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THE LINK
‘I didn’t want to complain until I sort of felt attacked’ Students face obstacles when complaining about problematic teachers
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Parker Sherry n a two-year-old post from Reddit’s r/Concordia, a frustrated user asks where they could go to complain about one of their teachers. According to the student, the professor would replace words in their essays with synonyms they preferred, lowering the paper’s grade when they did so. There were also technical problems in class the teacher had neglected to fix, making it impossible to view important course material. Did anyone know, they asked, what could be done about this? The post’s replies, most from now-defunct accounts, all say the same thing: “You’ll have to run it through your specific department. However, I hate to say it but your concerns will probably go straight into a drawer.” “Don’t bother they won’t do anything.” “Concordia doesn’t care, man. I’ve tried to go down that route in the past and [the] only thing that happened was me learning that Concordia just doesn’t give a shit about employee quality.” Two opinions reign: Concordia students aren’t told how to file complaints against problematic faculty members, and they don’t think doing so will change anything. There are several ways Concordia students can go about filing a complaint. If they want to complain informally, they can speak to a teacher they trust or the head of the department, who may take care of the situation on their behalf. If the concern is more serious, the Office of Rights and Responsibilities and the CSU Advocacy Centre both provide students with advice, resources, and assistance when filing charges against a teacher. But the reality of that process is a lot more complicated than it sounds. The Link spoke to a professor, who has helped settle disputes between students and other teachers, and who asked to be anonymous. According to them, the process can be “extremely stressful” for students who decide to file a complaint. “It usually only happens if there’s a situation that feels like it’s chronic,” they said. “If it’s not one remark or one test, that feels like it was unfair. When those things keep happening, I think students feel like they need to talk to somebody, not just for themselves but for future students as well.” Their department recommends that students first attempt to resolve issues informally. If a professor is involved, a conversation might be set up between them and the student who lodged the complaint. But many students T HEL INK NE W SPA P ER .C A
do not feel comfortable publicly complaining about a teacher whose class they attend. “If I was in a situation where I felt uncomfortable about how things were transpiring,” the professor admitted, “I would probably not feel like I could talk to the professor about it.” The Link also reached out to a student who complained about their teacher earlier in the semester. They too asked for anonymity. “From the beginning, I had a lot of anxiety going in,” they said. The student described how they felt put down by their professor, and wondered if their classmates shared their distress. “After the first day of class, I wasn’t necessarily happy that I’d taken it.” According to them, the teacher did not respond well to student discussion, and would regularly continue lectures half an hour later than they were scheduled to end. During one lecture, in particular, the teacher’s remarks affected the student’s mental health greatly, but they still felt hesitant to complain. “After that class, I had half a mental breakdown,” they said. “I didn’t want to complain until I sort of felt attacked, and even then, I really wanted to remain anonymous because I didn’t want to put my grades in jeopardy.” “Your academic future is at stake,” the professor told The Link. “You know that the instructor has power over you and over your grade. Nobody wants to get into that situation and then have to take an academic reassessment. Everybody hopes to be able to resolve things informally without having to attach their name to a situation and go through the stress.” On the New Concordians 2020-2021 Facebook page, over 100 first-year students were polled about whether they felt comfortable filing a formal complaint against a teacher. Twenty-one per cent of students replied that they would feel comfortable complaining, but only if they could do so anonymously. Over 50 per cent said they would file a complaint if they knew how, but didn’t. “It’s still kind of a labyrinth,” the faculty member said. “Students are thinking, do I go to the chair? The Office of Rights? Some students might say ‘the Office of Rights is great’ and others have said ‘I don’t trust them,’ so it’s really complicated, and in a way I don’t know how it could be otherwise.” After reaching out to their department, the student learned that several other complaints had already been filed against their instructor, and that a process was underway
