I completed my finally essay before the deadline but decided to wait until I got home after class to submit my assignment because my wifi connection on my laptop is not reliable. When I got home I took a nap which ended up taking longer than expected but that also meant I missed the 11:59PM deadline. I have submitted my essay but I would like to inform you that I had no intention of handing in my assignment late and was hoping you would be able to disregard the late submission. Attached I have included a screen shot image to show you that the last changes I had made which proves that the essay was complete well in advance from the deadline. I do apologize for any inconveniences this may cause but I would really appreciate it if you could understand.
Sincerely,
Justa Snowflake
[+]
Dear Colleagues,
I'm sorry that I can't come to work today, because I had a nap and overslept...could you cover for me so that there are no consequences?
Sincerely,
CB
Ugh. I had a similar one this semester, only he tried to turn in his paper about 15 hours late with accompanying sob story.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry I can't get excited about this. I don't care if something is a few hours late. I have enough trouble getting the students to engage the content, the actual material. I don't want to distract by making a scene about the deadline. I have penalties that go into effect, but I usually don't apply them on the first day late.
ReplyDeleteThis might have to do with the fact that it happened to me in college. It was a group project and the printer in the library really did fail and none of had one (this was back when hardly any students had computers of their own) and we ran all over like headless chickens. The paper was about an hour late and the prof just waved it through. What would have been the point of trashing our grades for an otherwise successful semester over this? Would the prof enjoy his job more for checking our "excuse"? What would we have learned in terms of "life lessons" - always buy two printers? Always be done a day early "just in case"? I can see a minor penalty, but I can't see not accepting the work in this case.
How late
Deleteis too late
for you then,
Der Slave?
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DeleteWhile I don't take a hard stance on this issue one way or the other, my spouse manages a large group of engineers, and the deadlines are definitely more flexible "in the real world" than you make them out to be. People are always missing and changing deadlines, turning in things not quite done, etc. There are sometimes consequences, but not that often.
DeleteI agree with this--not because I think it's okay that people miss deadlines, but because it's important to pick your battles. If I fought with students on every little issue like this, I wouldn't have any energy left to deal with the big things (plagiarism, cheating) or even the everyday quotidian things (grading, lesson-planning, etc.).
DeleteAt the end of the day, it's not a question of what's fair to the student. It's a question of what I can live with, or of not making any more work for myself by having to justify to some little flake why his hour-late assignment gets a zero.
I figure deadlines vary by industry, people and circumstances. The university can go ahead and simulate that. I know that in academia - which is part of the real world, of course - paper deadlines are often very, very mushy. Conference proposal deadlines are often rock solid, but edited volume articles or reviews can sometimes be submitted many _months_ late.
DeleteI think reasonable people can differ on this one. At my institutions, with part-time non-trads, many deployed abroad, and retention counting WAY more than grade inflation prevention on my boss's radar, and with the "mediacy" of online education and the difficulties of getting real engagement on the content, I would rather fight other battles. And it isn't a big problem. In a class of ten, I usually get eight papers submitted on time, one late, and one never, for a particular assignment. My last two batches came in ALL on time. Strangely, I have more trouble getting conference contributions submitted on time, even though I do impose penalties there because they need to be up for interaction (the students are graded for interaction and hence depend on each other).
@ SS - Printing out an assignment in the morning when it is due in the early afternoon is not "waiting until the last minute." It is completely normal.
My opinion on this relies entirely on the type of project. If this is a sernior thesis, a big deal, where an extra week or so might lead to a much better overall project AND a stronger learning experience, I'm super-flexible, because I think the overall goals are more important than our arbirtrary due date.
DeleteFor the daily things, the responses and term papers, I have a strict 20 points off if it's late policy. This is enough incentive for 95% to get it in on time, while 5% might have chaos or laziness reasons -- but it won't kill their grade. And ultimately, if it's 10 hours late, I wouldn't have even started grading yet so no skin off my back.
I grade down only 1/3 if it's in by the end of class, and 1 grade down after that. That's not "killing a student's grade." If their grade is already a D, it might go down to an F, but that's not my problem.
DeleteLate penalties are too part of the real world -- the penalty for being late is that nobody wants to deal with you or, sometimes, whatever it is you produced.
Omigod, I agree with StockStalker!!
I have a meeting this afternoon concerning a student who received an F on an assignment that was 12 days late. The course outline says after seven days the mark becomes an F. The complaint is it's not fair because he wasn't there the day it was due. I use Blackboard for submissions.
ReplyDeleteNext term Blackboard will be set to not accept any late work.
How hard would it be for a student to change the clock settings on his computer? Or to Photoshop the screenshot?
ReplyDeleteHA! I love to send my students e-mails at 2 in the morning. I like having them think I am a kook.
DeleteI've gotta go with AdjunctSlave on this one--especially if the student turned in a good essay. If it's a bad essay, then it won't pass regardless of a late penalty. If it's somewhere in the middle, well, the difference between a C and a C+ is no big deal.
ReplyDeleteMy response to cases like this is often based, at least in part, on the issue of credibility.
ReplyDeleteYes, in some sort of magical, fantasy land we would treat every student exactly the same, no matter what. The fact is, though, that I have my rules, but I also feel justified in bending them under certain circumstances.
Over the course of a semester, a student builds up a certain amount of credibility, based on his or her participation in the class, attendance, lateness, commitment to the work, ability to meet deadlines, etc., etc. That credibility is something I take into account when something like this happens.
If the student in question has turned up on time to every class, has done the required reading every week, has been a keen and interested participant in class discussions, and has turned all previous work in on time, then there's a good chance that I will overlook a single piece of late work altogether. If, however, the student has missed multiple classes, often arrives late, clearly never does the reading, and frequently turns in substandard and/or late work, it is much less likely that I will waive my deadline penalties.
While StockStalker claims that "a deadline is a deadline" in the "real world," I've worked in the "real world," and I know plenty of people who still work in the "real world," and missed deadlines are as much a part of other workplaces as they are in academia. And, just like in academia, the consequences for missed deadlines in the "real world" vary depending on the importance of the deadline itself, and also on the track record of the person concerned. A person who is usually very reliable and a strong worker will be unlikely, in many cases, to suffer much for a single missed deadline, while a person who screws up frequently will be fired fairly quickly.
We often forget this point, but you are absolutely right. And I waive my lateness penalties for those students who have earned it by coming to class every week prepared and full of ideas.
DeleteLate penalties or no late penalties aside, this excuse is hilariously ridiculous. Does anyone really INTEND to turn in things late, or do assignments poorly? Where is the shame in admitting that a *nap* was the cause of the missed deadline? Maybe forward the sleepy flake the recent post on the soldier-student "excuse" can put things in perspective.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. Everyone's all a-flutter on the lateness issue and is missing what I think is the real point: the nap as excuse.
DeleteI once had a student - a potential snowflake I called out a few times and managed to wrangle back to the herd - who openly admitted he skipped class to have a few drinks with his friends... because he was a senior and very tired from all his hard work in that, his last term in college.
After chuckling at his e-mail, I wrote a reply, reminding him of the absence policy he was being held to and noting that giving a lame excuse like he did was fine (because he didn't lie) but unwise (because he looked like a flake). He actually wrote back and apologized for acting like a boob. I laughed at that too because I really don't care WHY they miss... it's their problem to make up what the miss, not mine. Leave me out of it! ;)
But for some reason, every blessed cherub wants to e-mail me and get "excused" for their absences even though I have a VERY lenient attendance policy that takes into account dropping low quiz grades and such. But too many students are ot-nay oo-tay ight-bray and think sending along a lame e-mail will make me want to do more work and make alternative assignments for them. Um...no. You miss a quiz, it's a zero. You miss a paper deadline, it's a zero. You get too many zeroes, you've fucked your grade. There are many grades, most with little weight; you can still pass even with as many as 5 zeroes and moderate skill. Unless you're untalented, which means you need to not miss so much class then, doesn't it? Hell, back in my day, we could fail a class if we missed 3 meetings!!!!! Nowadays, they want an A even if they miss 3 weeks.
I don't ever waive penalties because the person involved seems to be a good student. Good students lie all the time. I've seen honors students plagiarize.
ReplyDeleteI will waive penalties if they have an acceptable excuse. But napping isn't one of them.
As much as I'd like to be a deadline Nazi, I have to ask myself: how many deadlines for submitting book reviews or even manuscripts have I missed? Answer: pretty much all of them. So there's an element of the Golden Rule here.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with the credibility issue though and with the issue of responsibility. Did that student talk to me in advance and ASK for help/forgiveness rather than just assume. That seems to me to be a real world skill.
I don't miss deadlines, save for once, by a week, and that was when the editor actually wrote me and told me I could have more time.
DeleteIf the paper was really completed, why didn't the student take a few minutes to submit it before going to sleep or, at the very least, use an alarm clock to wake up? I would have just sent it before to be more sure. In fact, while still on campus, I would have submitted a hard copy and/or an email, even if not normally permitted, to make sure the professor at least knows that I really had the paper on time, and then I would have decided whether to take a chance with the "unreliable" connection or wait until I get home. I remember how I went to submit a paper in person (there was no other method back then) even though I was very sleepy, so sleepy that I actually vomited before going to class. Since I was there and the actual sickness had passed, I remained in class even though, of course, I was still sleepy.
ReplyDelete