Professors' Guide

Given how concerned most students are about grades, it's amazing how little they know about how grading is done. Actually, it's not so amazing. Universities go to great lengths to hide—or at least not disclose—facts about grading that anyone who's taught at a university for more than a year knows. Want a peek? Read on.

1. It's 10 minutes—and then on to the next. You might think that your grader will spend half an hour to an hour grading each student's piece of work. Not so. Unfortunately, given that an instructor might have a stack of 30, 40, or even 70 papers or tests to grade, he or she has only about 10 minutes to devote to each piece of graded work. This is why you should make your claims clearly and forcefully, avoid any irrelevant or unnecessary material, and take the trouble to really explain your points.

2. The grading is often outsourced. In large classes at large colleges, the professor giving the lecture is rarely the one who does the grading. Instead, there is usually a cadre of low-paid grad students who do the grading. You might know the grad student as the TA running your discussion section. But your grader might also be an unseen and unnamed person who has been hired only to grade the written work, with no other duties in the course. Some professors actively manage the grad student or grader, going over sample papers and setting a grading scale. But other professors are happy to delegate the whole job to the underling and never set eyes on student work.

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No one should lunge at graduate school. Getting an advanced degree can take years and can cost tens of thousands of dollars if you're not lucky enough to land a fellowship. And no one should begin planning for graduate school in October of their senior year. Putting together a good application—one that can really sell—is the product of years of careful planning and doing the right stuff to get yourself ready for graduate work in your desired field.

How do you do this? Follow our step-by-step guide to getting ready for the graduate school of your choice:

1. Don't fixate too early. There's no point making a decision about whether to go to graduate school until you've finished about half of the courses in your major—especially the upper-division or advanced courses. Only then can you see whether you like the field enough to devote yourself full time to working in it, and whether you're good enough in it to make it your profession.

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Professors are human beings, too, with real human feelings. How your professor feels about you can influence how much time he or she is willing to put in to help you with the course, and even how good a recommendation he or she is willing to write for grad school or a job. Surprisingly enough, only 1 in 100 students thinks about this. Assuming you're one of the other 99, we offer you our baker's dozen of tips on how to ingratiate yourself to your professor:

1. Look interested. Professors like nothing better than to see alert and engaged students seated front and center in their classes. Even if they're usually too polite to mention it, professors do notice students who sit there yawning or looking bummed out—or, worse yet, openly texting or reading E-mail. If you look as if you're following, actively taking notes, and showing an interest in the material, you'll stand out from the huddled masses.

2. Say hi to the professor when he or she enters the room. Seems obvious. But take a look sometime at how few students do it.

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One of the most exciting things about starting college is finally being able to make your own decisions—no family rules to heed or break. But then it turns out that being responsible means you're the only one to blame when things go wrong, and suddenly independence doesn't seem all that great. This week, visiting blogger Marjorie Savage, parent program director at the University of Minnesota and author of You're on Your Own (But I'm Here If You Need Me) offers 10 tips for college students as they figure out a new relationship with their family:

1. Keep in touch. With all the technology out there—E-mail, texting, Skype, Facebook, Twitter—your parents don't just have the tools to talk to you every day, they can even see you. And if they paid for your phone and laptop, they probably expect you to use those gifts to contact them at least occasionally. Texting and E-mailing are ideal for checking in quickly without facing a lengthy conversation. The once-a-week or twice-a-month phone calls, though, are helpful for keeping up with what's happening at home and letting your parents know you're still thinking about them.

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