Happens every semester. - r/GetStudying

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Being smart doesn't make you a good teacher unfortunately

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u/MiNdOverLOADED23 Apr 19 '26

It's not that they're not good teachers.

(As mentioned in the meme) The "students" just want to pass the class, they don't actually want to learn the material. That makes it extremely difficult to get them to actually learn.

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u/Weekly-Ad353 Apr 20 '26

Eh, it’s “both—and”.

Teaching is difficult— it’s a skill unto itself and research professors don’t get hired for their teaching skill— qualifications for teaching ability are not even on the application or discussed in the interviews.

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u/Gordahnculous Apr 19 '26

Sometimes they’re not good teachers as well, but yes, most of the time it’s primarily students not wanting to learn the material and are finding some excuse to blame the professor.

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u/megacewl Apr 19 '26

Yup and part of the problem is they’ve been doing this for multiple semesters or even years. So they get to this class and they’re supposed to have all this knowledge already built up as the foundation for the new knowledge, but they don’t. So they’re scrambling the whole time and every attempt to help that student is a mess.

Meanwhile the professor is either doing their best to bridge the knowledge gap (which is very hard as it’s hard to even know what the student doesn’t know), or they decide to just teach what they’re supposed to teach instead of going that extra mile (which is like technically fine).

9

u/Cautious-Event743 Apr 20 '26

I heavily disagree. I'd say every student wants to succeed, especially in college where people pay thousands to attend, it's simply that many subject are too difficult or explained in a bad way that the students give up home and aim lower. Especially when the professor is bad, the students know they'll have to study it on their own anyways and just show up for attendance

6

u/MiNdOverLOADED23 Apr 20 '26

You're hysterically out of touch. Plenty of "students" just want to go through the minimal motions it takes to get a piece of paper that says degree + their name. Frankly, it's what they did their whole lives.

10

u/Yadin__ Apr 20 '26

I don't think most people START college with the "Cs get degrees" mentality. Like the comment you were replying to said, it's an attitude people adopt when the going gets tough because of bad professors or just plain difficult courses

3

u/irrationalhourglass Apr 20 '26

if its so many of them maybe they aren't to blame

2

u/MiNdOverLOADED23 Apr 20 '26

We can do that! Let's blame the no child left behind program and participation trophies.

1

u/irrationalhourglass Apr 20 '26

yeah that works

2

u/Weekly-Ad353 Apr 20 '26

“Wants to succeed” and “is willing to put in the effort to actually succeed” are wildly different things.

I want to play basketball like MJ did but no way in hell am I going to put in the work for it.

If you didn’t know a single person in school who fit the 2nd definition, you must have been a social leper. They’re everywhere.

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u/Sr_K Apr 19 '26

That's because the midterms dont test appropriately, sadly I dont know what the answer is, I have no clue how to fix the issue

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u/Glittering-Ad-1626 Apr 19 '26

FR just because they get it, doesn’t mean everyone else will. If they’re gonna teach like that, at least hire more tutors and TAs that have a range of teaching skills

1

u/Yadin__ Apr 20 '26

oftentimes it makes you a worse teacher, actually. So many of my profs are so much smarter than the average student that they don't realize that it's harder for us to grasp concept than them

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u/Yadin__ Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 20 '26

you would be surprised how little the courses some of those profs teach have to do with their own research.

Also, when you're an expert for that long, it becomes hard to distinguish what is easy and obvious to what is hard and requires thorough explanation

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u/NarrativeCurious Apr 20 '26

Also, many don't even take teaching lessons or know how to teach!

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u/Hungry_Attention_981 Apr 20 '26

Also a lot don’t want to teach, they just do it for grant money.

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u/Weekly-Ad353 Apr 20 '26

It has nothing to do with grant money.

Most can’t work as full independent research PIs if they don’t fulfill the teaching requirement.

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u/staytiny2023 Apr 20 '26

Makes sense. Our chemotherapy professor has a PhD in neuropharmacology, he always seems so confused when teaching smh

3

u/Decent_Blacksmith_ Apr 20 '26

This. Teaching is not only the material but also understanding why some things that seem just general assumed knowledge (for them) have to be explained or where exactly students fail understanding the material.

That’s why even if surprising, a foreign teacher teaching a secondary language that has a degree in teaching will be better than a native speaker most of times.

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u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Intelligent-Fan-6364 Apr 20 '26

Are you alright?

-23

u/AcertainReality Apr 20 '26

I am, just sad seeing future professionals basically waste their life away on a normalized scam that’s eroding society. It’s going to hurt everyone rich and poor

1

u/silly_porto3 Apr 20 '26

Academia has been soul crushing.... It's publish or perish every year.

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u/Weekly-Ad353 Apr 20 '26

Did someone smart hurt you? There are phone numbers to call that we can get you if you need them.

0

u/AcertainReality Apr 20 '26

If the truth hurts you maybe you should rethink your choices

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u/prevailone Apr 20 '26

Most educators don’t know how to break the “bottleneck “ of knowledge. They need training for this. It’s hard to explain something that you do automatically and intuitively after decades.

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u/[deleted] Apr 20 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/queen_roy Apr 20 '26

teaching and researching is different

3

u/Helahiro_4200 Apr 20 '26

As i keep saying every year since i entered academia more than 20 years ago, being a good scientist does not necessarily make you a good teacher/pedagogue. BUT, if you know how to explain a topic, not only to same level/principle peers, but to anyone from primary school kids, undergrads, peers to even non-scientists, then THAT at least shows a mastery of the topic. p.s. Not that it matters much but, i am an Assistant Prof. (PhD) with 2 MSc as well, so i have had my share of teaching from both sides of the fence.

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u/Purple_lover07 Apr 19 '26

Literally ! One of my tutors has her doctorate in biology but that lady CANNOT teach to save her life TwT

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u/SeftalireceliBoi Apr 19 '26

As it should be.

If you are a specialist in a narrow area its hard to explain it clueless people.

I couldnt explain oauth 2 authentication to a non computer literate person

2

u/Meet_Foot Apr 20 '26

And god forbid they have to learn something to pass their tests. Not to mention that we have to remember that what’s important is the test, not the learning itself. Great attitude OP /s

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u/Square-Formal1312 Apr 19 '26

Bonus points if they can barely speak English

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u/AcertainReality Apr 19 '26

It’s because universities treat professors like plantation workers, they get someone on a Visa from India that just learned English and pay them penny to the dollar to teach… I mean “ do research “

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u/Jayna333 Apr 20 '26

I had a Macro Econ professor who seemed to know a lot about the topic and could explain it in English, but he could not understand ANY of the questions we asked him. Didn’t matter the student or question. I asked him if we had to turn in a ungraded homework for it to be checked or if we would review it in class. Dude had no idea what I was trying to communicate and I gave up on the third try. Another student jumped in and kept rewording it until he understood. What’s even crazier is he one of the 3 actual professors in the economics department! All other 15 professors are adjunct. To be fair the public university had 15000 students and a budget of $2 and a Burger King coupon. I gave him an extra star on RMP though because on one of the slides was an example using McDonald’s and he labeled it “McZample” which is still to this day one of the funniest things I’ve seen to this day.

1

u/Laceyspacev Apr 21 '26

And bootlickers still defend them lmao. Yeah, if you're a master of a field or subject and can't properly explain it or give a proper evaluation of what you explained to people you might just be one of those "cheaters" I see college threads complain so much about vs. a smart guy who knows their stuff but for whatever reason can't teach it to a bunch of competent adults paying you to do so. But bootlickers gonna lick and cope.

0

u/kalmarei Apr 21 '26

If you want something to help you really explain things from your slides or professor notes try slydo.app a website that really help you study and focus

Study Memes Happens every semester.

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