“I have a theory: Google has changed how college students interact with their teachers. I estimate that 90% of the questions that students email to ask me are already answered on their syllabus and the webpages linked to from the syllabus. But hardly anyone thinks to look at the syllabus before firing off an email question. My theory is that they are strongly habituated to dealing with a question by asking Google, and in relation to our class, I am Google.”
—Alan Jacobs, Baylor University professor