The Modern Hippy Male

I started reading the syllabus for a new class today. This thing is arranged in 21 pages of pure chaotic randomness. It is a word document with links to the different sections. And the document itself does not have headings for each section, making looking through the document without using the links very difficult. Oh yeah, and not all of the links work. The deadline dates are listed as “04/04/09 – Wed.”.. that’s not a Wednesday. It also makes reference to a Quiz #1 which should be listed under the blackboard under the “Quizzes” section, only it is not.

I joined this class off of the wait list, which means I’m getting about a 4 day late start. According to the syllabus I was supposed to get an email containing the syllabus and a welcome letter. My assumption is that I never received this email because of the manner in which I joined the class, from the wait list. The only possible way that this email would have been helpful is if it had told me to read the welcome letter BEFORE reading the syllabus.

You see, the problem is, as it appears to me, that the syllabus was written originally and then amended many, MANY times in an attempt to help answer the myriad of questions that undoubtedly followed each time it was released. This is evident by the lengthy “Examples” that are given under the explanation for each section. Many of these examples are just as confusing as the section itself. The syllabus introduces procedures for doing things, prior to defining why or when we need to perform them.

One of the basic rules for giving information and direction is to consider the order in which they are given.

If you’re told to submit a document which outlines the reason for the fall of Roman society, many of you would do just that. However, If there were a specification that said, “All submissions must be in Times New Roman, Font Size 12″ in a different document, not all of you may have seen this extra information to format the document as requested. This is just a subtle hint of what this syllabus is like.

Complaints:

1. Believe it or not, the 21 page syllabus does not contain all of the necessary information.
2. The syllabus makes use of a link structure which is broken.
3. Adding to the complication of the broken link structure is the lack of headings for the sections.
4. The syllabus does not properly define each topic or subject that is introduced. In some cases the syllabus refers to other documents, or makes no referral or mention of further information or specifications that are missing.
5. The 14 other documents listed, including the 8 documents in the FAQ section, for this class sometimes modify or change the information that the syllabus gives.
6. Some documents are titled with a completely different course number than the one specific for this class. This makes me wonder if they were listed incorrectly, and if the information they contain is even valid to this course.
7. The deadlines listed do not match up with the day of the week that was stated. The deadlines that are posted on blackboard itself appear to be correct, but the only mention to this is an announcement by the teacher saying that the Syllabus Quiz had been taken down and re-written to represent the correct due dates and that the students that had previously taken the quiz must now retake it. It does not make mention however to which of the lists, the one in the syllabus or the one on blackboard is correct.
8. There is information listed in the syllabus pertaining to the assignments including: how to submit them, how to save them on your computer, naming conventions.. and so on. But there is no mention to where to obtain the specifics for each assignment.

There is so much information, in so many different locations, it is astounding to me that it is allowed to be presented in this manner. In my opinion, just because you able to teach, does not make you able to teach on-line classes. I also wonder if there are any further requirements for a teacher that teaches on-line classes.

Doesn’t it stand to reason that if you have to have 14 documents (8 of which are FAQs) that are external from your 21 PAGE SYLLABUS that you may be time to rewrite the course material? This wouldn’t be as bad if all of the information was in one place. Or if there was one location that would act as an index for the information.

UGH!