Choosing instructor over convenient classtimes

[Pegasus]

DD has an evening class this semester to take advantage of a top-notch instructor.  DD is a morning person and really prefers to cluster her classes as early as possible. However, she had her first evening class last night and came home excited and chattering about the instructor and the class.

 

Do your students give preference to class times or instructors?  DD was grumbling about having an evening class but seems to be realizing that it will be worth it. 

 

[regentrude]

DD has a tight schedule; with two majors and a heavy core requirement, it is  a scramble to fit her required courses in at all. So, if a class happens to have multiple sections, scheduling takes precedence.

For some courses, there is only one section, so you're forced into a time slot/instructor.

For others, several different courses fulfill the same requirement; she goes by the topic when she chooses, a great instructor is bonus.

[EKS]

Instructors.  A good instructor makes all the difference.

[shawthorne44]

Schedule.   The only time I ever chose by instructor, the university did a bait-and-switch on me because the good instructor had so many more people registered.  By then, I was locked in with the bad schedule and the now bad instructor.  

[MBM]

For liberal arts classes, my son has to take whatever he can fit in. However, because he is in a specialized economics program, he is guaranteed any of the economics classes and certain math classes over students who are not in the program. It has a lot of requirements, which is why they give the students precedence.

 

[katilac]

Our experience has been that the listed instructor often changes, particularly in required courses.

 

I would be reluctant to completely schedule around listed instructors, and I'd maybe be asking the instructor if their schedule is pretty firm or still up in the air. 

[FaithManor]

Every student's priorities and situation is different. Ds made a decision to make his schedule fit around the schedule of an instructor in his major under whom he is really blossoming. But he was able to do that because he found classes that he could take to meet gen ed requirements. These were not his first choice classes in terms of interests, but he was willing to make the trade off in order to continue with this particular instructor which is working very well for him. On the converse, he dropped a class being taught by a very poor instructor and is adjusting his spring semester schedule to take that class with someone else.

 

It all depends on the circumstances. OP, I am glad it is working out.

[G5052]

Instructors, if at all possible.

 

DD is at a small community college, so sometimes scheduling comes first. He had a professor last semester that I knew wouldn't be good, but we went with it. Originally there was an adjunct in another slot, but DD had a conflict with that, so we signed up with the department head that everyone rants about. But in the end she ended up teaching all of the sections of that class anyway. They bumped the adjunct in early August.

 

That said, he's taking English 112 first thing Friday mornings. Not a morning kid, prefers to relax on Fridays. But he had the same professor last semester and adored her. He said that having her made getting there first thing on Friday worthwhile. Unfortunately that's her only section of that class, so we went for it. I did notice that hers filled first among all of the other professors, so apparently she's popular with others too!

[klmama]

Instructors.  Dc had a terrific instructor last semester and is taking another class from him this semester, even though doing so meant having to schedule some other courses at less convenient times. 

[Mom22ns]

Instructor. Ds has taken one class each semester that has been very inconvenient for him, but were with an instructor he really wanted. It paid off last semester and hopefully will again this semester.

 

 

[The Girls' Mom]

I would put preference of instructor first if at all possible.  That said, sometimes it just isn't possible.  We ran into that for our DE this semester.  I really wanted dd to take a math class with my prof from last semester.  It just could not work out.  

Edited January 21, 2016 by The Girls' Mom

[Joules]

Instructor, definitely.  Ds is going to college to learn from smart people who are passionate about their field.  He's not paying money for someone to read powerpoints to him.  

 

He does know that once he gets to upper level classes, there is often only one choice of professor, but while he has an option he is taking advantage of it.

[G5052]

Instructor, definitely.  Ds is going to college to learn from smart people who are passionate about their field.  He's not paying money for someone to read powerpoints to him.  

 

Yes, the disadvantage of the route we've gone (community college) is that there are indeed some PowerPoint-reading professors. I guess that's true anywhere, but this particular community college has had pretty high turnover among the adjuncts of late, and I've heard some horror stories of unprepared adjuncts who had done very little teaching.

 

We avoid that by spending a lot of time picking either full-time professors or adjuncts who have been there quite awhile. Because it's a small school, and I also taught there for over a decade myself, this is doable. Last semester, both his art and accounting professors are very active professionally and have been teaching at that college for over a decade as adjuncts. They were demanding in a reasonable, organized way.

[sassenach]

Dd is taking a 7:30am class entirely for the professor.

[TechWife]

DS is only in his second semester of his freshman year, but he is already working through his major requirements as they have them on a schedule in order to be ready for portfolio reviews at designated points. He has already had classes that have had only one section, so he has to fit his gen. ed. courses in around those. Of the gen. ed. courses, he has to choose areas of interest to concentrate on, so that also narrows his choices as some of those courses have only one section.  This semester, three of his courses have only one section. A fourth one has two sections, but only one that isn't opposite the three that have only one section. The fifth one was the only one where had had any choice, and for that one, he chose a section that prevented him from having four classes on one day. Otherwise, he would not have time to eat. I really wouldn't call that convenience, I'd call that a necessity, though. So, the short answer is: He has to let the courses dictate his schedule, It is neither convenient class times or the instructor, it's simply when the courses he needs are offered.

 

ETA: I will say that this has worked to his advantage somewhat. He is not a morning person and his first class is at 11:00 AM. He also doesn't have any classes on Friday. His advisor told him his Friday courses would be rare because the profs don't like teaching on Fridays (I thought that was strange, but whatever). 

Edited January 25, 2016 by TechWife

[dhudson]

My ds had a horrible Comp Sci prof last semester (who was just fired as he was so bad) and that really affected his semester. He also had a fantastic Astronomy prof and between the two experiences, he decided he would rather be inconvenienced than take a class from a bad instructor. He did a lot more research on instructors this time around.

[JanetC]

ETA: I will say that this has worked to his advantage somewhat. He is not a morning person and his first class is at 11:00 AM. He also doesn't have any classes on Friday. His advisor told him his Friday courses would be rare because the profs don't like teaching on Fridays (I thought that was strange, but whatever).

Art classes at DDs CC are almost all either MW or TuTh. The students are often in the studios doing homework on Fridays, but there are no required class meetings.

[TechWife]

Art classes at DDs CC are almost all either MW or TuTh. The students are often in the studios doing homework on Fridays, but there are no required class meetings.

 

So maybe it's an art thing, then? It does make sense. He has Materials & Modeling this semester and there's no way he could do that homework in his room. He could work all weekend in the shop uninterrupted, though. 

[Matryoshka]

Art classes at DDs CC are almost all either MW or TuTh. The students are often in the studios doing homework on Fridays, but there are no required class meetings.

 

Our local CC just switched to almost all MW and TuTh classes.  The only classes I know that meet on Fridays are science labs (so lectures are MW and labs Friday).  I think there might also be some classes that just meet Friday (and are 3 hours long - yuk - the Sat. and evening classes are also often like that).

 

So, one dd has Fridays off this semester, the other is taking a MWF lab class, though.  So I'm back and forth to the CC 5 days a week(!)

Edited January 26, 2016 by Matryoshka

[Bluegoat]

DD has an evening class this semester to take advantage of a top-notch instructor.  DD is a morning person and really prefers to cluster her classes as early as possible. However, she had her first evening class last night and came home excited and chattering about the instructor and the class.

 

Do your students give preference to class times or instructors?  DD was grumbling about having an evening class but seems to be realizing that it will be worth it. 

 

I came to the conclusion, by the time I finished my degree, that the #1 determinine factor of whether a class would be worthwhile was the instructor.  A great one would give a great class, no matter how hum-drum or difficult the topic, and a bad one would ruin anything.