Student Evaluations Part 2

Today I'm examining the evaluations for my undergraduate course from last semester. The course is called Development of Sociological Thought, but it's basically the theory requirement for our sociology majors. The section was capped at 30. I pushed a few students with especially low grades to withdraw early. 25 students completed the course, of which 20 completed the evaluations.

I should note that I ask students to complete evaluations at the beginning of class, rather than at the end. When students complete evaluations at the end of class, the form becomes the only barrier to leaving the classroom, so they tend to complete them fairly quickly. By distributing evaluations at the end of class, the forms become a way of delaying my lecture, so they are happy to take their time and give lots of thoughtful feedback.

Here's the summary of the evaluations. The numbers in parentheses indicate the number of students who made the comment.

What worked well?

• Discussions (8)
  
• Feedback on papers (7)
• Readings (5)
• Explanations of the readings (5)
  
• Organization (4)
• Learning a variety of theories (4)
  
• Approachable professor (3)
• Knowledgeable professor (3)
• Breaking the paper in segments written across the semester and then revised (3)
• Powerpoints (2)
  
• Attention to writing style (2)
  
• Did not stray from the syllabus (1)
• Connections to real world issues (1)
• Having readings/journals end a couple weeks before the end of the semester so students could focus on papers. (1)
• Journals (1)
• Du Bois selections (1)
• Enthusiastic professor (1)
  

Major success stories:

• Upper range scores (U) on all course- and instructor-related questions. (There's one question about how "well prepared" the students were for class. The score on this question was in the middle range although it's a 4.3 out of 5.)
• Means of 5 out of 5 on two questions--"instructor clearly explained the objectives" and "instructor was well organized"
• Since this is a course I teach repeatedly, I note that these are the highest scores I've received for this class and that there's been a consistent improvement across semesters
• I also note that these high scores were received even as the average grade for the course was a B-. That's a higher average grade than I used to have for the course (it used to be a C). But I'm doing a better job of catching the potential failures early now and advising them to withdraw.
  
• Sensitive to diversity (16), ("but please add some ethnic Hawaiian analysis").
  
• "I really enjoyed this course. I took it my last semester but I still felt the course helped me to understand a lot of what was going on in my other classes. Dr. Kidd was very approachable and gave very helpful feedback. This class has really prepared me on so many levels. I especially liked that he went over the many grammar mistakes people make and reviewed a lot of what I feel I had forgotten from high school and grade school."
  

What didn't work?

• Nothing. Everything was fine. (5)
• Readings too difficult (3)
• Too much reading (2)
• Paper too structured (1)
• Professor gets impatient with questions asked at the end of class (1)
• Too much pressure to participate (1)
  

Suggestions:

• Papers should be due at midnight, not before class (1)
  
• No papers due just before Thanksgiving (1)
  
• Provide extra credit opportunities (1)
• Less grammar lessons (1)
• Relax the attendance policy (2)
• Fewer journal submissions (1)
• Instructor should be more relational with students and show he cares (1)
• More textual analysis, dissecting the readings (1)
• Discussion questions to guide the journals (1)
• Add a one-week break from journals in the middle of the semester (1)

Interpretation:

Lot of items were listed as useful components of the course, but I focus on those that are mentioned multiple times. Discussion, the feedback provided on papers, the readings themselves and the professor's explanation of the readings, the organization of the class and professor, and the variety of theoretical perspectives all topped the list. These are the elements that I'm going to preserve if I seek to make changes to the class. In contrast, with only 2 people mentioning the powerpoint slides, I might end up abandoning them as I grow less interested in using powerpoint myself.

The quantitative scores were very high. They demonstrate first that the general consensus about the course was overwhelmingly positive. This is important to note because the structure of the open-ended questions tends to make it seem as if the students are ambivalent about the course. If you ask what contributed to student learning, and what needed improvement, and if students answer both questions, then they will seem to be ambivalent about the course. But the numbers provide a better barometer.

The scores also fit into a longer narrative about my teaching at Temple over the years. I taught this course every semester that I've been here and scores have steadily improved, with these being my highest yet.

The question about diversity asks students to comment on the instructor's sensitivity to the diversity of the students in the class. Many students leave it blank. It is therefore meaningful to me that 16 out of 20 chose to actively write in a statement that I am sensitive to these issues.

I am please by the confirmation that the process that I use to teach writing is working.

The most common answer to what needed improvement was nothing. These are students that actively wrote this in, not students who left the item blank. Additionally, there were a few comments about the level and amount of reading. In my experience, every professor receives a few of those comments.

While I certainly note the various suggestions, there's only one that I'm inclined to implement. That is the request for a week's break from journals in the middle of the semester. The current organization of the course involves 2 weeks of introductory material, 10 weeks of theoretical material (a different paradigm per week), and 2 weeks about the writing process. I might move one of the weeks on writing into the middle of the semester, since students are writing stages of the paper throughout the semester.

I admit to being tickled by the request that I be more relational and show that I care. I've made a deliberate decision not to tangle with the emotional lives of my students. I feel that this is not my job. My job is to teach them sociology and I think the best thing I can do for students is teach them as much sociology as I can, as enthusiastically as possible. Their emotional lives are important, but they are not part of my job. It's the job of their mothers, friends, and counselors to worry about those issues. Although the student intended this as a suggestion, with a hint of criticism, the comment actually confirms to me that the teaching persona I've developed is apparent in the classroom.

Overall, I am very pleased with the evaluations!

Student Evaluations

Today, Temple released student evaluations from last semester. I taught two courses last semester--an upper-level undergraduate seminar on social theory and a graduate seminar on classical social theory. Reading evaluations can be tricky. The self-critical eye tends to be drawn towards particularly damning comments. The self-praising eye tends to be drawn towards comments that are especially kind. Either can lead to a distorted image of what actually happened in the classroom from the students' perspectives.

The multiple choice items provide a better sense of the mean, but even this quantitative data can be misleading. My school places one of three letters next to the scores, indicating whether the number is in the upper levels (U), middle levels (M), or lower level (L). The assignment is based on the percentages in "strongly agree" (U), "disagree," and "strongly disagree" (L). But a professor who receives "agree" from 100% of his students on any particular question will receive an M, even though that sounds like a better than average situation.

The school also provides comparative averages for the department, the college, the university, and the course level.

Before reading evaluations, you need to know what you want to learn from them. An instructor who has no plans to change his course probably shouldn't read evaluations, but might need to in order to make a case that he deserves tenure or a raise.

In my case, I'm looking for two broad purposes. First, I want the feedback for my own pedagogical reasons. I'd like to know what's working in the classroom and what I can do to improve. The evaluations are just one source of data on this. My own assessment of student work is the primary source of performance information. For instance, if students say they hate the course paper, but I can see that they are writing smart papers that will benefit them down the road, then I limit how much I pay attention to that feedback. That said, I do want to hear from them about what may not be working so that I can tinker with the course and make it better.

Second, I want to use the evaluations to build a narrative about my teaching. That narrative should highlight what I am doing well and it should also document that I work successfully to improve my teaching. Since I teach the same courses from year to year, it's nice to be able to say I learned a lesson in an earlier year than paid off with a new successful teaching method in a later year.

So, I try to highlight the following items:

1. What worked well. I want to keep these aspects of the course since students report that they work. Here, I am looking for the overall pattern, not the one-off comments.

2. Major success stories. This is more than just things that generally worked. These are the quotes that are exceedingly positive, or the good comments that are made repeatedly.

3. What didn't work. These are the aspects I want to consider adjusting for the future. That doesn't mean I need to scrap them altogether, it just means I want to pay attention to them. If a reading is widely criticized, I might replace it, or I might try to give a better introduction to it. As with item 1 above, I'm looking for the overall pattern.

4. Useful suggestions. These might come from just one student, but if it's a good idea, it's worth considering.

You might argue that if I'm looking for major success stories, I should also look for major failure stories (individual students who write mean angry comments). But, to state the obvious, I apply for raises and tenure, not for demotions. If someone wants to make a case against me, it's their job to find the failure stories.

As an example, I'll review one set of evals from last semester. This course only had 7 students in the end (an 8th student had withdrawn). This was my graduate seminar in classical social theory. The number in parentheses indicates how many students made the comment.

1. What worked well?

• Applying the readings in group assignments (3)
• Lectures on key concepts and backgrounds of the theorists (4)
• Journals (4)
• Selected Topic Paper (1)
• Capitalism Paper (2)
• Papers, in general (2)
  
• Emphasis on making arguments (3)
• Overall structure (2)
• Focus on student research areas (1)
• Feedback on writing (1)
• Grading style (1)
• Tocqueville (1)
• Gilman (1)
• Du Bois (1)
  

2. Major success stories:

• 6 students highlighted my sensitivity to diversity.
• "I really thought the course was valuable, but of course time consuming."
• Though most of my scores are in the middle range (M), all are 4.1 or higher on a 5 point scale.
  
• Two scores were in the upper range (U): 1) increased by ability to analyze and evaluate, and 2) learned a great deal in this course.
  

3. What didn't work?

• Reading journals due on the same day as papers (reading journals were due every week, papers were additionally due on some of those weeks) (3)
• Small group assignments (1)
• Tocqueville paper (1)
• Applying concepts in group assignments (2)
• The readings (1)
  

4. Suggestions

• Skip journals the week a paper is due (3)
  
• Add Du Bois's Souls of Black Folk, in addition to The Philadelphia Negro (1)
  
• Give biographical info the week before the reading (1)
• More applications (1)
• Option of less detailed journals (1)
• Don't remove Gilman reading (1)
• One less paper (1)
• Remove Tocqueville paper (1)

Interpretation

Lots of classroom components were listed as working well but the ones listed most often include journals, lectures, the emphasis on making arguments, and group discussions/applications. It's worth noting that the small group work was also mentioned twice as something that did not work well. However, in my experience group work is often disliked by some students, even as it proves invaluable to others. I'm inclined, then, to keep using it, even though feelings about it are divided.

Additionally, I note that journals are valuable but there were a few comments about the journals being due the same day as papers. The suggestion is to skip journals that day. But if journals are valuable, why would I drop them on a regular basis? That would mean those readings are read less closely and the students would not have useful summaries for those authors that they could use later. Instead, I'm inclined to shift the due dates of papers to later in the week. Since papers are submitted electronically, I can collect them anytime. This is something I will raise with my current graduate students in class this week.

The other items that didn't work well were only mentioned once. Components of the course that are only mentioned once under worked well or didn't work well I treat as neutral items. They work fine, but I could also replace them easily as I work to improve the class.

I could have ended the quote under 'success stories' before the part about the course being time consuming, but I find that my department and college like indications that my classes are demanding. Students who attempt to complain about the demands of my classes are unwittingly making a good case for me to the administration.

Graduate courses have been a challenge for me since I started at Temple. These are actually pretty good evaluations so I will use them to build a narrative of gradual improvement in my graduate teaching.

I will blog soon about my undergrad evals. Because of the high enrollment, that will take more analysis.

Q-Licious Details!

WHERE German Society of Philadelphia, 611 Spring Garden Street

WHEN Sat, Feb 13th from 8-11PM (the awards ceremony is from roughly 8:30-9:30)

ATTIRE Fancy, Fun, Frivolous...

TICKETS Advance tickets are $100 a pair and $65 for single tickets; all tickets at the door will be $65

The Torture Memos

Board Recruitment Resources in Philadelphia and Beyond

http://dustinkidd.blogspot.com

1. Business on Board: A function of the Arts and Business Council. Provides training to prospective board members and connects them with local arts organizations.

2. Philadelphia's Young Nonprofit Leaders: Provides training and resources for staff and volunteers, including board members, for local nonprofits. "Young" is broadly defined.

3. Blue Avocado: An online magazine about non-profit boards.

4. Board Cafe Archives: The predecessor to Blue Avocado. Has a nice section on recruitment and diversity. Here's a good one.

5. BoardnetUSA: A board recruitment and placement website. Like Monster.com for boards.

6. VolunteerMatch: Similar function to BoardNet.

7. Bridgestar: Connects corporate employees to nonprofit service.

8. Eide Bailley: Non-profit toolbox. Includes a nice short article about board service.

9. BoardSource: Recruitment and Orientation resources. More resources throughout the site.

10. Wharton Nonprofit Board Leadership Program: Connects MBA students to nonprofit service.

Chime in with additional ideas and resources!

Useful Websites for Writers

1. Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way. The link goes straight to the Basic Tools page, which includes a pdf sample chapter from Cameron's book. If you're not ready to buy the book, this is a nice place to start on the Artist's Way. Cameron offers a lot of her work for free, unlike most similar authors.

2. William Strunk's The Elements of Style. Full-text available on this website. Great way to get familiar with grammar and punctuation basics.

3. Guide to Grammar and Writing. Nice menus for refreshing your grammar skills.

4. Citation Machine. Easy way to generate your citations.

Fixing Your Finances for the New Year?

Some of my favorite personal finance tools:

1. Suze Orman's The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous and Broke: great book that is easy read but full of useful information. Read it with a notepad or journal handy. It also gives you access to a set of tools on Orman's website.

2. The Suze Orman show podcast. Free podcast of Orman's weekly show. A great way to learn more about money and making good financial decisions.

3. Mint.com. A website that can track all of your financial accounts. Other sites claim to do the same thing but I've found that only Mint can actually track all of them (some sites couldn't access by ING savings, others couldn't access my retirement accounts). It has tools for building a budget and tracking your expenses. Use the categories tool on the Transactions page to label and track your spending. Also be sure to download the iPhone app.

4. Get Rich Slowly. A great blog about saving money and making good financial decisions.

5. Wallet Garden. This is new to me, but it's a site where you can enter info about all of the cards in your wallet, in case it's ever stolen.

What's in Your Writer's Backpack

George Clooney's character in Up in the Air is a motivational speaker who begins his talks by setting a backpack on a table next to his podium, opening it, and then leaning in to the microphone to ask "What's in your backpack?"

The character wants his audience to feel the weight of all that ties them down. I'm going to use the same question in a writing workshop tomorrow for faculty and graduate students. But I'm using the question very differently. I want my participants to take stock of all of the writing resources they already have, many of which they take for granted.

The workshop actually brings together two different writing retreats: one for graduate students writing dissertations and one for faculty working on books or articles. Having been in both camps, I'll start with iconic stories from each experience:

The horror of the blank page: When I was a graduate student, I followed my dissertation proposal defense with a heavy summer teaching load. When the summer ended, I moved into a new office (thanks to a writing fellowship), set up my computer, and then stared in horror at the blank page of a new Word document. What do I do now? Eventually, I turned the computer back off and started reading. I had to read my way into the writing process. I took notes on my readings (initially from secondary sources, later from primary sources) and then used these notes to develop my own thoughts and arguments on the topic. The blank page needs to be quickly replaced by a map. The map will initially be quite simple: no dissertation --> dissertation. But will quickly be filled in by the mountains, valleys, rivers, and speedbumps of the research and writing process.

The invisible chapter: I spent a semester writing the theory chapter of my book. The initial version was 70 pages. That was obviously way too long, so I revised it down to 40 pages. Then I filed it away and moved on to other chapters. Later, I shared it with my mentor, who said it was too dense and inaccessible. I spent another semester revising it down to 25 pages. Then she suggested I remove it altogether, and disperse the theoretical discussions into the various chapters. By that time I had drafts of all chapters, and I was working with an editor, even though I still hadn't signed a contract. The editor concurred with my mentor, so I spent a few more months re-writing the other chapters in a way that allowed me to dispense with a separate theory chapter. My book came out last month and it has no theory chapter. I still have all of those drafts and I can see now that I needed to write them even though the chapter didn't need to be in the book. That invisible chapter guides all of the language and organization of the six visible chapters.

So what's in my backpack?

1. Human Resources: People--friends and mentors--who can read your work and give you feedback. Courses where you can test-run some of your work as lectures or assigned readings. Conferences, research centers, and lecture opportunities where you can experiment with your writing and find a sample audience. Research assistants, when you have them, all bring their own strengths and weaknesses to the process and these should be carefully assessed. And of course, the campus writing center.
   
   Example: Write for Your Mom. A good way to make sure that your writing is accessible is to write for your mom. I'm assuming your mom is alive and that she is a smart person who is not in your field and who may not even care about your field. If that's not true of your mom, pick someone else: dad, boyfriend, girlfriend, etc. When I was writing my dissertation, one of my readers told me to write it for Joan Snapp, the graduate secretary in my department. "If it doesn't matter to Joan Snapp," she said, "you're wasting your time." Joan Snapp and my mom are both people that I can imagine in my head as I revise my work, unlike editors, reviewers, or 'readers'. I can hear them stop me when I have a sentence that is jargon-ey, or too abstract, or awkwardly constructed. Joan Snapp and my mom would both make me say what I need to say in a way that is clear and straight-forward. Both would get swiftly impatient with rambling or tedious writing.
   
   
2. Language Games and Grammar Tools: We all have our favorite phrases and syntactical constructions. I can use a dash to sneak attack a word or phrase that would otherwise never fit into my sentence. I have a list of active verbs that make abstract discussions more compelling: argue, lament, explain, decry. Stephen King calls this set of resources the Writer's Toolbox. He offers a nice discussion of it in his book On Writing.
   
   Example: I Argue That.... You need to be able to state your argument in one sentence and that sentence needs to be in your head all the time. You should get used to state that one sentence argument in a variety of ways. The off-page version of the one-sentence argument is the elevator speech--stating your argument in one minute.
   
   Intervention: Take one minute right now and tell someone your argument.
   
   (30 seconds): Tik Tok Tik Tok
   (60 seconds): Times up, the elevator has reached the top floor, you're out of time.
   
   
   
   
3. Material Resources: A good word processor on a trusted laptop. A good notepad in a leather portfolio. A good pen. A set of index cards.
   
   Example: Beerspiration. When I was writing my dissertation, I hit a point where my computer became an impediment to the writing process. I just couldn't be creative in front of a computer screen. So I implemented the following method. Every afternoon, I would read through the key sources (primary and secondary) for whatever section I was working on, and I would take notes on index cards--one idea per card, with a relevant citation if needed. After dinner, I would take a stack of index cards and legal notepad to a bar down the street where I would order the cards into a narrative and then transform them into sentences, with development, on the notepad. And yes, I drank beer while writing. The next morning, after breakfast, I would turn on my computer and type up the text I had hand-written the night before. As I typed, I would also revise to improve the clarity and organization of the writing. You've heard of inspiration and perspiration; I call this method beerspiration.
   
   
   
   
4. Inspirational Resources: Find a voice from your field and keep it nearby. I like Du Bois as a model of a voice that is unquestionably authoritative but also widely accessible to all. I also keep handy a variety of writings on writing: Zerubavel's The Clockwork Muse, King's On Writing, Lamott's Bird by Bird, Cameron's The Artist's Way.
   
   Example: Shitty First Draft. Anne Lamott's book Bird By Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life encourages writers to begin with a shitty first draft. We have a tendency to not want to write until we can write it beautifully and perfectly. That generally means we don't write at all. Make it your goal to write a terrible and shitty first draft. This will give you to the freedom to write badly, misspell everything, ignore transitions, and even dangle your modifiers. Shitty first drafts are open for feedback and easily revised. A blank page can never receive feedback or be revised. When you write a shitty first draft, you can even forget your mom all you want and write for yourself.
   
   
5. Practical Resources: The appropriate style guide (Chicago, Harvard, MLA, etc.), the rules for the product (from your department for dissertations, from your journal for articles, from your publisher for books), the important literature (books and articles) from the field. Keep a model handy: a dissertation written by a student in your department, preferably with your adviser; a book from your field written in style you wish to emulate; an article with similar goals to yours, that is well-organized and well-written. I also recommend The Elements of Style by William Strunk, A Guide to Writing Sociology Papers by the Sociology Writing Group (or something similar from your field), and the Chicago Guide to Writing About Numbers by Jane Miller.
   
   Example: Write someone else's dissertation/article/book. Find a possible model for your book. Use the chapter and section titles to outline to the work. Now rename those titles to make it an outline of your work. Congratulations, you just made a roadmap for your writing! As the you continue on the path, or perhaps at journey's end, make sure you're not actually stealing from the model. But then, in a footnote or foreword, acknowledge the source as a model and inspiration for your work.
   
   
6. Emotional Resources: Trusted friends to complain to or celebrate with (whine or wine). Note: colleagues, department chairs, and dissertation advisers should be trusted human resources for your project, but NOT emotional resources. Pets are also good emotional resources. Family and close friends keep you grounded and remind you that there is a whole world that will keep going if you happen to mess up a sentence or two (or more)!
   
   Example: Name the worst or hardest thing about writing for you. Remind yourself that this is the hardest thing so when you get to that point you know that the worst is right in front of you and after that it gets better. For me, the hardest thing is opening the document. I'll spend hours doing anything to avoid a few simple clicks in word that open up that document. Once it's open, I'm usually fine.
   
   Intervention: Name the worst or hardest thing for you. Write it down.
   

This is a brief overview of what's in my writer's backpack. What's in yours?

What to Buy (and not buy) Organic

Nice posts on Andrew Weil's website with 12 foods to always buy organic and 12 foods that don't need to be organic (because of low pesticide use or low pesticide retention).

12 Foods to Buy Organic

• Peaches
• Apples
• Sweet bell peppers
• Celery
• Nectarines
• Strawberries
• Cherries
• Lettuce
• Grapes (imported)
• Pears
• Spinach
• Potatoes

In Philly, I suggest the Fair Trade Stand at Reading Terminal, or the farmer's markets around town, especially at Rittenhouse. Many of these foods will not be available from those places when out of season. At that point, I turn first to Trader Joe's (best prices) and then Whole Foods (worst prices).

12 Foods you Don't Need to Buy Organic

• Broccoli
• Eggplant
• Cabbage
• Banana
• Kiwi
• Asparagus
• Sweet peas (frozen)
• Mango
• Pineapple
• Sweet corn (frozen)
• Avocado
• Onion

For fresh non-organic food, I go Iovine at Reading Terminal (the big produce place in the SE corner). They also carry some organic food too (but it's usually not local). Otherwise, I go to Whole Foods. Trader Joe's fresh produce is pretty but generally tasteless. Their frozen produce, however, is great and cheap.

2010 Goals

Career Goals

• Publish two articles (goal is to have them at least accepted and forthcoming by year's end)
• Draft the proposal for my next book on popular culture
  
• Develop a longterm plan for research on art awards
• Get tenure (submit an excellent file; have positive results at the department level by year's end)
• Continue current service committees, but no new service (I do too much)
• File the first report on the Wolgin International Art Prize
• Draft several of my lectures as text that can be used towards publications and for improving the courses

Financial Goals

• Have $25K in savings for a condo by year's end
• Submit a strong merit raise application at year's end (current application pending)
• Move current savings into a CD

Health and Fitness Goals

• Yoga 2X/week
• Pilates 2X/week
• Strength Training 3X/week
• Abs 2X/week
• Continue cycling to work
• Get a physical

Home

• New entertainment system
• Switch from Comcast to Clear
• Switch from home delivery to NYTimes Reader
• No new books (use library instead)
• Become a real estate expert (2009 was my year to become a personal finance expert and that worked out well)
  

Personal

• Increase the board size at Spiral Q
• Invest in nicer dress pants
• No new shoes, dress shirts, jeans, coats, sweaters, or hoodies (I have plenty)
• Take a vacation (trip to Mexico is booked for March!)

I wasn't planning to make a list, but then I found my list from last year. I achieved most of the goals on that list! So I figure writing these down is a good way to make them happen.

Financial Planning Fail

Earlier this week I had an initial consultation with a financial planner from ING Financial Partners. I wasn't in the market for a planner, but it was something I had considered. This planner found me at my gym. He had a promotional table set up and was offering to give a dollar to charity for every person who signed up to get more information. I signed up and he called me a few days later and persuaded me to come in for a free consultation.

The first warning sign was at the end of the phone call when he asked me to respect his time by canceling if I wasn't going to come in. He seemed to already be assuming I wouldn't show up. The second warning sign was when he sent me a confirmation email addressed to 'Susan'.

The appointment, at the ING offices on JFK, lasted an hour. It was a lot of marketing talk. He quickly assessed that my financial goals are to buy a condo in the near future and retire well. Pretty simple.

His marketing approach was focused on demonstrating how little I know and how much I need his expertise. At least twice, he used this line: "You're a sociologist, right. So I would come to you to find out about sociology because you're the expert. People come to me to find out about financial planning, because I'm the expert."

But he didn't convince me of his expertise. When he learned that all of my retirement money is in my 403B, he gave me a little speech about diversifying my tax burdens by putting more money in brokerage accounts and Roth IRAs. That's a good generic strategy but it doesn't make sense for me because I can achieve my retirement goals simply by investing up to my employer's match in my 403B. I can't lower the amount that I put there, because I'd lose the match. So his diversification plan would require that I invest much more than I do now. That would make me a super-rich retiree who spent his 30s, 40s, 50s and 60s totally broke. No thanks.

He laughed when I mentioned Suze Orman. Not a good move.

When I told him that I treat my contributions to a Roth IRA from a few years ago as an emergency fund that I can tap into for a downpayment on a house, he grew concerned. He explained that I would be penalized for withdrawing that money before I'm 59 and a half. I explained that with Roth IRAs you can withdraw the contributions (but not the returns) at no penalty and he insisted I was wrong. I let it go for the time being.

At the end of the session, he asked me to make another appointment where we would begin to lay out a financial plan. This would cost me $500 and would provide me with a written plan and access to his advice for a year. I refused to schedule the appointment on the spot and told him I wanted to see a sample plan and get something in writing about what was being offered. After asking me why I was hesitating, he agreed to send me those items later in the day.

At the end of the day, I didn't hear from him. I sent him an email with links to support my claim that contributions to a Roth IRA can be withdrawn at no penalty. I asked him to explain the discrepancy between what I was reading online and what he was telling me, and I said that his explanation would help me decide whether he was the right planner for me.

4 days later, I still haven't heard from him.

If I did hear from him now, there's no way he could persuade me to work with him. His real failure was not his mistake about the Roth IRA, or even the little blunders in communication. His failure was investing his marketing speech in his own expertise. I don't want a financial planner who knows everything--I don't believe anybody knows everything about anything. I want a financial planner who treats me like the expert, because nobody knows my money or my goals as well as I do. My ideal financial planner would be a resource, not an expert, who provides useful tools that help me become an even better expert than I am now.

Grading Rubrics

Life is a combination of emotional problems and math problems. The same is true of grading. But, as much as possible, I like to insist that emotional problems are not my problem. I make grades a very straightforward math equation by using grading rubrics.

A grading rubric is system of accounting for every point that can be earned in the class. At the end of the semester, a final grade is submitted in letter form, but the letter is generally equal to a numerical percentage. So all (or nearly all) classes can be constructed around a 100 point system.

The first step in the rubric is also often the last step for many instructors. That's the step you take on the syllabus of proportioning various assignments into the 100 percentage points. Here's a hypothetical example:

Attendance: 10%
Participation: 10%
Midterm: 25%
Final: 25%
Journals: 15%
Paper: 15%

Usually we use numbers divisible by 5 or 10 to keep it simple.

A grading rubric forces you to then account for each point within those larger percentages. This is easier for some assignments than others. For midterms and finals, for instance, the points are usually accounted for by specific questions. A midterm worth 25% of the final grade might consist of 25 multiple choice questions. Done. All points accounted for.

I should note here that most people grade individual assignments out of 100. I stopped doing that a few years ago. It never felt like a meaningful grade. I had a clear sense of the difference between an 80 and a 90, but I wasn't so clear on the difference between a 20, a 30, a 40 or a 50 as variations of failing. Then once you have a grade out of 100, you twist it around again by multiplying by the percent that it's worth. I give grades that are equivalent to actual points earned in a class. If a midterm is worth 25%, then a perfect score is a 25, not a 100.

Going back to the hypothetical midterm, let's say instead of 25 multiple choice questions, there were 20, plus a 5 point essay question. In that case, a complete rubric would force you to account for all 5 points. So you might say that 1 point is for accurate discussion of the text, 1 point is for a clear argument, 2 points are for thorough evidence (only 1 point given for mediocre evidence) and 1 point given for referencing statistical data. That, combined with allotting 1 point to each multiple choice question, gives you a full rubric for the test. You could go even further and decide how many test questions will be on each of the subjects that are covered by the test. That will help you ensure proportional coverage of the various topics.

Papers are much more difficult to create rubrics for. It forces you to articulate everything you expect to see in the paper. Here's a sample from one of my classes for a paper that is worth 25% of the final grade:

Expectation Weight

· Clearly stated argument that is creative and original 4

· Thorough content analyses 4

· The paper is well-written and the meaning of the sentences is clear 3

· Argument is explicitly linked to an important sociological issue 2

· The literature on the topic is sufficiently reviewed 2

· The paper demonstrates a thorough knowledge of all material that is cited 2

· Paper has been carefully proofed for any errors 2

· Paper conforms to the ASA style guide 2

· Findings demonstrate a good comparison 2

· Paper tells the reader how to respond 2

(25 pts total)

This is the rubric I place in the syllabus. For my own purposes, I also have a more detailed rubric that accounts for each point within the items. I share that with students as they are preparing the final draft of the paper. For most of the items, I allot one point for modest performance and two points for excellent performance.

Using rubrics makes some of my numbers a little messier than the typical class. The paper above is from a course where the overall breakdown looks like this:

Journal: 35% (7 submissions X 5% each)

Attendance: 14% (28 classes X .5% each)

Participation: 11%

Content Analysis: 40% (consisting of the elements listed below)

• Content Analysis 1: 3%
• Content Analysis 2: 3%
• Discussion: 3%
• Conclusion and References: 3%
• Introduction: 3%
• Completed Final Paper: 25%

Participation is easy to adjust in order to accommodate odd numbers on the other assignments. Attendance, when fully quantified, tends to produce a weird number--like the 14 above. 15 would have been prettier on paper, but I wouldn't have been able to explain that last point, so I found a way to incorporate it into participation instead. For each of the items, a detailed rubric is also presented on the syllabus. Examples...

Grading rubric for participation

Expectation Weight (out of 11)

Consistently participates 4

Good participation in group work 2

Clearly familiar with the readings 2

Punctual 2

Not disruptive or dominating 1

(11 pts total)

Grading rubric for journals (5 pts each)

All readings are summarized (half point each) 2 points

Summaries are sufficiently detailed 1 point

An application is presented that is specific and detailed 1 point

Application is creative 1 point

(35 pts total)

Grading rubric for the staged assignments:

3 points for each of the five writing assignments during the semester

o You will earn the full 3 points if it is submitted and shows clear effort (need not be perfect—but should be proofread)

o You will earn 2 points if it shows clear effort but has not been proofread

o You will earn 1 point if it is submitted but shows no clear effort

o You will earn 0 points if it is not submitted

o No late papers accepted and I will not provide feedback on papers that were never submitted

Pros and Cons

Using rubrics removes a lot of professor subjectivity. I think it is common for professors to read a paper and say "this just feels like a B," even if they have trouble explaining why. The rubric system might force a professor to give an A to a paper that feels like a B. But that's an important learning moment for a professor. If it feels like a B, but it's an A according to the rubric, then there's an expectation that hasn't yet been articulated. Once that's realized, you should work on naming the expectation. Words like creativity and originality are helpful here. Creativity and originality often make the difference between an A and a B. So you can include them in the rubric. If an assignment is worth 10 points, award the last point or two for creativity. But that means you should also have a discussion in class about what creativity looks like. That doesn't mean you have to give a formula for being creative--I know of no such formula--but you do need to talk about the process of being creative.

The Curve

I find that grading rubrics flip the usual curve on its head. Because the expectations for the course, and for each assignment, are clearly named, students who are interested in meeting those expectations often do very well, while students who are not interested do very poorly. Last semester, I gave just as many A's as I gave C-'s (several of each). I gave very few C+'s and even fewer B's. Because the math is so straightforward, it was easy to identify folks early on who were headed towards D's and F's. So I pushed those students to withdraw from the course by the withdrawal deadline. For students with low grades, grading rubrics made it very easy to explain why their grades were so low and I never had a student complain about unfair grading. More importantly, the rubrics allowed good students to excel because the expectations were very clear.

Here's a nice example of a detailed rubric online.

The Case Against Comcast

http://dustinkidd.blogspot.com

I'm having a battle with Comcast at the moment. Over the summer, I had Comcast internet installed in my new apartment, at a promotional rate (for the first year). They began billing me at full price, and then some. I have automatic payments set up, so the money was just disappearing from my account. I called to complain, they said it would be fixed and credited to my account. I got the same bill again, and the same deduction from my checking account. I called to complain again and they said there was a delay in fixing the problem, but now it's all fixed. So by August I had a huge credit on my account and my monthly internet bills were getting deducted from the credit.

On October 30th, Comcast sent me an email saying that I still owe nothing for my service because of the credit. That very day, my service stopped working. I called to complain. They arranged a service call for two days later, and didn't indicate that there would be a charge. The technician comes and fixes my service, claiming that the signal was too STRONG for the modem--which is a Comcast modem. He installs some little part on the cable to lower the signal. He asks me to sign the work order, which does not indicate a charge, and he asks me to sign an additional receipt for the little part that he installed. He wrote "no charge" on this receipt. On November 15th, Comcast adds a $31 charge to my account, which pushes me over my remaining credit, and they immediately withdraw the additional money from my checking account without sending me any notice whatsoever. I called to complain, they explain about the service call, I explain that no charge was ever mentioned and I describe the work order and receipt that I signed, which I have copies of. They agree to remove the service charge as a courtesy but insist that they have to charge me for the part--about $1.50. I again explain that the receipt says "no charge." Carolyn, my customer service rep says that she can't see the receipt so she has no way of knowing if I'm being honest. In my frustration, I gave up on Carolyn, hung up, and sent Comcast an email explaining everything and insisting that if they don't remove the charge, I will subtract it the next time I get a bill (at the moment, I'm back to having credits). They email back and say they will look into it.

So anyways, Comcast blows. Here's more evidence...

Comcast Sucks Balls

Comcast Sucks

MSN Money: Customer Service Hall of Shame

Comcastwatch

Eye on Anapolis

Amplicate

How Not to Reward Loyalty

Comcast technician sleeping on the couch

5 Favorite Teaching Tools

1) What questions do you have?

The typical way of gauging whether your students are still with you, and prepared to move forward, is to ask "Any questions?" That's a yes or no question and in many cases students will simply answer 'no' to themselves and otherwise sit there silently. Instead, try "What questions do you have?" It presumes that students do have questions and puts the impetus on the students to identify the questions they actually have.

2) Silence

The goal of the classroom experience is to engage students intellectually. If you're giving students something to think about, they're going to need time to think about it, too. Silence feels very awkward to the person standing up front but it's often barely noticed by the audience, especially if the silence is preceded by something worth thinking about. So after you make a point, take a long pause. If you ask students what questions they have, take a long pause to let them identify their questions. Push yourself to take more and longer pauses. Drink some water, walk across the room, check your notes, whatever it takes to introduce some silence into the room to let students think.

3) "What do you want to comment on, critique, or ask a question about?"

Once each week, I take a seat amongst the students and I ask this question. I then pick a point in the room to begin. I might say, "We're starting with Christy and then moving to her left." Students are allowed to respond to each other's comments, but they are not required to do so. This accomplishes several things. First, it reduces my voice in the classroom and actually takes some pressure off of me to have a detailed lesson plan for that day. Second, it amplifies student voices and reveals to me what it is that they are getting from the readings--as opposed to just confirming whether they are getting the things that I want to focus on. Third, it teaches me new things about the readings and about student experiences because they often pick up on something that I would overlook. In a class of 30 students, I rarely get through more than 10 in 50 minutes. Usually the first few comments go without much reply, but then students relax and a conversation develops. Here's the thing: as the teacher, you have to let go of the belief that you have to respond to every student comment. It's fine to simply say "thank you, next" or to sit silently and see what happens.

4. "Go!"

If you give students something to do in class, it is surprisingly helpful to also tell them to start. For instance, if I ask students to find a partner and discuss some basic questions about the text, they tend to sit there looking confused for a bit. If I say "Go!" with an authoritative voice, they start moving.

5. The Elements of Style

Teaching students how to write is a complex process, but it is worth investing in that process if writing is important to how students learn in your class. When it comes to basic mechanics, the Elements of Style is invaluable. It's a cheap little book, also available on the web, the concisely identifies the major grammar and syntax rules that often trip us up.

The new role models of television

dustinkidd.blogspot.com (videos will not appear in facebook, so click on the blog for the full post)

Like my reason posts on popular culture, this is focused on Glee.  In last week's episode, Kurt came out to his dad, after joining the football team and scoring the winning field goal.  It's striking that the usual story of a painful coming out followed by endless abuse and mocking is here replaced with coming out as an inner torment that is greeted with support by surrounding characters.  In other words, the focus is less on presenting gay characters who can serve as role models to gay youth, and more on presenting positive straight characters who can offer a welcoming environment to the kid coming out.  These characters present new role models for straight people.

In the first clip below (advance to the .55 second mark), Kurt pulls Finn aside to ask a question. Finn, not realizing that Kurt is asking for help with football, intercedes and says: "Thanks, but I already have a date to the prom. But I'm flattered, I know how important dances are to teen gays." Although Finn makes the wrong assumption about Kurt's request, he nevertheless declares his support for Kurt's sexuality.  There's no sign of homophobia in the response. Finn then, in the next scene, helps Kurt in joining the football team, despite concerns from his teammates--concerns that seem to derive from perceptions of Kurt's sexuality. 

Later in the episode (clip unavailable), Kurt comes out to his dad.  His father responds that he's always known his son was gay and that it doesn't make him love Kurt any less.  This is a father who embodies working class masculinity and manages to present a gay-positive role model without undermining that masculinity. 

A similar image was seen in the premier of Modern Family.  When the gay couple on the show introduces their newly adopted daughter to their extended family, the father--who had previously shown discomfort with the gay relationship and with the idea of a gay couple raising a child--declares his full support for the growing family (second clip below).

These images of male heterosexuality are a new and positive development for televised representation.  

Full episode of Glee: