Hello Michael, Dean, our students are Gen Y.  My students are not focused on their work.  They prefer to use their energy for other pursuits.  Do I not wish that I can fail them?  But I'm supposed to go the extra mile!  So on some working weekends like today, I get them to come and do their assignments, revision etc.  And I get their friends to send a Whatsapp message to them to come to do their uncompleted duties, since they are more willing to listen to friends, rather than lecturers.

Michael - it would depend on context - but my view on such matters would be to fail them. That would, however, require a number of things to be in place i.e. especially that there is a clearly established institutional policy on the consequences of non-submission that the students have access to from day 1 of their topic, module, paper, programme. Better still, is that they also receive face-to-face instructions in their first session - or when their assignments are being discussed. If the instructions are that 'all assignments must be completed' - then it would be a clear fail. However, if the marks are cumulative i.e. three assignments where the total marks added together must cumulate to an average of over 50% - then the student can make that choice of non-submission and still pass. It's adult education - so I have no problem with this. For the partially complete submissions - that would depend. If it was a competent student that I knew well - or their previous assignments had scored very well - I would contact them to ask them if it might be an error on their part i.e. submitted the wrong draft file if they had more than one draft. If it's poor quality throughout and also incomplete - I wouldn't do the same. 

Hello Michael, Dean, our students are Gen Y.  My students are not focused on their work.  They prefer to use their energy for other pursuits.  Do I not wish that I can fail them?  But I'm supposed to go the extra mile!  So on some working weekends like today, I get them to come and do their assignments, revision etc.  And I get their friends to send a Whatsapp message to them to come to do their uncompleted duties, since they are more willing to listen to friends, rather than lecturers.

I think the question should focus on the students - what type of students does your University seek to service? If the students at your University had every opportunity to be prepared for the rigors of college - then, give them the grade they earned - a zero on the assignment. If however, your University seeks to work with students who are very bright, but perhaps came from circumstances that underprepared them for higher education - perhaps use this as a mentoring opportunity. Many students from underresourced high schools to not understand the value of homework or teachers who care to really understand them as individuals. I would push to understand your students - who they really are, where they came from and what life circumstances may be impinging on them before you create a policy that could further disenfranchise them from the high ed pipeline...

Appreciate the question and it reflects very much on the

• student's interest /
• Attached or perceived importance /
• time availability /
• impact of earlier timeline extension precedents /
• very lenient teacher etc.,

Dear Professor Marek,

At my department, we usually call students as we follow one of the university's retention policies. Some teachers ask their class for active cell phone numbers at the beginning; some teachers access available student database for their phone numbers.

I myself usually call students 1) to get confirmed that I actually haven't received their papers, not that I've lost their works by mistake, 2) to ask if they will give me their papers, and 3) to remind them of how they will be graded without the papers.  Then I'm open to negotiation if their request for assistance and a new deadline is reasonable. Otherwise, they will get an F on that particular assignment.

Best regards,

Cameen

I have heard some complaints like ....

There are even cases, when the academic work load is more, students bunk the class (and make good of the time) to write assignments

There can be two principal reasons for this:

• They simply don't want to continue studies, so they are ready for facing any kind of disciplinary actions
• The task given may be very difficult to work with so they abandoned the assignment

It would be better if you could arrange a one to one meeting with these students- talk calmly to them to invoke positive responses,else you could approach a good education councilor to enhance the participation of these students in learning.

Three points:

• It's important to find out the cause of their failure to do the assignment and advice them accordingly;
• Assignments' instructions should be clearly stated including the contribution of the assignment to overall course grading and the implications of not doing the assignment;
• Assignment questions(s) should be explained to students and ask if students have any questions to be clarified.

May be pre-assignment processing is necessary to build a proactive learning climate than an evaluative learning. It also depends on the level of students, if they need some more facilitation (additional interactions and clearing doubts) or support (reference books / materials / wifi connectivity within campus ranges etc.), such a requirement should be identified and scaffold the assignment process.