6972, I wasn’t planning to ask you for materials anyway because your students told me your course sucks. It’s because you talk too much (at least 8K words a class) and you’re cocky.
They also mentioned that they hear it when you “silently” pass gas during your long-ass boring lectures.
The ridiculous sensitivities of some academics will never cease to amaze me.
Borrowing course material is encouraged institutionally. It's supported by our discipline (e.g., TRAILS) and by textbook publishers who regularly make these resources available to instructors. Heck, in my TA seminar during graduate school, most faculty for whom we TA'd straight-up told us to use their materials the first time we taught the same course (with understandable modifications). The department actually requested that professors submit their syllabi, so professors/grad students could use them when developing their own materials for the same course at a future date.
That said, obviously, if you're borrowing the course materials of faculty who've not made them publicly available, you should ask their permission first (and give them credit if they request it).
I too don't understand the possessiveness going on here, a symptom I guess of the competitive, individualistic culture that we have.
I handed over everything on one subject to a new colleague who is starting and has a pretty heavy teaching load. Who would I have helped if I withheld it?
First - slides from textbooks. As if it wasn't bad enough to use a textbook.
I'm not possessive over slides. The students have them all so why would I hide them from others.
That said you can borrow from slides and syllabi but I don't see why you would want to wholesale use another syllabus or worse slides unless it's for a very standard course like intro to stats. My syllabus is readings that I personally think are really useful to know. They're readings that I've read and reread for my own research and so I know exactly what the take away is and how it fits the larger literature and the field. If that reading is not something you know then the slides won't make sense. And the syllabus won't make sense. It would actually be more work for me to use someone else's syllabus even the first time i teach a course because it means taking over someone else's views wholesale.
If it's a standard course you don't need slides from your colleagues. Google and find tons of examples online and tailor your slides. You're railing against considered views that your colleagues have about slide sharing. Do you want slides or do you want to change those views? If you want slides go online. If you want to change their views...
This entire conversation misses the mark. The comments about not wanting to distribute slides because its your IP is not valid from a welfare perspective, unless you are arguing that this is going disincentivize profs from teaching/developing the best material. Not sharing because you worked hard on it seems petty. If professors can spend less time prepping course material without affecting the quality of their course, then that is win-win.
The conversation should be focused on whether borrowing materials affects teaching quality. I think their is a good argument that it does - I recalled having a professor that borrowed someone else's slides and clearly did not understand them. In sum, materials should be shared to some extent, but the profs who do this need to do some rewriting in order to ensure that they truly understand what they are teaching and are comfortable speaking in about it in a way that is consistent with what is written.
This thread clearly proves that this forum dominated by ABDs who did zero real teaching so far. I understand you guys, you simply don't want to effort in. But it doesn't work that way. Welfare perspective is ridiculous, especially because it comes from fully possesive subjects who are trying to justify their laziness
"Laziness", gtfo. You don't have much experience, or if you do it's at some privileged 1% institution. Down here in the trenches it's not uncommon to be asked to teach something at the last minute, or something that's not remotely related to what you're actually an expert in. There is no shame at all in looking at other people's materials and borrowing the pieces that work. Think of it as the teaching equivalent to a lit review.
i dont think its lazy to want to use already prepared lectures in class, but i do think its entitled af to think a colleague should give you theirs. If you want to use already prepared lectures versus spending (or wasting) time designing a course from scratch then get the lectures from people whos job it is to provide that: the textbook publishers, not your colleagues
At the end of the day, you need to do a good job and feel invested. There are lectures where I’ve changed very little from what colleagues have given me—eg, methods and stats—and others where I look at the syllabus and use some readings but mostly put it all together myself.
Case by case.
As a rule, if materials are available for you that are better than you can make in the time available, use them, at least for inspiration. Don’t listen to these self obsessed ding dongs.
You’ll find your way.
And by the way, having taught both high school and college for many years, this Is the first time I’ve seen people being possessive about their stuff. Lame as hell and also stupid.
98% of sociology research: completely dispensable
A professor who teaches by reading slides someone else wrote: completely replaceable
sociology job market candidate using someone else's slides: "why oh why will no one hire me it must be because of prejudice"
Somewhere in this picture there's an idiot.