The relationship between students and professors goes both ways; students should be respectful of their professors and professors should be respectful of their students.

As a science major, I have come across some great professors who intently care about students’ success and learning, and others who are not so great.

When you enter an intensive science course, it is already very intimidating because you are already expecting not to do well and are praying just to pass. So for these classes, I try to take the most recommended professor. This doesn’t always happen, because sometimes, only one professor teaches the course or the section you wanted to take was full by the time you finally got through your 6 a.m. registration process after the website crashed three times. This not only goes for science majors, this goes for all majors and courses; I am just speaking out of experience.

Here at UNH, not all professors are the best—lets be real, there are many terrible professors. Whether they really care and just can’t get the information across to the students clearly because of the content, or they can’t get information out clearly because of their accents or simply because they don’t care and believe we are idiotic college students who don’t care and don’t try or want to learn so they don’t care either, a bad professor is a bad professor.

I personally have experienced a little bit of everything throughout the first half of my college career, and I appreciate professors who care to get to know your name and care to make sure you understand the information. These professors are the ones who understand that we have a lot of other things to work on so they try not to give a terrible amount of outside class work. I understand when a professor has a hard time getting across to their students for whatever reason.

My biggest pet peeve is when a professor talks down to you, ultimately making you feel stupid, because you don’t understand the information or the purpose of something. I was always taught “no question is stupid,” but in recent classes, I find that statement false.

I’m afraid to ask a question because my professor may think that I don’t have the intelligence to be in the class or may answer in a demeaning way, making me feel more stupid than I already do. Not wanting to ask questions because I feel this way negatively affects my learning, because then I don’t understand the information to my fullest ability.

This has occurred a lot in my labs, probably because it’s putting your lecture knowledge in use, and this is difficult, but as a professor, it is his or her job to guide you and help you understand the material; not just to supervise you.

It’s just frustrating because I do pay to go here and I don’t think that every professor does their job to their fullest ability, yet I’m expected to do my job to my fullest ability. Of course I try my hardest because, like every college student, I want that A.

However, no matter how terrible a professor may be, I still feel that, as a student, I should give them respect because they are giving me my grade, after all. That sounds terrible to say, but its true; students often give up their personal dignity for a good grade in a class. GPA is everything in college.