Student e-mail and the Blackboard Academic Suite are two wonderful systems that allow students and teachers to keep each other informed on assignments and other aspects of the courses they are enrolled in together.In theory, the two systems work together to provide an easy form of communication and access to documents, slide shows and syllabi. I feel the systems themselves do a decent job. However, the students and faculty who use them could use some improvement. The phrase “operator error” comes to mind.

On more than one occasion, I’ve opened my e-mail only to have 10 messages from one person who apparently clicked the “send” button nine times too many. Also, the subject of these e-mails usually lets the recipient know the sender is lazy and is asking for a typed copy of the notes from the class he missed. I typically delete these messages without reading them.

I refuse to send a copy of the notes I took to someone who was too lazy to attend. Another popular question asked through e-mail is “When is the test?” These usually come from the students who refuse to attend class on a regular basis. I love these e-mails because it allows me the opportunity to respond with “He said it in class today.”

Students are not the only people who have conflicts with the systems.

Many faculty members on campus refuse to use the Blackboard and e-mail systems. I think I speak for every student when I say we don’t like attending class when the instructor fails to show up without informing the students of the absence. I would also like to log on to Blackboard just one time and see all of my grades neatly posted and calculated the way it was intended.

One day, “Course Documents” will actually contain documents that are important to the class.

It shouldn’t be hard to communicate between students and instructors. In my opinion, we make it much harder than it has to be. I think most of the conflicts between the systems come from the operator and not so much the technology.

Hopefully the implementation of the BANNER system will make it easier to realize simplistic communication between students and faculty. The easiest way to simplify communication, however, would be to think before sending 42 e-mails with the subject line “I Need Notes NOW!!!” or to take that extra five minutes to send a mass e-mail to students saying class has been canceled.

I know there are students and faculty who wield the technology appropriately, and I applaud you for it. However, there will always be duller knives in the drawer and those are the people I usually “peeve” over.