I would like to solicit your thoughts on a problem I have every semester or two. Every college or university I know of has a policy for excused absences. Most of the absences are for sports activities (at least at those schools that have sports) but some are for field trips and other academic activities. In most cases I have no problem adjusting to the student absences and the students make up any missed work. However, in one of my courses students make brief presentations that are integrated into our discussion of the material. If the student is not present, the other students suffer by not hearing the presentation by the absent student. I cannot really have the student present at another time since we will be discussing other topics by the next class. My question is what is the right thing to do in this situation. Can I tell a student that her or his grade will suffer if the class is missed (if I put this in my syllabus)? Will my (or your) institution back me in this case? Or do institutionally approved absences always trump classroom activities? And if so, is this really appropriate? What message does this send about the importance of being in class?
Any thoughts will be appreciated. Jeff Nagelbush [EMAIL PROTECTED] _________________________________________________________________ MSN Photos is the easiest way to share and print your photos: http://photos.msn.com/support/worldwide.aspx --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
