Both governances mentioned in the
prompt, attendance and use of electronics, I believe are two of which all
professors must make decisions on. Throughout my past seven semesters at the
University of Illinois, I have experienced classes that varied greatly in class
size, attendance policies and electronic usage. I’ve had classes where
attendance wasn’t mandatory and worth nothing more than gaining knowledge, where
attendance wasn’t required but you received extra credit through iClicker usage
and where attendance was absolutely mandatory and regulated by turning in a
note card at the end of every class session. Similarly, professors across
campus have very different beliefs about technology usage. In some cases,
professors allow technology because it is a way to take notes, others allow
technology but urge students not to since studies have shown it’s a distraction
to students and others, I’ve found typically older professors, have banned
technology use all together, forcing students to take notes by hand if they
wish to take notes at all. I think there are clearly benefits to each rule put
in place and I can see the rationale behind the choices each professor makes.
Towards our class more
specifically, the first governance that I will talk about is the choice to not
make attendance required. I’ll be candid that when I registered for this class,
I had heard through the grapevine that attendance wasn’t required. Being a
senior, I was pretty excited to hear this and it was one of the reasons that I
ultimately ended up registering for the class. Despite this factor, I was one
of the students that attended class regularly, though not perfectly, despite
the fact that it wasn’t required and nearly half the class never showed up. Just
this past week, there were only seven students in class on Thursday for
whatever reason. Although the fact that attendance wasn’t mandatory this
semester and the lack of people who showed up might seem discouraging to come
to class at all, it actually had the opposite impact on me.
I felt that because I had made the
commitment in the beginning of the semester, I created this “reputation” that
we talked about in class as a student who showed up to class. I personally knew
I realized when certain faces in class were missing of those who regularly
showed up, and I’m sure if I was observant of these things, a professor would
be to. Ultimately, by not making class attendance mandatory, it inevitably lead
to some students never showing up to a class session after the first day, or to
show up once every few weeks. I believe that, while all the homework and
quizzes were online, that those people didn’t get nearly as much out of the
class as those who were present did.
Next, the governance of technology
usage in class I think is also an important factor to talk about. Personally, I
was in favor of being able to use portable electronic devices, such as my
laptop, during class. This is a privilege, yes, but it is one that I have
become accustomed to during my time at the University of Illinois. Although I
described cases where I’ve encountered professors who banned electronic use,
those cases were by far the majority in my experience. By allowing electronic
usage, I was one of the students that always had my laptop open. I personal
prefer to take notes on my laptop, I find myself to be much faster at typing
than I am at writing. Almost inevitably, though, I would find myself surfing
the web and finding myself distracted and off task at times because of this
privilege. I’m sure many students fell victim to this as well.
One thing that I will say, however,
if that I think that by allowing the technology, even though I’m sure everyone
knew that it would take away pieces of our attention, kept consistent with
other governances of this course. What I mean by that is, overall, this class
was portrayed to be one with much lax. As mentioned, class attendance wasn’t
required. Additionally, most deadlines weren’t very strict. While blog posts
were “due” on Friday evenings, a timeline I tried to stick to every week, they
were accepted until Sunday evening and sometimes even later than that. All of
this created a rather lax environment, and if students were not allowed to use
their electronics during class if they wished to I think would’ve been
inconsistent with the lax setting. I think that by allowing the students whom
did show up to class this semester the choice to use their electronics was a
good move because I think that by being strict with this rule would have the
potential to decrease class size, although I’m not quite sure if that would be
possible.
