Wednesday, May 3

Firing Students

When should instructors fire students (ask students to no longer participate)?

This is a more challenging issue in the corporate and government world, where training is more thought as a service, or a requirement, than the academic.

This gets more interesting when simulations are introduced, and there is real work required from a student, not just showing up. Courses can also be several sessions, not just one.

Some people view percentage who finish the course as a critical metric. And any pure e-learning course never automatically jettisons a student.

But if students weakly approach a course, they go through the motions but don't push, then that messes up any ROI and evaluations. The passive students also can become the biggest critics, resolving their own dissonance by lowering the view of the course instead of raising their own expectation for growth.

2 comments:

Donald Clark said...

Hi Clark,
As long as the learners do not give up on themselves, I will not give up on them (fire them).

If they are passive and lower the ROI and/or assessments, then so be it -- it means something was wrong and needs to be investigated. And it does not matter if it is a simulation or whatever. Just because there is a great activity, such as a simulation, does not mean that it something that is actually needed for their job.

If a student becames too passive AND so loudly critical that it starts to ruin the learning environment for others, then that means they are trying to bring their own agenda into the class, hence they no longer have a need to be there, rather they need to move own and claim their own activity that allows them to proclaim their agenda.

Anonymous said...

divorce any agenda... just follow