Sounds like a very tragic end of term. I have had to deal with deaths due to car accidents/texting, and am having increasing issues with social anxiety/stress responses in recent years. Many tipsters must be ending things up? and are busy with final exams. I have ended over a week ago(I am teaching half-time now to prep for retirement), attended graduation, starting yard/garden work, doing an online MOOC? class at MSU, and catching up with some fun reading. Other than dealing with weird Michigan spring (hail, snow and rain on Mothers day),I am enjoying a break from classes. Gary Peterson Psych at SVSU
----- Original Message ----- From: "Annette Taylor" <tay...@sandiego.edu> To: "Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS)" <tips@fsulist.frostburg.edu> Sent: Tuesday, May 14, 2013 9:27:12 AM Subject: RE:[tips] testing This has been a particularly hard semester! But not with things that I need to seek help for from TiPS. We had 4 student suicides this semester. I don't think we have had 4 total during the previous 23 years that I have been here. This was really rough. The first announcement about the sad and sudden passing of a student left me wondering if it had been a car accident, or a sudden bursting of an aneurysm. But more than one? more than two? No, it turns out that these beautiful, bright, young people took their lives. Very sad. It was only after the third that the word spread--can't stop social media--about the suicides. This is one time that social media truly has a negative effect. I recall Cialdini's writing in Influence about how there has been a concentrated move by news media to suppress stories of suicides because they then tend to come in clusters--perhaps some element of social comparison at work. At any rate, give the local news media their due, there has been nothing in the local news about these. But social media has been busy and finally the school paper had a special story last week with an emphasis on healing and where to get help and how to pick out warning signs, etc. I thought it was well-written. In the last month I've had students take a one to two week leave-of-absence to go home to see their psychologists. In the previous 23 years I don't remember once having a student bring me a note from their psychologist about their fragile condition. I have had the occasional student with various problems, but this was unusual. Then, we have finals starting on Thursday and I've had 5 emails asking me what's on the final! Well, if they had come to class, if they had asked their friends, if they had asked classmates for notes from the days they missed...then they would have known that there are multiple study guides posted on blackboard...yes, I am one of those "easy" teachers who posts study guides (honestly, they are so lame...mostly a list of terms from each chapter but students seem to find those so "helpful"; I mean, all they would have to do is type up a list of terms in bold font in either the text or on their ppt slides, the latter also posted to blackboard. But students find them very helpful.). Then there are still unreturned midterm exams for at least 7 students--very unusual at my school--these are students who have not been back to class since the last midterm. I have 79 students in various classes this semester (yes, we are a small, private, liberal arts school so we cap at 25 to 30 per section), so almost 10% have not been in class for at least 2 weeks. I don't have an "attendance policy." Some of those are the ones who emailed me about "what's on the final?" And if you are wondering whether in this fragile climate I gave sweet answers, the answer is NO! I was pretty blunt. Read the syllabus, everything you need to know is in blackboard. Come to class once in a while. Read the syllabus; it advises you to get notes from 2 classmates if you must miss a class. Ok, I try to diffuse it with humor, and then I gave them all the info they need to know. I'm grumpy...but I'm going to the Kings game tonight :) Woo hoo, first Stanley Cup play-off game. Don't ask what the tickets cost...I'm sure it will be a "priceless" experience (we just talked about subjective utility in cognitive class :). APS next week; AP readings a week after that, and then a little time off :) to catch up on other commitments. I wonder why tips has been so silent... ;) Annette Annette Kujawski Taylor, Ph. D. Professor, Psychological Sciences University of San Diego 5998 Alcala Park San Diego, CA 92110 tay...@sandiego.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: peter...@svsu.edu. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13445.e3edca0f6e68bfb76eaf26a8eb6dd94b&n=T&l=tips&o=25511 or send a blank email to leave-25511-13445.e3edca0f6e68bfb76eaf26a8eb6dd...@fsulist.frostburg.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=25512 or send a blank email to leave-25512-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
