Late Nights in the Library: Meeting Students on Their Terms

It was about 2:00 in the morning, and I was up late drinking Code Red Mountain Dew and snacking on honey barbeque Fritos and sour gummy worms. I was forming my routine for writing research papers as an undergraduate, and I had found my fuels of choice.

Sure, I had known about the paper for a few weeks. And yes, there had been plenty of time to work on it before now. But hey, I was in college now. I could stay up all night if I wanted to!

Thankfully, my paper writing regimen has improved since then, but even through seminary, I never finished a paper until close to the deadline. Maybe I work best under pressure. (Or maybe I have poor time management skills. But I prefer the thing about working better under pressure.)

I remember all the syllabi telling me that if I wanted help or feedback from my professor, I had to submit something no later than one week before the due date. (Insert guffaw here. Who has anything ready for review a week ahead of time??)

Therefore, the only guidance and feedback I got was after I’d submitted the paper to be graded. This “feedback” came in the form of pointed comments and points deducted.

Reasonable Expectations

Now, maybe you were different. You got all your work done well ahead of time, so you expect students to do the same. But for those of you who resonate with my former practices, let me ask you this: If we did at least some of our research and writing last-minute, why do we expect our students to do anything different?

Do we include instructions to submit drafts or sources for feedback one or two weeks ahead of time, when we know full well very few students will take advantage of that? Do we put those clauses in just so we can say, “Well, I gave you a chance to get help. But you didn’t take advantage of it. So here’s your D.”

Now, we should never encourage procrastination. Nor should we commend the practice of cramming in library late nights right before a paper deadline. But often, faculty expect students to make time only during the day (AKA: during our office hours). Normally, this is reasonable. But when do you think students are doing most of their work on their papers? (When did you do most of your work on your papers?) It’s at night, when they can focus more, and yet faculty are nowhere to be seen. I’ll bet if you surveyed your students, over eighty percent of work on term papers is done during the evenings on the week the paper is due.

Meeting Students Where (and When) They Are

If your students are doing their work in the evenings leading up to the due date, why not be available to help them then?

I make it a practice every semester to spend a few late evenings in our university’s library. I publish those times to students and treat them like office hours.

I bring my coffee, laptop, and any reading I need to get done. Even if no students show up, it’s not wasted time.

And here is where some of my best interactions all semester often happen. Students will come up and have lengthy conversations about their chosen text/topic, and I can physically walk around the library with them, helping them select responsible sources. Or they can bring their laptop, work on a section of their paper, and then show it to me to get instant feedback. This keeps them from doing hours or days of work on their own, only to be told they’re doing it wrong or headed in a bad direction.

I get good time with students that I’d never get during the day, when they’re busy going from class to class. And I make sure to schedule these evenings the week the papers are due. That’s when students are doing their most focused work. Why not come alongside them and help them on their terms for once?

Some Tips

1. Schedule this time and put it in the syllabus. Let students know when you’ll be available to help.
2. Don’t be disappointed or resentful if no one shows up. It may take them a while to “get” this new concept.
3. Bring your own work to do, but don’t count on getting it done. You want to focus on the students who show up and not be worried about the work you’re not getting done.
4. Find where your students do their writing. (Hint: it’s probably not their dorms or apartments.) The library is my chosen location because the research sources are there. (This is changing with the constant digitization of content.) But maybe a nearby coffee shop would work better in your context.
5. As soon as you arrive at your location in the library or coffee shop, email your students and tell them exactly where to find you. Also email them when you leave. That way, they don’t have to worry about showing up and not finding you.
6. Bring coffee.

I’ve applied this idea to paper writing help. But it would also help for exam studying. Imagine a 10:00 pm exam review session that you facilitate! There are many possible applications.

This costs you a few hours of sleep, but I think the rewards are very much worth it, not only for your students’ papers, but for students’ relationship with you.

So grab your coffee and a book, and head to the library at night to pretend you’re cool again!

Photo Credit: “DSCF1759.JPG” by Christopher Neugebauer— CC by 2.0

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