Professionalism: What is it good for?

You’re told it’s important. In our classes, we even get graded on it. And when I got the TA mentor position, I was told professionalism is one of the most important things the journalism faculty wants me to help TAs work on.

But what is professionalism, anyway?

I’ve never liked the term for a few reasons. It’s one of those concepts like “networking” and “personal branding” that gets thrown around a lot but isn’t very well defined. “She’s unprofessional” seems too much like a way to say “I don’t like her” without being, well, unprofessional.

Also, I can’t ignore the class bias alarm bell implanted in my brain during my undergraduate years spent learning Marxist political theory. When people say “be professional," they often really mean “be more like people in the professions” – i.e. doctors, lawyers, accountants, and engineers. The key to getting people to take you seriously, it seems, is to act and dress like someone who would hold one of these jobs – someone in the upper middle class.

But even though there are things about the term that rub me the wrong way, there are other things about it that are important, useful and good.

I came across this question posted on an online forum by a 22-year-old trying to break into freelance writing. Basically, she was confused about how to combine advice about everything from business cards to age to clothing to achieve the elusive goal of “being professional.” And she got some really good advice back. Advice including:

- Meet deadlines religiously
- Don’t pretend you know how to do something if you don’t. Ask for help.
- Take responsibility for your mistakes
- Don’t complain about other people
- Cover your butt. Save emails that you can use to defend your actions if they’re called into question.

What all this really boils down to is empathy. If you can empathize with your boss and coworkers, you’ll do your job in a way that makes their lives easier, not harder. If you’re thinking about people other than yourself, you’ll realize how much it stresses people out to show up late and miss deadlines, and how much it helps when you’re punctual. Obviously, this applies to just about everything in life – from handing back assignments to students on time to that golden, mythical day when you’ll actually be employed full time.

All that stuff about appropriate work wear and firm handshakes is a distraction. Thinking about other people is the most important thing.

Tips for effective grading

Journalism TAs probably have the toughest time grading. Not only are students competitive and prone to grade challenges, we’re also expected to hold them up to higher standards of grammar and writing style than in other disciplines.

Here are a few tips to make your life easier. They should apply to TAs in journalism who are working in other departments, too.

1. Remember that grades are an emotional issue.

Something I’ve heard come up in workshops is that if we could just get students to see grades rationally instead of emotionally, all conflicts could be resolved.

This is impossible. When you assign a student a grade, you’re passing judgment on their work. For dedicated students, work is very closely tied to how you define yourself as a person. So to these students, you’re basically grading them on how they’re doing in life.

There can be a “sink or swim” mentality in journalism – and other departments. There’s a difference between coddling someone and remembering that what you write and the grade you give will probably be taken personally - and taking it personally is totally natural.

It helps me to remember the phrase “constructive criticism.” Is what you’re writing constructive, or just criticism? If it’s just criticism, what’s the point in writing it? Ask yourself, “How can I help the student improve?” instead of “Is there anything wrong with this paper that I forgot to point out?”

2. Back up your grades both digitally and as a hard copy.

Emailing grades to yourself is a good idea, because Google’s entire cloud memory is a lot less likely to crash than your hard drive. But have a hard copy too, just in case.

7. Criticize "this paper," not "you.”

This is tied to remembering grades are an emotional issue. Even though students often see their paper as an extension of themselves, you can help break that association by never using the word “you” in your feedback.

8. Use a question rather than a correction to challenge errors.

“How could this sentence be phrased more clearly?” “What other examples could you use here?” This is another tip for making your criticism constructive, not destructive.

9. Put your papers in piles before grading them.

I found this technique very helpful. As you read each paper, put them in piles based on what you thought of them. I generally had three piles: “Very good,” “met all the basic requirements but didn’t blow me away,” and “has some sort of major problem.” I often found that as I went back over them, I re-thought my original assessment if I couldn’t find a concrete reason to justify it. I might not have changed the grade if I hadn’t used that system.

10. Don’t leave all your grading to the last minute.

I marked 50 exams in 48 hours last spring. I liveblogged it. Hopefully there was no long term psychological damage.

11. Be glad there are no research assistant positions this year.

Whenever you’re tempted to put your head down and weep into your pile of unmarked papers, just be thankful that this is not you.

Liz and I are going to offer the grading workshop again, probably on Thursday Oct. 22. In that workshop, we grade a mock essay in groups. Half the groups get a rubric, the other half doesn’t. It’s really interesting to see how other people’s minds work when they grade, and how much having a rubric changes things. You can find the slides for the workshop here.

Materials from discussion groups workshop

Wondering what you missed at the workshop on leading effective discussion groups? You can find the powerpoint slides here. Also, Liz Martin, my always thoughtful and hard-working partner in TA mentor crime, typed up notes on the best take-away tips that came out of the discussions in both workshops. They're copied and pasted below.

Remember that Monday's workshop on grading will be in St. Pat's room 472 at 11:30. That's conveniently nearby and immediately after J5000, but not right next door so the MJ1s don't have to guiltily avoid looking me in the eye as they shuffle past like last time. I try to be thoughtful.

Facilitating Effective Discussions: Sample Scenarios

For the following situations, how could they be handled effectively? How could you prepare yourself to avoid these situations?

1. Only four or five students show up to your discussion group.
• Make the session as fun and useful as possible. Don’t give up because many students are missing.
• Address specific concerns of these students
• Emphasize that the session is still important.
• Have activities or questions prepared in case attendance is low.
• Emphasize importance of regular attendance to students. Let them know you record attendance.
• Keep in touch with students through WebCT or email to let them know what will be happening in upcoming sessions.
• Find out from students how to make discussion groups more useful to them so they want to attend.
• Relate the discussions back to lecture material and readings.
• Emphasize points that might show up on exams.
• Incorporate different media to make your sessions more interesting.

2. One student keeps monopolizing the discussion and bringing it off track.
• Identify the relevant points to what the student says. Paraphrase what the student said and re-focus the discussion
• Make eye contact with other students.
• Call on other students if they are attempting to contribute but are being cut-off.
• Regain control of the discussion by emphasizing that you are the moderator.
• Emphasize that others should get a turn to speak
• Politely interrupt the student if they are becoming obnoxious
• Use smaller-group activities to allow quieter students to have their ideas heard

3. No one in the class has done the readings.
• Have an alternate activity prepared in case students haven’t done readings.
• Divide the reading into sections. Have students break into pairs or small groups, read the section and summarize
• Come prepared with 5-10 key points from the readings. Go through the text in small groups and have groups discuss these points
• Ask at the beginning who has completed which readings. If lots of people did one reading, you can focus the discussion on that reading. If some did another, you can break into smaller groups to discuss individual readings.
• Give pop quizzes at the beginning of sessions to encourage students to read regularly
• Provide students with focus questions a week in advance as a preview to next week

4. You have to lead a discussion after a paper was just handed back that many students did poorly on.
• Address some of the main issues from the essay
• Provide students with resources to help with their next essay
• Have a fun, light activity prepared to get their mind off the essay

5. A student makes a comment that offends another student.
• Handle the situation immediately. Ask the student to explain their comment
o Ask the student if they can restate their point in a less offensive way
o Ask the student to take a moment to think over their statement and give them a chance to reformulate it
• Point out why the comment was offensive
• Focus on the comment, not on the person
• Allow students to take a break if the situation is emotionally charged. Take the opportunity to talk to the individuals privately.
• Establish ground rules with your students in the first class. Outline what kind of behavior is not appropriate.
• Have students create a contract of respect for the classroom.