In 34 years of teaching I have changed my mind on this subject about 33
times. In the last few years, I have been less skeptical. My thinking on
this is that students rarely do better on late exams than on the other exams
they take on time, so they probably aren't gaining anything. It is not
really any skin off my nose, and they often do have legitimate reasons. Many
times they are making it up, but if I refuse to give in, it hurts the ones
who aren't lying. My favorite was a message I receive from a student saying
that his mother had been mugged and was in the hospital. He had to be at the
hospital with her until she was out of danger. It was soooo good. It
contained all the elements, mothers, hospitals, unforseable accidents and
crime that I figured he probably couldn't have made it up and if he did he
deserved to take it late because it was absolutely unique.
Harry Avis PhD
Sierra College
Rocklin, CA 95677
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Life is opinion - Marcus Aurelius
There is nothing that is good or bad, but that thinking makes it so -
Shakespeare
>From: Payam Heidary <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Subject: Your Thoughts
>Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2001 19:25:11 -0700 (PDT)
>
>Dear Colleagues,
>
>I wanted to get some of your ideas and opinions on
>taking student excuses from their face value. In other
>words how do most of you handle situations where
>students are absent on the day of exams and when
>assignments are due. Do you require some sort of
>documentation such as a doctor's visit letter from the
>student before allowing the student to make-up an exam
>or for not penalizing later work or assignments. How
>do you handle cases like this? Do you just take the
>student's word or story about the emergency that came
>up for them as being valid or do you require them to
>provide you documentation of the emergency as to why
>they could not attend class on the day of the exam or
>assignment due date. Your feedback is appreciated on
>this matter.
>
>Payam Heidary
>
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