How to deal with bad lecturer?

WolfSong2000

Alright...basically I am doing a masters degree. With the exception of one person, the staff in my department are phenomenal and world class. There is one person who lets them down, however. This member of staff is openly rude and verbally aggressive towards other members of staff (witnessed by students) and to students, she's incredibly unprofessional, disorganised, never gives clear advice and drops hints that she doesn't want to be bothered with questions.

She's basically a bully, and I've already had run-ins with her on more than one occasion (face to face she will usually back down).

My current problem is I just got a paper back and the grade is essentially a fail. This shocked me as up until now my grades have been pretty decent - not top of the class, but definitely nowhere near a fail. I emailed the lecturer and asked if I could see her - did this and it was a disaster. To cut a very long and complicated story short, this paper was meant to be a field report (we'd done some fieldwork abroad recently), but she was very unclear with regards to what she wanted, initially saying we'd have carte blance to do as we pleased, then saying she didn't want it written in certain formats, blah, blah, blah. I emailed her a few times asking for clarification and aside from her saying she wanted it written as an essay, and that the question needed to be more focused, I got nothing.

I went ahead and took her comments into account, but essentially wrote a field report, not an academic essay and this was reflected in the number and type of references I used.

Now, the comments I initially got said that the content was no good - I challenged this when I saw her and she agreed, reluctantly that I was right, and then went on to insist that it was my referencing that was poor. I admitted that it wasn't laid out as well as it could have been, and pointed out that the essay was never going to get a good grade, but that I felt it was unfair to fail me for it. I also disliked the fact that she penalized me for the type of references I used - basically anything that wasn't an academic journal was considered ineligible, even though the articles I'd used were more relevant to what I had been writing about.

We sent a few emails back and forth and I tried to point this out to her, but she never once addressed any of my questions - just kept finding new ways to take a dig, with the latest one being that she would have helped if I'd seen her in person. Is email not acceptable any more? lol.

I've already made a number of complaints about her to my course co-ordinator and am thinking of escalating them. It's not even about the grade any more (I initially just went to see her to see how I could improve in future, but she can't seem to get her story straight about why it failed). It's just her attitude and unprofessionalism, and the fact that she seems to think she's being clear when myself and the vast majority of the class disagree.

But yeah - this is a part vent/part what the hell am I supposed to do.

southoftheriver

Can you approach student advisers at the students union? I did a masters 2 years ago and the organisation of the course was an absolute shambles from start to finish. I approached the students union and they were very supportive in being an advocate, arranging meetings with the course directors and getting the challencelor involved because 100% of the cohort complained once I had raised my concerns!

Hope you get this sorted I would never go back to that university again and it made life so stressful for a while.

GothicStirling

:rotfl:

This sounds exactly like my Renaissance/Early Modern Literature lecturer. He's a top Shakespeare scholar and seriously old school.

He gave everyone else in my class near fails, yet I got a 2:1. Nice guy, hard marker. He refused to communicate through email, and you could never find him during office hours.

catfish50

WolfSong2000 wrote: »

She's basically a bully, and I've already had run-ins with her on more than one occasion (face to face she will usually back down).

Maybe she feels as if you're the one who'd doing the bullying?

I also disliked the fact that she penalized me for the type of references I used - basically anything that wasn't an academic journal was considered ineligible, even though the articles I'd used were more relevant to what I had been writing about.

Perfectly reasonable to expect academic references, considering it's supposed to be postgraduate study.

We sent a few emails back and forth and I tried to point this out to her, but she never once addressed any of my questions - just kept finding new ways to take a dig, with the latest one being that she would have helped if I'd seen her in person. Is email not acceptable any more? lol.

Is face-to-face not acceptable any more "lol"?

You sound like a bit of a nightmare student to me. Don't you think it probably seems to her that you're the one who keeps finding new ways to take a dig?

The lecturer may dislike you, and it may show, but the sensible response would be to try to show her more respect and stop trying to bully her into giving you a better grade than she thinks you deserve.

I've already made a number of complaints about her to my course co-ordinator and am thinking of escalating them.

That will do your academic career loads of good.

But yeah - this is a part vent/part what the hell am I supposed to do.

Ask her nicely if you can have permission to rewrite and resubmit?

WolfSong2000

GothicStirling wrote: »

:rotfl:

This sounds exactly like my Renaissance/Early Modern Literature lecturer. He's a top Shakespeare scholar and seriously old school.

He gave everyone else in my class near fails, yet I got a 2:1. Nice guy, hard marker. He refused to communicate through email, and you could never find him during office hours.

I've had a few lecturers like this myself at undergrad - got on really well with all of them. God I miss them now. lol.

WolfSong2000

catfish - she is a bully. I've seen her first hand shout-down a student who said something she disagreed with. Even when he apolgoised (god knows why as he'd said nothing wrong) she kept laying into him.

As for the references, the point I was trying to make is a field report is not the same thing as an academic essay. They are not referenced in the same way and field reports don't make such heavy use of references, especially academic ones. She automatically discounted my non-academic journal references without even researching to see whether they were valid.

As for the face to face vs. email, she's implying that the help she would have offered would have been different if she'd met me in person than via email. I don't see why she couldn't have recommended materials via email. Instead she continually insinuated that I was being thick for not understanding what she was trying to say, which I didn't appreciate. I already pointed out to her that my grades prove that I am perfectly capable of writing academic essays, and if that's what she'd wanted she should have asked for that. Instead she asked for a field report and criticized me when I didn't write it as an academic essay - the two are totally separate.

As for the complaints and my academic career - I don't complain lightly. I *never* complained about a lecturer at undergraduate level, but she is just so consistently hopeless (this is only highlighted by the fact that all the other staff are world class) and it's really frustrating.

With regards to my grade - in the end, if I failed, I failed. The problem is she wont give me a straight answer as to why, which is not helping.

catfish50

If others in the class agree with you, why not join forces in trying to sort it out? That would show that it's not just a personality clash between the two of you, and might lead to some constructive improvements.

If no one else in the class wants to join with you, that might suggest that at least part of the problem is to do with you, and your response to her. You say you've already complained about her. If you complain again, and it's only you complaining, you may find that it has little effect except to make her dislike you even more.

WolfSong2000

catfish50 wrote: »

If others in the class agree with you, why not join forces in trying to sort it out? That would show that it's not just a personality clash between the two of you, and might lead to some constructive improvements.

If no one else in the class wants to join with you, that might suggest that at least part of the problem is to do with you, and your response to her. You say you've already complained about her. If you complain again, and it's only you complaining, you may find that it has little effect except to make her dislike you even more.

A lot of people agree with me, but are reluctant to speak up in case it affects their grades. They're probably also concerned about repercussions from her, as, as I've already said, she has shouted at students in the past.

I've just made an official complaint with the head of the department. He's emailed me back to say that he's glad I got in contact as, although he'd heard a lot of rumours, to date no one's made an official complaint, so he hasn't been able to do anything about it. Have also contacted my class to urge them to contact him anyonymously to voice their concerns.

This latest fiasco is a culmination of her atrocious behaviour, and it's not even the worst. The worst was our overseas fieldwork trip. I wont go into details, suffice to say her behaviour was shocking and appalling. I was embaressed for myself, my class and the univiversity and its reputation because of her behaviour. I have never, ever seen someone behave as unprofessionally as she did.

I'm sure she's a capable researcher, but she should *not* be teaching.

zuzieq

Hi Wolfsong,

Luckily I've never been in this situation! I think you've got the right idea by making a complaint with a course co-ordinator already. May I suggest you also look into this issue with a student representative. My Student Union has an elected graduate who acts as Education Officer and acts on the behalf of students if any academic issues arise. If you're lucky enough to have (a good) one, a very clear and well worded letter/email that puts down in writing your concerns and the points you are raising may be a good way to go. That way the facts are in writing - try to avoid any emotional language and stick to the facts as it may help in your issues being taken more seriously.
Is she a senior in the department? If you spoke to other lecturers would they be too scared to approach her? (You mentioned she's shouted down other members of staff).

Anyway best of luck, I really feel a formal complaint is the best way to show you're serious but make sure your facts are right, you're a hard working student and it doesn't sound like your motive is to get your mark changed. A girl in my seminar once tried to challenge a lecturer and the lecturer could just point out that her attendance record was at around 40% and her marks were consistently bad - suffice to say her case bombed!

leedsmodus

why dont you have sex with her then report her for breaaching her position of trust. she gets sacked you get a new lecturer

eklynne

I'd get off of moneysavingexpert, ask for an opportunity to write the paper again and get on with it. The only way for you to salvage any sort of 'one-upmanship' from this, and I do get the feeling there's a grudge match going on here, is to do it again properly. I get so angry when MA students hand in work that they 'know isn't going to get a good mark'. Every piece of work you do at that level should be handed in with confidence.
Also, you're doing a masters and you're using the term 'lol'? The mind boggles.
Good luck.