INCOMPETENT SUPERVISEE CORRESPONDENCE Professor M.J. Perry begins as he means to go on
In my experience, the students who are the most incompetent in these fields are those who underachieve in the final exams by the greatest margin. However, the same criticisms can be levelled at the incompetence of the communicative abilities of staff within any organisation. I have proposed an international scheme of training in basic communication at secondary school level, aimed at increasing the overall efficiency of the planet. I recently submitted this scheme to the United Nations, although it is very probably lost in their internal mail network. Some amusing examples of correspondence with supervisees are now presented. Poor excuse with unnecessary detail: "I've spent the last night heaving my guts up after a dodgy prawn curry. I'm still feeling awful and spending most of my time in the loo this morning. As a consequence, I really wouldn't gain much from the revision supervision taking place today (and probably wouldn't spend much time actually at the supervision table). Would it be possible to put the supervision back a couple of days?" Pathetic excuse with arrogance: "I fallen ill, my bedder even said I looked "a bit off" this morning, so we're going to have to move today's supervision, any day any time next week will be okay, I have no other commitments that can't be rearranged for this." Feeble excuse: "Dear Dr, I tripped in the snow/rain today and I am still in a lot of pain. I am very sorry that I can't come to the supervision this afternoon. I will certainly borrow the notes from my partner and catch up." Incomprehensible response: "Works fine for me for one time. I will skip my Rock'n'Roll team practice." Delusion with grovelling: "hey Neil dear Neil in fact : ) i have totally started work like 3 days ago ish, powering forward towards the exams !!! your supervisions are quality so i was wondering if we could like have one a week to cover both courses starting towards the end of next week so like beginning of march and i am staying on through the hols if that is any good for you ,please please let me know many thanks in advance if i end up getting a jammy first that would be A mazing by the way honest opinion ,do you think it is do able like starting from my position in the 3 months left ???" Further desperate grovelling: "hey Neil i know i have not showed and fucked up huge time but like you are awesome at supervising, imre has given the go ahead i am totally begging you to all intents and purposes to give me lots or a bit of time these next few days i need those alphas from asymptotics please let me know if you are available" The Story of Clown, Muppet, and Imran: /Background info:/ My supervisee, Clown, has never handed in any work for my revision supervisions. According to his DoS, he never hands in any work, ever. Even for JRL. His partner, Muppet, does plenty of work, but always fails to hand it in by my deadline of 5pm, because he "forgets to get up in time." /Monday:/ I email supervisees informing them of a change in location and timings, asking them to reply to confirm that they are okay with this. /Tuesday:/ I email again, as some have not responded. /Wednesday:/ Clown emails to say he and his partner are okay with the change. /Thursday:/ Clown turns up 15 minutes late. Muppet doesn't show up. Imran: "Do you know whether Muppet is coming?" Clown: "No, I haven't seen him." Imran: "Then how come you said you were both okay with the change?" Clown: "Ahhhhh..... Unfortunately..... I haven't ssssseen him." Imran: "Have you done any work?" Clown: "Ahhhhh..... Unfortunately..... I have not." A weak supervision then occurs. Later, Muppet sends the following email: dear coomaraswamy Sorry i didnt showed up for the supervision. i only just came to realised you've changed to Burreals field instead of cms. Would it be possible for you to have my supervision tomorrow at 5pm? Sorry again for the inconvenience i'd caused. The above contains a world record number of spelling, grammatical, syntactic and moral mistakes in just 46 words. Remarkably, sentence number three is free of all such mistakes, but is undoubtedly the most wrong of the lot. Even if I did wish to waste more of my time tomorrow, it would not be possible for me to "have" his supervision at the same time as giving it, barring my being afflicted by some strange form of schizophrenia. Complete lack of excuse: "I am soryy to say this, but could you please postpne our first supervision? I was waiting untill I revised more of the notes but then I didn't have enough time to do the problems. Thank you very much!!" Reply to the above from the supervisor: "No, for the following ten reasons: 1. The exams start in 24 days, and the time available for revision is very tight, so revision needs to take place as quickly as possible. 2. There shall be four applied revision supervisions within the next 18 days, and postponing won't change this. 3. I don't think that postponing supervisions would result in more being learnt, so there's nothing to be gained. 4. The supervisions should provide a focus for revision, and the next few weeks are a period when focus is essential, so keeping supervision times fixed is intended to motivate. 5. The four applied courses constitute half of your workload, so these revision supervisions must be a very high priority, regardless of any other factors. 6. I think it's important that you should come, as part of the revision process, regardless of how much of the problems you've done, so that you can ask about, and I can help you out with, whatever parts of the courses are problematical. 7. Your revision will be more efficient after attending a supervision so that any important difficulties can be resolved at an early stage. 8. Supervisions help you monitor your own progress, and indicate what parts of the course you need to concentrate on. 9. This first supervision has already been arranged for later than everyone else because of your concerns about the flow of work. 10. 4 hours' notice is generally regarded as insufficient to postpone a supervision; about 24 hours is usually regarded as the minimum." Superfluous message from supervisor to supervisees: "The numerical value of F(0.1) is 0.84367 found by numerical integration. The partial sums of your divergent series are 1.0000 0.8000 0.8600 0.8360 0.0480 0.8408 0.8458 0.8418 0.8454 0.8418 which oscillate around 0.8437 before diverging. One can perform a Shanks transform on subsequent triples to "accelerate the convergence", giving 0.8462 0.8429 0.8440 0.8435 0.8438 0.8436 which are nearer the answer." How ironic that 0.84367 is also the probability that none of his supervisees understood that. A lengthy chain of emails in which supervisor X attempts to arrange one supervision with student Y, who ultimately never shows up: Date: 30 Apr 16:49:13 Hi Your Director of Studies mentioned that you might be taking [Course 1] and [Course 2] for the exam. If you've decided not to, then that's fine, but if you require supervisions, then please let me know. Regards X Date: 30 Apr 18:00:15 Dear X Hi, was I meant to come along to sign up for the supervisions? If so, please accept my apologies. I have been fully occupied by the CATAM recently and have not been able to check the supervision arrangement. Would you mind if I got back to you after I finish the project and properly check the board in front of my Director of Studies' room? I would like to apologise again for my carelessness. Thank you for your attention. Regards, Y p.s. Yes, [Course 1] and [Course 2] are certainly two of those which I am thinking of tackling in the tripos exams. Date: 3 May 20:06:07 Please can you confirm whether or not you want to be supervised on [Course 1] or [Course 2] or both. X Date: 4 May 09:37:33 Further to this, you should contact Z for your [Course 1] supervision (I understand that he's emailed you already). I will only do [Course 2] for you if you want, in which case you should let me know as soon as possible roughly when you want the supervision. X Date: 04 May 11:08:04 Hi, Thank you for your e-mail. I am sorry to keep you waiting for my reply. I just had a chance of a minute to check my inbox and thought I should let you know that I am aware of the fact that I should arrange the supervisions. If you do not mind, I promise to get back to you as soon as the next two lectures finish. Thank you. Y Date: 4 May 11:29:27 These arrangements should have been made several days ago and further delay is unacceptable. You must contact me by the end of today to arrange the supervision, telling me roughly when you want it, otherwise I will refuse to supervise you. Since I am the only person doing [Course 2] revision supervisions, I strongly advise that you get your act together. It is exam term, and the exams will be far less forgiving than me. X Date: 04 May 16:49:24 Dear X I would like to express my sincere apologies for the delay and all the inconvenience that I have caused. I would like to have the revision supervision on [Course 2] in the either week starting with 23rd or 30th of May if this is okay with you. I would also like to let you know that I have contacted Z for the revision supervision on [Course 1] and got a reply from him. Please accept my apologies again. Thank you for your kind attention and patience. Regards, Y Date: 4 May 17:56:41 Please pick a time from the following: Thursday 26th or Friday 27th 9.00am-10.00am 10.30am-11.30am 2.30pm-3.30pm 4.00pm-5.00pm X Date: 04 May 18:49:28 Dear X I would like to choose 'Friday 27th 4-5PM' if this is okay with you. Thank you. Y Date: 27 May 02:56:52 Dear X I am supposed to have a revision supervision on [Course 2] tomorrow from 4PM to 5PM. I was not well at all yesterday. I had to stay in bed for a while. (Now I woke up in the middle of night and I thought I should e-mail you.) I missed the deadline for handing in the work - I live in [removed] and it was hard for me to get to the Great Court yesterday. I am not so sure if I could a supervision tomorrow. Also, there are some questions which I have not completed but I would like to complete before I have the revision supervision. I am so sorry about this late notice but I am wondering whether you would mind postponing the supervision to some time early next week. I look forward to seeing your reply soon. Thank you for your kind attention. Y Date: 27 May 06:21:10 There isn't much point in having the supervision today if you haven't done much work, so we should move it to early next week, although I'm quite busy next week. Let's have it on Monday 30 May at 8.00am in the CMS cafeteria, which I hope is early enough next week. This will give you time to do lots and lots of years' questions. I look forward to seeing you soon. X Date: 30 May 10:42:50 Dear X Please accept my apologies for missing the supervision this morning, first of all. I set my alarm clock last night but I somehow missed it and I woke up late this morning; Maybe I shouldn't have gone to bed late last night. I am so sorry to have kept you waiting. I don't know how I should express my apologetic mind. Y [In fact, X visited Y's room in college two hours earlier, finding it unlocked and with Y absent.] Supporting the correlation between general cluelessness about life and exam performance, the following student Y was the only undergraduate supervisee of X ever to obtain below a Third Class at the end of the year: Date: 23 Feb 16:17:20 Dear X, I don't think I'll be able to make the supervision this evening - sorry for the late notice, I had hoped to make it but have now been unwell for a while. Would it be possible to rearrange the supervision for sometime next week? Y Date: 23 Feb 16:35:06 We don't have a supervision this evening: it's next week! Three days after a missed supervision by student Y: Date: 28 Jan 07:03:57 Hi Can I arrange to see you this week, perhaps tomorrow? X Date: 31 Jan 17:14:00 Subject: Re: Supervision Hi, sorry just got the email...when would you like to meet...my number is [telephone number removed]. what is it you want to see me about? Y [In fact, the claim of just getting the email isn't true: X checked via hermes that Y had indeed read email previously but had chosen not to reply. X emailed the Director of Studies of Y on the morning that this email from Y was sent.] Date: 31 Jan 17:38:14 Subject: Re: Supervision Hi Can you make some time next week in the CMS? Monday afternoon, or Tuesday at 3.30pm, or Tuesday at 6.00pm? Hand in your work into [removed] by midnight before. The reason for seeing you is that supervision attendance is mandatory, but you were absent from last week's supervision and so, as a matter of routine, it should be rearranged. If, for whatever reason, you can't attend, then it's your responsibility to explain why and to rearrange; the onus is not on supervisors and Directors of Studies to make enquiries. X An extremely long chain of emails to arrange what was initially planned to be two supervisions, but an extra one got added in between: Date: 12 Oct 19:05:04 Subject: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS From: Y To: X Subject: SUPERVISIONS Date: 12 Oct 19:03:07 hi i am Y. i was supposed to be getting supervisions for [Course] with you but i fail to show up at the meeting. Can i get supervision times please. I can take anytime after 2 on any day. Y Date: 12 Oct 22:19:25 From: X To: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS I currently have a singleton with the first supervision arranged for 2.15pm-3.15pm on Thursday 27th October, and second supervision for 2.00pm-3.00pm on Monday 14th November, and the third to be arranged at a later date. Can you manage these times? X Date: 13 Oct 17:27:20 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS is there no way i could have them later than those times? Y Date: 13 Oct 18:36:14 From: X To: Y, Z Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS Z: I'm giving you a supervision partner. Y: By "later", do you mean later in the day or on a later date? It might be possible to move, but you'll have to consult your supervision partner. I'll forward you the current supervision arrangements so that you can see what times have already been taken up by other people. Please let me know what times you've already arranged your other supervisions for and I'll see if I can sort anything out. X Date: 13 Oct 18:36:49 From: X To: Y Subject: [Course] Supervisions (fwd) My current supervision arrangements are as below. [removed] X Date: 14 Oct 16:36:34 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: [Course] Supervisions (fwd) hi ive checked and i can make those times. where are the supervisions being held? Y Date: 15 Oct 14:12:07 From: X To: Y Cc: Z Subject: Re: [Course] Supervisions (fwd) In the CMS cafeteria. See below for the supervision rules which include instructions about handing in your work. [removed] X Date: 26 Oct 12:50:54 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: [Course] Supervisions (fwd) hi X can i bring my supervision work with me its just that its pretty hard Y Date: 26 Oct 13:12:39 From: X To: Y Subject: Re: [Course] Supervisions (fwd) Yes, that's fine. It would be useful if you could come five minutes early so that I might have a quick look at it beforehand. If there's anything you want to hand in before 6pm today, then do, but not afterwards since I might not pick it up. X Date: 02 Nov 21:15:12 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS hi X saturday is a bit soon for me. would i beable to join the monday two? Y Date: 2 Nov 23:47:10 From: X To: Y Cc: Z Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS No, I'm going to have to do supervisions two people at a time. You could try finding out whether you can swap with one of the two people on Monday. X Date: 03 Nov 14:35:23 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS then is it not possible to move the saturday to monday? for me and Z Y Date: 13 Nov 15:23:07 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS hi again i know i have a supervision tomorrow but i have three others in the following two days and i just cant get everything done, i was reluctantly wondering could i move the [Course] tomorrow? Y Date: 3 Nov 15:39:54 From: X To: Y Cc: Z Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS First of all, I again suggest you ask V and W whether you can swap with one of them. If that fails, then there's a tiny possibility of Monday, but it's extremely awkward for me. The only time available is 9.00am-10.00am as there's no space in my schedule from 10.00am onwards. I really think it would be better to get it out of the way before the weekend: it will be about 60% of the way through term already and we've only covered half of the first sheet so far. Then you'd have time over the weekend to consolidate the course before lectures go even further. You should consult your partner about this. As it currently stands, I'm expecting you on Saturday. X Date: 13 Nov 15:23:07 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS hi again i know i have a supervision tomorrow but i have three others in the following two days and i just cant get everything done, i was reluctantly wondering could i move the [Course] tomorrow? Y Date: 13 Nov 17:15:53 From: X To: Y, Z Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS Yes. I should have some free time on Thursday afternoon from 3.30pm onwards, although that's not quite certain yet. Is that day any good for both of you? X Date: 13 Nov 17:36:07 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS yes id like 4pm on thurday thank you. I have asked Z and i am waiting for his reply. Y Date: 13 Nov 23:05:55 From: Y To: X Subject: Fwd: Re: hello ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Z To: Y Subject: Re: hello Date: 13 Nov 17:56:06 hey, thats ok with me. Z On Nov 13, Y wrote: > hi would you mind moving our supervision tomorrow for 4.00pm on thurday? > > Y Date: 14 Nov 12:44:42 From: Y To: X Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS hi X is that time confirmed with you? Y Date: 14 Nov 14:20:29 From: X To: Z Cc: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS I'm fine with that (4.00pm Thursday provisionally). Is that any good with you, Z? X Date: 14 Nov 18:45:22 From: X To: Z Cc: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS Sorry, I forgot that Z had already said that 4.00pm was fine. So 4.00pm it is then. Date: 14 Nov 19:40:31 From: Z To: X Cc: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS Hey X, I know I said that 4 was ok, but I have carelessly organised another supervision at exactly the same time (iin Great Court with the Dean). I know its my fault so Ill try to organise an internal swap to save you the hassle. Thanks Z Date: 14 Nov 20:02:25 From: X To: Z Cc: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS There's also the possibility of moving to any of the other times on Thursday or Friday when I'm free rather than an internal swap if you prefer. X Date: 14 Nov 20:23:42 From: Z To: X Cc: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS When else are you free? I thouht all the slots were taken. Z Date: 14 Nov 20:31:10 From: X To: Z Cc: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS Friday from 3.30pm onwards, but not too late that day. Or later on Thursday. Date: 15 Nov 13:47:28 From: Z To: X Cc: Y Subject: Re: Fwd: SUPERVISIONS Hey X, Is a 2 pm Friday supervision possible? Y has a supervision at 4pm on Friday. Z Date: 15 Nov 14:06:27 From: X To: Y, Z Subject: [Course] Supervisions (fwd) Friday at 2.00pm is currently not possible since T and U are at 2.15pm. I won't be able to do anything after Y's 4.00pm supervision because I'm planning to go out of town on Friday evening. The possibilities would seem to be: 1. See if T and U are willing to change their time. 2. Any time from 3.30pm onwards on Thursday. 3. Early morning on Friday, say 8.45am. 4. Swapping with anyone else. 5. Late on Wednesday, say 9.00pm (although I'm not too keen on this one myself). 6. Next week (if none of the above can be scheduled, but it would be nice to get it out of the way sooner rather than later). X ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: 14 Nov 18:54:43 There have been quite a few changes to this week's [Course] supervisions, so I'll just confirm what I believe is the current status for this week: [removed] X Date: 15 Nov 19:53:48 From: Z To: X Subject: Re: [Course] Supervisions Hey X, Y says that his preferred option is next week anyday except 8pm on thursday. And all the people ive emailed about a possible internal swap havent gotten back to me yet. Is this possible? Im thinking as early as possible next week..this supervision has been postponed enough! Z Date: 16 Nov 20:07:14 From: X To: Y, Z Subject: Re: [Course] Supervisions Can you do Monday 3.15pm? Date: 16 Nov 20:19:38 From: Y To: X Subject: [Course] Supervisions yes Date: 16 Nov 21:47:55 From: Z To: X Cc: Y Subject: Re: [Course] Supervisions That is perfect for me. Z |