Difficult professor/preceptor- has this happened to you?

[DHEA]

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So I think my professor hates me (or dislikes, at least). I am not sure why since I have only had him for 2 guest lectures in the past 2 years and never spoken to him until recently. Normally it would not be a huge deal, but this is a class that revolves around group presentations and I feel like my group is being singled out and I do not want to cause any of my group members grief on account of myself. So far, we have gotten the most complicated case, he has singled out our group consistently for SERIES of difficult questions (i will answer- he will ask another question delving into detailed statistics and things that he mentioned were out of the scope of the course) while other groups get asked questions like "did you read about such-and-such other therapy?" In fact, one group could not answer his question (at least it was related to the therapeutics...) at all and the professor just answered it himself and said it was an "FYI" then complimented them. I am not the only one who has noticed this (the rest of my group has, as well as my friends who feel like our questions were much more difficult than theirs)

On one hand, I know this is his personality. He is a very intelligent pharmacist and I do look up to him. It just makes me anxious that he seems very understanding and lenient to other groups, and does not "pimp" them if they do not have a satisfactory answer. Even in my group's evaluations, the ONLY person who got points deducted was myself (mostly in the "subjective" areas, some with no explanation). Some deductions were fair- for example I have anxiety in public speaking (I am a shy person- not type A, but not asperger's level)- so I am still working on that.

Have any of you experienced this type of behavior before? How do you deal with these situations?

I have tried talking to him after every class to follow up on his comments, and genuinely try to learn from them. However, while he seems more positive towards our group then (says we have a good understanding and he wants us to push it to the next level, etc) he doesn't really smile when he talks and seems in a hurry.

I take his comments to heart but when I make those improvements on the next presentation I will get points deducted for something else.

I have already given up on keeping my 4.0 because of this class and it is starting to make me greatly question my own ability. I guess I just want to know if anyone has every experienced some weird, negative vibe from a preceptor or professor before, or if any of you ARE professors or preceptors, if you have any insight on why a professor/preceptor might act this way. Starting to think there is something wrong with me :/.

 

[Ackj]

I'm not sure of all the details, but maybe the topics your group is doing is a specialty of his, whereas the other groups are not?

For example, I'm doing an am care rotation at an endocrinology clinic now, and our professor is a genius on diabetes with multiple publications. We get pimped on diabetic things all the time, since she knows a lot about the topic. When a student was doing a presentation about ACS, and she didn't really have much to ask them, since it was not her area of expertise, so the questions were obviously simpler.

 

[DHEA]

I'm not sure of all the details, but maybe the topics your group is doing is a specialty of his, whereas the other groups are not?

For example, I'm doing an am care rotation at an endocrinology clinic now, and our professor is a genius on diabetes with multiple publications. We get pimped on diabetic things all the time, since she knows a lot about the topic. When a student was doing a presentation about ACS, and she didn't really have much to ask them, since it was not her area of expertise, so the questions were obviously simpler.

I thought about that, but his specialty is in surgery and our presentation was on obesity pharmacotherapy (i guess you could relate the two a bit actually).

I want to think all professors act this way occasionally to challenge students (I wouldn't mind it if it was meant to push and challenge), but part of me is starting to think he is power tripping over pimping an easy target (anxious, quiet, not type A).

 

[jyso]

So after graduation they just placed me in a slow store, then they placed me in a high volume store in which I was supposed to work for 2 weeks to gain some experience. But my training store (the very intense and high volume) has now been my permanent store. Ive asked my supervisor numerous of times to see if I could go to a slower store, but they told me to stick it out and that Im doing a good job.

I can handle the volume and the intensity of having to do over 4000+ scripts a week. But after months and months it has finally take a toll on my health and social life. I kind of feel like my supervisor hasnt been willing to help me switch to a different store, but finding someone willing to come to our store is hard... (kind of infamous in the district for all the craziness and high script volume).

With a lot of changes happening with the upper heads in my district, I do not know if I should wait to talk to my new supervisor comes in or if I should just call another district's supervisor and ask if their is any openings for a possible switch. But dont want it to seem like I am going above my new supervisor in doing so (which I know probably looks like i am doing, but this isnt my intentions, just tired of having nothing being done).

 

[Stinkycheezmonk]

Some professors prefer that you talk to them during their office hours, rather than immediately after class. You might get better responses and/or a less rushed response trying that.