No, we're going to cancel class, because you won't be there. What's the point?

[Coventina]

Hello, I’d like to inform you that I won’t be attending tomorrow’s meeting because I have an appointment tomorrow at noon. I’m getting my first tattoo & I’ve had the appointment set for 5 months now so I didn’t want to reschedule. If there’s anything important that we’re covering tomorrow please let me know. Thank you.

*******************************************

This is a Zoom college class....

This drives me crazy. Why would we be covering unimportant material in class?

[soothsayer]

1. Why can't he/she zoom or at least listen in from the appointment?

[Chemisse]

2. High school kids are even more nonchalant.

Here's what I get: "Are we doing anything tomorrow because I'm not going to be here."

Occasionally I do respond with, "Well if YOU'RE not going to be here, we just won't do anything at all!" And we all laugh.

But I wouldn't be laughing it was college and it was a serious email.

[catbyte]

3. It's too bad privacy laws prevent you from forwarding that to his/her parents. I'm sure they'd just

loooooooooove to see how seriously their little darling is taking higher education.

[Claire Oh Nette]

4. Did I miss Anything???

Did I Miss Anything?
Nothing. When we realized you weren’t here
we sat with our hands folded on our desks
in silence, for the full two hours

Everything. I gave an exam worth
40 percent of the grade for this term
and assigned some reading due today
on which I’m about to hand out a quiz
worth 50 percent

Nothing. None of the content of this course
has value or meaning
Take as many days off as you like:
any activities we undertake as a class
I assure you will not matter either to you or me
and are without purpose

Everything. A few minutes after we began last time
a shaft of light suddenly descended and an angel
or other heavenly being appeared
and revealed to us what each woman or man must do
to attain divine wisdom in this life and
the hereafter
This is the last time the class will meet
before we disperse to bring the good news to all people on earth.

Nothing. When you are not present
how could something significant occur?

Everything. Contained in this classroom
is a microcosm of human experience
assembled for you to query and examine and ponder
This is not the only place such an opportunity has been gathered

but it was one place

And you weren’t here

—Tom Wayman

[Coventina]

5. Thanks!

This is great!

I think I will include it in future syllabi!

[Claire Oh Nette]

7. I do...

Every year, I use this...

yw

[gristy]

8. This is really wonderful on so many levels.

The ending really drives the point home in a beautiful way.

Everything. Contained in this classroom
is a microcosm of human experience
assembled for you to query and examine and ponder
This is not the only place such an opportunity has been gathered

but it was one place

And you weren’t here

[a la izquierda]

6. Happens all the time.

We’re cashiers and they’re customers, it’s not professors and students.
One of the many reasons I can’t wait to leave the academy.

[The Genealogist]

9. Times sure have changed

When I was in college, I'd never have dared to shoot my mouth off to a professor, or send massage like this to a professor. When I taught some college courses a few years later, I had numerous students disrespect me. Sounds like it is getting worse. Glad I moved on.

[Ms. Toad]

10. Hello, I'd like to inform you . . . full stop.

Sorry, but you don't "inform" professors you are going to miss their class. You ask permission. Occasionally missing class is unavoidable (you are dead or dying, a parent is dead or dying, a child is dead or dying. a sibling - you'd better get your rear into the classroom. In that event, you say so with the biggest apology you can muster - AND - you suggest everything you can think of that might help you learn the material you will be missing. You acknowledge that what you are missing is important.

At least in my classes when students say something like that I can remind them that they are entering a profession in which their peers (and the judges who rule on their cases) all have massive egos - and they are entering at the bottom of heap. If they don't wipe that smug, self-centered attitude off of their faces they can expect a very short career with very few cliens, once word gets out that having them for an attorney is a death sentence.

Not that I've ever encountered anyone like that, or put them in their place.

[efhmc]

11. I once had a grade lowered from an A to a B because I had to miss a class before a holiday.

Professor said if you are not here, this is what will happen. I told her I was Godparent for my niece and had to go and still it happened.

[Ms. Toad]

12. My daughter's first day of kindergarten was also my first day of law school.

The neigbor across the street put her on the bus that first day . . .

That said, I generally have equivalent assignments that students can do IF they ask about missing a class, rather than informing me they will be absent.

[efhmc]

13. Sounds resonable.