We even get final year student's mothers phoning about failed coursework

Mind you, I quite like some of their mothers :)

laptopdancer, it sounds as if you are not well supported by your university if you feel there is no middle ground between organising everything for your students yourself or just wishing they didn't knock on your door

I have not had any specific training for a pastoral role, but I know exactly who does what, because the university paperwork is in good order. So when a student comes to me with depression/dyslexia concerns/money worries/mental health problems, I can listen to him or her and then liaise with the right people: that won't make the student feel let down and doesn't require any special skills on my part beyond the ability to find a telephone number on the university webpage.

I think you are spot on cory.

cory - I would be interested to know how old you are? The pastoral care you offer sounds great - but I know my lecturers would not have seen this as their role. If you needed pastoral help you were expected to go to the su and they would help or refer on.

When my parents went to uni they didn't get their parents to take them because their parents didn't have to shell out anything. Nowadays parents have to pay out about 3 grand for accommodation. Now they want to see where their money is going. Its not because students can't navigate public transport ffs.

Parents don't have to shell out. Many better off parents choose to. Poorer students just get into debt.

Actually Leslie parents do have to shell
out,the living and accommodation loan is means tested and you don't have to earn very much at all to find that the amount your child can borrow won't even cover the basic rent for university accommodation in the first year,not to mention food and travel and books etc.

I went to an open day with ds last week mostly because it was a 5 hour drive from home and the cheapest way was to drive and it was impossible to get there and back in one day by train.

Also in my day if you got good grades you would get a place ,not so these days and ds has a difficult choice to make between two different Universities and wants a second opinion,given the consequences of this decision and that he will be paying for it for the rest of his working life I think that if fair enough.

Unlike me who went because it was the done thing and mostly wanted the social life he is very motivated and I am struggling to get him to think about employability etc because he wants the intellectual challenge etc not a good job.He and I have to say most of his friends are much more serious about it then we were,I hope his lecturers are more keen on students than mine were because quite frankly I hardly dared speak to mine .

Well parents do kind of have to. If you get 3000 a year loan that doesn't even cover accommodation, but a student can get 1000 overdraft max so how could a student live off 4000 a year? Poorer students have it made, they get bursaries. Students from middle income famailies have to rely on their parents.

No they don't have to shell out. That is why some students from poor backgrounds end up in a lot of debt - and that does not include just grants.

Well can you explain to me where my ds can borrow this money from ,as far as I can see unless your parents are very poor it is almost impossible to make ends meet without some help from family.Banks no longer provide bottomless student overdrafts and I don't really think credit cards are the answer

Me and DW used to see our course tutor for 2 hours each week when we were undergrads. We never had any contact with our course lecturers though and we never got slide packs or materials sent to use before the lecture. We got a reading list and went to the library to get the books/articles ourselves. This was 1983 - 1987 though.

Now DW is a lecturer and she would echo a lot of what has been said on the thread. Students who dont turn up to lectures but who moan if the materials are not on the internal intranet a week before the lecture. Constant emails.

I am going for an interview to return to lecturing next week. At least I know what I am letting myself in for. I think you have to manage the contact. Now everyone is on email it is too easy for students to fire one of and expect an answer.

When I last lectured all of a decade ago students still had to come and see me to talk to me and only at designated times. I think I will institute that system again if I get the job.

tbh I don't know where they get loans from. Just know relatives who don't get family financial support and are in masses of debt paying for degree - they also do paid work to support themselves as well.

mrswoodentop I'm afraid I will have to refer you to student finances for that one.

Well things ate changing 5 years ago it was possible to do that ,not so easy now the economic climate has changed.

More beta what a shame to be viewing the students as your enemy before you have even been interviewed for the job

Well done laptopdancer! You didn't know wasting your time on mumsnet was going to be part of your professional development did you?

Good answer laptop and I certainly hope I have brought ds up to be reasonably able to stand on his own feet and seek help where necessary from the appropriate sources,however he will demand a high standard of teaching and personally I think that's fair enough ,I don't think I learned very much at my very highly sought after University and I hope that's not the case for him,I do worry that his expectations are too high though