Is it appropriate for professors to ask students to type notes for their classes (with or without paying students) in United States? I wonder if it is appropriate for professors to ask their students in class to type notes (in latex whatever) for the classes they are teaching and if there is any &quot;elegant&quot; way for students to turn down such request of professors they are taking classes with.
There are several specific scenarios that I am interested in asking about:

Professor asks students to take turns to type the notes for the classes and the notes may be used for publication under the professor's name (with students appearing in the acknowledgement in some way), and professor pays students for doing that.

Professor asks students to take turns to type the notes for the classes and the notes may be used for publication under the professor's name (with students appearing in the acknowledgement in some way), and professor does not pay students for doing that.

Professor asks students to take turns to type the notes for the classes and the notes is just a shared free document for academic purpose, and professor pays students for doing that (simply as an act of kindness).

Professor asks students to take turns to type the notes for the classes and the notes is just a shared free document for academic purpose, and professor does not pay students for doing that.


Which of the options above are appropriate/inappropriate (and why)?
Since if the students are enrolled in the class and it might be hard for them to turn down the professor's request since their grades are &quot;controlled&quot; by the professor (one more question: is it appropriate for professors to make notes-typing a course requirement?), or simply that students might meet professor everyday and there might be invisible pressure for students (especially for graduate students). I understand this must be some grey area in university teaching but it seems to me it is also very common in the graduate level (especially for special topics) courses (but I haven't seen any professors paying students for doing that).

By &quot;publication&quot; I mean publishing the notes as a textbook or monograph to publishers like Springer, APS, etc, profit or nonprofit. And as a consequence the public have to spend money to get access.
It would be unethical for a professor to publish something written by students under the professor’s name without express consent (which is to be given free of any coercive pressure) and coauthorship for the student. (See this recent discussion on a related type of abuse.)
It would also be self defeating and something that no competent professor I’ve met would ever wish to do. Students do not generally write notes at a level that comes close to the level most professors can write on their own. Publishing someone else’s subpar notes under your own name is a sure way to hurt your own reputation even if you do technically get some publication credit.
Setting aside the publication issue, it’s fine to have note-taking as an official course assignment if there is an educational rationale, which there often is. For example in mathematics graduate programs we try to get students to work on improving their mathematical writing skills, which are extremely important for success in research, and some writing assignments of this type are not uncommon.
If note-taking is not an official course assignment but the professor simply asks students to do it on a voluntary basis, the request should be made in a way that makes clear the students should feel free to say no. To put pressure on the students to do things they don’t want to do and that are not an explicit course assignment is unethical, regardless of whether the professor publishes the notes or not, and regardless of whether some payment is exchanged.