r/UTS • u/BookkeeperFinal1327 • 5d ago

Low quality lectures

I don't understand the point of doing a prerecorded lecture when the lecturer just sits there and slowly reads the poor quality, copy and pasted slides which have probably been used for the last 6 years.

Do you think we can't read? Your job is to explain the terrible quality slides not do bedtime stories.

We pay thousands and thousands of years for these courses and the quality of learning materials put out is quite frankly appalling.

122 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

16 comments sorted by

28

u/AussieSpender 5d ago

It’s people being lazy. Recorded lectures in Covid and keep reusing them. I’ve seen ones with blatantly outdated information and at the bottom of the canvas page they might have a little amendment list.

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u/[deleted] 4d ago edited 4d ago

[deleted]

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u/AussieSpender 4d ago

Yeah there’s 2 sides to it all, but not showing up for the 20 people who need to attend the lectures in person just because the other 280 are mucking off isn’t acceptable. We pay thousands for courses and therefore expect them to be taught to a high standard like other universities in Sydney.

As much as I would love to, I find it easier to go and get a textbook from the library and read and notetake from it for a day than sit in a chair and watch a recorded lecture for an hour. I can’t help it, it’s just who I am. And I absolutely love learning, I hold a quite high wam and am very much considering the masters-phd pipeline after a couple years gaining experience in the workplace. Online recordings are not for everyone and the signal that this sends to me is that I should basically be watching YouTube videos, doing practical projects, and udemy courses on the topic instead of paying thousands for the course because that’s the level of value that is being provided to me.

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u/[deleted] 4d ago

[deleted]

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u/AussieSpender 4d ago

Sure recorded lectures are better than anything, but the whole thing about lectures being able to be streamed/recorded at the same time are happening on campus should not be an issue since that technology has been around for over a decade and is in pretty much every university at this point.

And yeah sure many people might get along fine and decide not to show up to lectures because they don’t need them, for people like me that struggle with ADHD (or other issues) but are highly motivated students, it puts us at a disadvantage just because others who can watch the online content just fine don’t feel like coming. I wish I could just sit my ass in the chair and watch the online lecture but my brain doesn’t work the way I want it to so no matter how hard I try it just doesn’t work. And this is not just a me issue, it’s not an uncommon thing to be neurodivergent (especially in a university environment), putting others at a disadvantage just because another group is “doing just fine on their own” isn’t right.

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u/Head_Acadia_2658 5d ago edited 5d ago

Sometimes it’s because those lecturers turned up to lecture and not a single student turned up. So fuck it. They can have recordings. The recordings can be tracked - almost nobody actually watches them. Small group tutorials? Not allowed to enforce attendance so students don’t turn up. There are some lecturers who have simply checked out in the same way the undergraduate population collectively chose to check out years ago. I’m so sorry for the ones who still want to come and learn. Some of us lecturers still love to teach - but you cannot teach an empty room

Edit - there are also some zombie units being run where that lecturer who actually knew what they were talking about and designed it was made redundant, retired or even died. But their teaching materials and recordings are still being rolled out by a caretaker convenor in the hope that maybe next year…

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u/AussieSpender 5d ago

100% it’s both sides that have caused this, but for someone like me who can’t watch those mind numbingly long and boring recorded lectures because I will find myself inadvertently zoning out and missing key information, it puts most of the onus on me to do self study and research to learn topics.

I understand that many students don’t show up to lectures, but that’s not an excuse for not running any at all. USyd, UNSW, Macquarie, Monash, UniMelb all have it figured out, why doesn’t UTS? Because it’s a culture issue within the university, and it needs to be fixed. UTS used to be a place people wanted to get into (and still partly is) but has turned into a place that dropkicks who didn’t make it into USyd or UNSW go to because they got early entry. The amount of first years that I hear complaining they didn’t get into their first choice is astounding.

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u/Head_Acadia_2658 4d ago

This is across all the Sydney Universities

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u/AussieSpender 4d ago

I have been here for 2 years and have not had the chance to attend a single lecture besides Amanda’s large workshops (if you can call those lectures). Other universities are not on the same level as this.

It also doesn’t excuse not updating information either. There needs to be an expectation set that if the professor does not want to do in person lectures they need to re record them with updated information and examples each year (minimum)/ semester AND be readily responding to emails and canvas discussions.

7

u/AmandaLovestoAudit 4d ago

I suspect part of what you are seeing is also a product of our promotion system. Promotion is supposed to provide equal weighting to teaching and teaching development - but the anecdotal evidence suggests research outputs are still more highly valued than teaching.

And when university rankings weight our research output so heavily as well - none of that helps!

2

u/AussieSpender 4d ago

Research is important. But what should be happening is that the output of that research should be integrated into the learning and course content of students. Many universities globally leverage their research output as a key differentiating factor as to why students should attend their university, for example MIT wouldn’t be know for the technology powerhouse that it is today if it didn’t work to put some of that cutting edge research in the minds of their students to be developed upon further. Research is important but leaving it in the form of papers and in the minds of post-grad students isn’t where it should all be. What’s the point of research if it’s not being utilised

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u/Head_Acadia_2658 4d ago

Wow! That is fucked

1

u/culturecartographer 4d ago

It’s also not people being lazy, but rather, people be asked to do so much with so little time that remaking a lecture isn’t a priority.

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u/utsBoss 5d ago edited 5d ago

It would be cool if some of the subjects gave students the possibility to submit their own version(s) of the video lecture, It could be fun. Specially for the harder subjects.

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u/sourceofmarmite 4d ago

It'll probably be AI slop

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u/totallynotapersonj 5d ago

Yeah they're pretty bad, but honestly they are slightly better than me reading them by myself

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u/iwoolf 2d ago

And some lecturers are exploited casuals, who sometimes don’t get paid for 6 weeks while University admin take time to process their contracts, or get paid less hours than those set for classes. Cheaper to have recordings than pay someone to lecture.

1

u/7kcits 4d ago

Can't entirely blame them. Students just don't give a fuck about attending lectures. I was one of those students, in-person lectures just ate up my time whilst not providing me anything of value. As soon as I saw a non-compulsory lecture, I simply stopped showing up.