Obviously there is individual variation among students. There is probably also variation in e-mails received -- both number and content -- among faculty, within and between departments. I suspect that there's also variation by campus. My impression is that few professors where I am feel overburdened by e-mails from students. The campus discussion listserv only a week or two ago had a thread on e-mail from students, and as I recall, the only issue raised was the degree of informality (e-mail written in IM or text-message shorthand); no complaints about content or volume.
It's a topic crying out for data. What are the variables at work at any of these levels (teacher, department, campus)? The most jaw-dropping detail in the NY Times article IMHO was the teacher complaining that a student had sent a draft of a paper and asked for suggestions on ways to improve it before submitting the final draft. I assume that the readers of TeachSoc will have many suggestions on how to get students to stop trying to get help in order to write better essays. As for the choice of e-mail addresses mentioned in the Crooked Timber link, yes it is unsettling, at least at first, to address e-mail to a female student as "ballzdeep@" But Internet IDs are another potential source of data. I recall reading a report on passwords -- a techie had culled all the passwords on some institution's system. It was not a scientific study, and the only "finding" I remember is that guys tended to have passwords like "superstud." But it would be interesting to look for other patterns. Jay Livingston Montclair State University --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Teaching Sociology" group. To post to this group, send email to teachsoc@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/teachsoc -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
