How do you handle student complaints?

[nursebrandie28]

hey guys....

okay, at the end of the semester, i make a point to get better and try better for the next semester. well, this spring is my 5th semester now, and i am still getting complaints.

most of the complaints are about difficult tests, expecting too much, giving too much homework or not enough study time!!

my boss backs me up 100%, however, i get down on myself and worry about it. how do you handle your student complaints? (if any)

:trout:

[llg, PhD, RN]

I think you have to honestly evaluate what the complaints are and who is complaining. Just reading the previous posts in this thread, you can see the range of possibilities.

Evaluate their complaints ... and if they are legitimate, then make the appropriate changes. If they are not legitimate, don't let them intimidate you or play mind games with you. Remember that some of the "least worthy" students are experts at playing on your guilt feelings and making you feel like you are being mean for maintaining high standards. That's how they've gotten this far in school. Don't become a sucker -- and don't graduate nurses that can't pass boards and/or can't give good patient care. Pause and ask yourself if you are being both kind and fair -- and if the answer is "yes," don't be afraid to give the low grade the student has earned. Part of your job is to evaluate their performance and give them an honest grade that truly reflects the quality of the work they have done in your course.

That said ... don't get stuck in a rut or be so set in your ways that you refuse to consider making a few changes. If some of the better students in your class make the same suggestions and/or large numbers of students seem to be struggling with certain aspects of your course, it's may be time to make a few changes.

[IShallWearPurple]

140 total students -- 3 students got A's, 10 got B's, 90 or so students got C's, and the rest got D's and F's. I was horrified that a professor would make a class THAT difficult where over 90% of the class got a C' or lower. He replied by saying, "well at least 80% passed right?". Yeah, with a "C"!

I wish professors/lecturers would be interested in not only helping their students enjoy the class and actually learn, but also design the class in a way where students can do well if they study.

Yeah, micro was a tough class in our program, too...

I'm not sure what the "best" way to grade students is, but perhaps this prof's grade distribution reflects a relative vs. an absolute grading standard (i.e. the curve). It's undeniably true that only 3 students out of 140 got A's, but in this prof's class, those A's really mean that exceptional or stand-out perfomances were given, and to my knowledge, this is what the "old" or "traditional" meaning of an "A" grade was. A "C" was not demeaning or shameful until more recently, it was just the mark of average or passing performance, not poor or deficient work. As for me, I rather lament this shift in values. I know it's not really fair or workable, however, for some classes/programs to enforce tougher grading standards while others do not. Any future employer or grad school won't likely be aware of the prof's individual grading standards at my school, and this can make for frustrating/unfair handicaps in future applications. I would value more consistency between coursees/programs in this respect so that everyone would agree on what constitutes "A" versus "C" performance, but I don't see that happening any time soon.

In my program, (and the students really like this), an A means that you pretty much showed up to class regularly and maybe read the relevant portions of the textbook. Extra credit opportunities, detailed test plans including page numbers from the text, and make-up assignments abound. So, students seem to generally enjoy the absolute standard in my program, provided the material is adequately covered/presented in lecture and assignments.

Like I said, I don't know the "best" way to grade, but I do know that my A's feel much more meaningful when earned in under tougher/higher standards.

Best wishes in your program, I'll graduate in Dec. 2007 (barring any totally unforeseen calamities...knock on wood)!

[vickynurse]

llg is right on ! Don't let them play mind games with you.

[smk1, LPN]

I guess from a student standpoint, be open to discussion over test questions. Doesn't mean you have to give points back for every complaint, but if a large portion of your class read a question a different way than you intended, you may want to look at changing the wording of the question for clarity, be careful about changing the reading assignments from semester to semester if you aren't changing the tests because several times i have found the reading that pertained to past unit test questions in material that was not yet assigned. Don't worry about students who can't do their part to pass. That isn't your problem. Try to make sure that things like accepted lab vaues are standardized for testing purposes because it really isn't fair to students to have to guess which set of lab values you hold as "correct" when all of the required texts have slightly dfferent ranges.

[EmerNurse, BSN, RN]

I'm just finishing my first term (gone back to school for my bsn online) but I remember the good and bad from my nursing school. I did quite well in nursing school (and yes, I skipped sometimes - worked fulltime and had 4 kids at home).

What I did, was kind of pick apart the test ahead of time in my head. Yes, I was wierd, but it worked (and I'm a geek bigtime). My logic was that if you have 50 questions and 10 subjects (pancratitis, hepatitis, colitis, etc GI), I'd figure you have about 5 questions per subject and have to aim those questions at the most important things a nurse needs to know about those diseases to care for the patient. So that's what I studied. What a NURSE needed to know. Sure the cellular physiology is important, but I tried to figure out exactly what I'd need to know as a nurse at the bedside and study that. Where did I study it? I used CEU articles on each topic. The book gave you 60 pages on one topic, a third of which was normal physiology, another third was nursing interventions and the last was mixed with incidental info, tables nobody memorizes etc. It worked for me.

I'd warn your students at the very beginning that they are now in a NURSING class. They should already have their A&P down pat, especially the P, and if they don't, they need to brush up on it bigtime. Knowing my physiology inside and out is what made the nursing part make sense. But I'd never have had time to learn the physiology all over again and THEN the nursing parts.

For the sleepers, and skippers. After the first time you see a sleeper, simply point out - you know, you slept 45 minutes in tonite's class. I don't have time to play alarm clock to everyone, so if you want to pass, you really need to stay awake. Reiterate after each failed test. Then shrug, oh well.

There ARE a few teachers out there who will find the most esoteric information to test on, the kind I'd never in a million years use a the bedside - but that's not the norm. These students need to pass NCLEX (which tests NURSING interventions etc), not basic physiology.

I'm going for my Masters in Nursing Education... when I finish this godawful BSN course...so I learn a lot from your boards. Good luck! And don't let the slackers get you down. You can't fix someone else's lack of work ethic or attitude of "you owe me an education". They need to shaddup and get working.