It's the passivity of freshman that gets to me. If they don't understand, they blame me. In preparing to write Teaching College Freshmen , we heard these sentiments echoed many times. Faculty complained about students' lack of motivation, their neglect of their studies, and their refusal to assume any responsibility for their learning. At the same time, freshmen told us the pace in most courses was far beyond them, it was not humanly possible to do all the work, they frequently felt overwhelmed, and their professors seemed neither to notice nor to care whether or not they learned.
Freshmen expect, of course, to study more in college, and most apparently do.
Studying more would only help, of course, if students studied in productive ways. Although it is difficult to pin down what freshmen actually do when they study, surveys of our students reveal a fairly limited repertoire of study activities. Most say they read assignments, underline or highlight important ideas work assigned problems, and read over or copy over their lecture notes. Few freshmen can keep pace with their courses if they study only an hour between classes and if their only study activities are reading, highlighting, and copying over notes. Faculty expect more, and those who teach freshmen play an important role both in making expectations about college work explicit and in helping freshmen develop their study skills.