A simple one, that I’m sure all the faculty in the audience will recognize. What is the proper approach to meeting with a professor outside of class:
Even if we’re talking about a quantum physics class, faculty are classical entities for all practical purposes, so you can only choose one answer.
I picked the first one, but I think it’s slightly more complicated than that. For various reasons, you might not want to meet during the office hours. In fact, if the professor has regularly-scheduled office hours, but I emailed to ask about meeting times, I might be looking for a time where there would be fewer interruptions. Maybe I want to apologize for how my struggles with alcohol are bringing down my in-class performance. Maybe I want to tell the professor that I’m carrying his child. Whatever the reason, I don’t want that hand-raising smartass who sits in the front of the class to be hanging outside the professor’s door while I’m trying to talk.
My answer in this situation would probably be, “Specifically ask to meet at Z:00.” If I wanted to talk during the office hours, I’d just go to office hours.
(The answer would be different, of course, if the original email just asked for the times of the professor’s office hours.)
K
I always just showed up a office hours without an appointment. It never occured to me to send a warning email.
In my experience, faculty will sometimes wander away during office hours for no apparent reason. Option 1 with the warning email is probably better.
Etiquette question involving undergrads? Sadly, I’m surprised when undergrads are thoughtful and/or motivated (at least underclassmen).
But see, I’m answering the way I would want people to provide information to me. If it was a student, the answer would more likely be “Skip the meeting entirely, then complain that the professor was not available for help outside of class when filling out comments at the end of the term”
I also picked the first option, but I’d probably actually send an email with “I’ll see you at Z:00, thanks”. If I don’t say “I’ll be there at Z:00” the professor might assume I’m not coming and go do something more interesting just before Z:00.
I meant “particularly underclassmen” (not ‘at least’) and you can add “and/or in 100 level courses”. I’m sometimes surprised by some thoughtful/motivated upperclassmen in higher level degree related classes and equally surprised by some thoughtless/unmotivated students in those classes.
Natalie, exactly. Based on what I hear from professors and TA I know, how I answered is what I would do it but unfortunately it’s not what most students would do.
I went with the first one, but I think it’s fine to drop by unannounced during offices hours, that’s what they are for.
Are office hours a product of a time when it was harder for students an professors to get in touch with each other? In the days of one phone for a floor of studnets in a dorm and no email making individual appointments would have been more challenging, but that’s not the case anymore.
I went with “send another email asking about more convenient time”. If the office hours worked for me, you wouldn’t have gotten the first email from me- I’d just have shown up and checked in person if it’s a good time. For any given semester, a random Z:00 probably wouldn’t work for me, so that’s the most likely course. Of course, if Z:00 DID work for me, I’d send on an email telling you and then show up!
Only one answer really hurts this one, IMO, but it depends. If Z or X-Y are good for me, then:
Send email telling him which of those works better for you.
(Would anyone complain about this?)
-OR-
Skip the email, and go to office hours, because he’ll be there anyway.
(Despite what a couple of math professors seemed to think, if you say your office hours are in a certain time block, then confirm it in an e-mail, you REALLY shouldn’t complain about someone coming in.)
If Z or X-Y aren’t good for me, then I’d have no choice but to:
Send email asking about a third time block that’s more convenient for you.
(I was once told, by an English lecturer (not professor), that I’d have to change my schedule to fit theirs and that it was rude to inquire about times they hadn’t brought up. Needless to say, they got poor reviews. Setting up meetings has to be give-and-take and nobody’s time is actually ‘more important’.)
I’ve cut down on the number of office hours I post, for the very reason @katydid13 alluded to: many issues can be handled by email, and students can always set up a time with me outside of the scheduled office hours. To be honest, most student questions are handled right before or after class.
I don’t know what I would suggest. I was a professor before email, so cannot comment from experience. I always had posted office hours, and valued them as periods of time when I could usually work without interruption. However, if students came by, I gave them my full attention.
James, and others, the problem with just showing up to office hours without emailing is that, in the stated scenario, the prof has already offered to be there at a different time. If you just don’t reply, you’ve rudely left the prof hanging. Had the first email exchange not already occurred, I would certainly say that not emailing is fine.
My “classical” vote was for the first, reply with your choice, but …
Skipping the email and stopping by office hours or asking the question in class would be fine *if* they were well in advance of the proposed time Z.
Sending an email with a 3rd option would be perfectly fine if it were done politely and with the recognition that the prof has as much right to reject the third proposed time as you did to reject the first two.
Stopping by at the 3rd time would be fine *if* it was well in advance of the proposed time Z and *if* it was done politely and with the recognition that the prof may be busy has every right to send you away.
All the other options are inconsiderate to the prof.
Tell that to my late advisor who scheduled himself to teach two classes simultaneously.
On my campus, the administration is pushing faculty to have increasing numbers of office hours even though students routinely ignore them and either come at other times or don’t come at all. I think office hours have become mostly obsolete as my students can always contact me via regular email, messaging within the online class shell (that I have even for fully in-person classes), or the phone.
I don’t understand why I’m sending an email in the first place. The office hours are on the course syllabus, so just show up.
I recall a student newspaper debate about faculty office hours; it included a pair of commentaries by faculty members on the topic. One, by someone who taught writing, argued for expanding required office hours, as they provided more and better time to assist students in improving their work.
The second (by a physicist, IIRC) discussed the data collected on when students came by the office. There was little correlation with the published office hours, but a strong one with the campus bus schedule, supporting the hypothesis that visiting the faculty offices was largely at student convenience.