What if I miss class?

Much of the learning in this course happens through your engagement with me and your peers in class via class discussion and group interaction. Your course projects will be sequential and in-class activities will build toward larger assignments. Class time and online discussions will be highly interactive, requiring frequent participation, discussion, composing in and outside of class, and responding to your classmates’ work. For this reason, I expect you to attend all class meetings and post by the due dates on the days we work outside of class.

Please note: Failure to submit an online assignment by the due date (typically by class time on Thursdays) will count as an absence, and you will not receive credit for the assignment. I will post all assignments on the “Schedule” page of our course blog, but it is up to you to keep up with your work for the class. Just because we do not meet face-to-face on Thursdays does not mean we will not have “class”—only that you will have work due instead of coming to a face-to-face class meeting.

Having established this policy, note that you can miss class up to 2 times, no questions asked. Only religious holidays constitute excused absences; beyond that I do not have excused or unexcused absences. Any absence, up to your second one, is excused with no questions asked.

If you have more than 2 absences (including 2 missed posts on our “online day” on Thursdays), your final course grade will be lowered by a half letter for each additional absence (a B+ becomes a B)—and your grade likely will be otherwise affected simply because of the activities and work you’ll miss.

If you miss class more than 4 times, you must arrange to meet with me privately and, according to Baruch College policy, you will be subject to a WU grade, which counts as an F on your transcript and your GPA.

If you must miss class, let me know ahead of time if possible to make sure you stay caught up. If you miss unexpectedly, check the schedule on our course website and make friends with someone in class to see what you missed so you can stay up with your work. If you miss class, please do not email me asking what we did in class, or, worse, if we did anything in class you should know about.

If an assignment is due on a day that you miss because of an unexcused absence, you are responsible for keeping up with the daily schedule and contacting someone in the class to see what you missed and for turning in your work at the same time it was due for those who were in class [see “Late Work”].

What if I’m late to class or leave early?

Because showing up on time and respecting other people are important parts of being a good student (in your case), a good teacher (in my case), and ultimately a good human being, I’ll hold all of us to a standard of being on time to class and staying until class is over. Late arrivals and early departures are disruptive and ultimately disrespectful. Therefore, if you arrive late to class late more than twice it will count as an absence. The same will hold true if you leave class early more than twice. If you do arrive late to class, please check with someone nearby to see what you may have missed.

What if I need to drop the course?

If you feel you must drop or withdraw from this course (and I hope you don’t find yourself in that situation), you must do so by the dates on the Spring 2016 Baruch academic calendar. Merely ceasing to attend class is not the same as dropping or withdrawing; dropping and withdrawing are separate, formal administrative procedures. Dropping is officially removing the course from your schedule within the first three weeks of class with no grade of W appearing on your transcript; withdrawing is officially removing the course from your schedule any time between weeks 3 and 11, and as a result, receiving a permanent “W” on your transcript for the course. If you’re having difficulty in the class for any reason, I encourage you to let me know before withdrawing.

Can I turn work in late? What if I have technology issues?

No. All work is due at the time specified within the assignment details. If you’re not already in the habit of turning your work in on time, I encourage you to develop the practice and will try to help you in that endeavor in this course.

Please note that technology issues, including files you turn in that I cannot open, do not constitute an excuse for late work. Double check your files before and after you submit them to make sure your peers and I who will be reviewing them can open them. As you may have learned the hard way in the past, it’s a good habit to save important files such as course work to a location aside from your laptop or whatever device you may use for your classes—for example, Google Drive. Hard drives crash, thumb drives get lost, and laptops, tablets, and phones can get stolen. While I’ll be sad along with you if this happens, it’s your responsibility to make sure you back up your work so that life—and your effective participation in this course—can go on.

How much time will the class require?

The college standard is that students spend about two hours working outside of class for every hour spent in class. For a four-hour course, that equals an average eight hours of time outside of class per week. In this hybrid course we will meet each Tuesday from 2:55-4:35, approximately two hours. Even though we will not meet face-to-face on Thursdays, you will be expected to do work outside of class (online typically) that will take as much time (or more) as would meeting twice per week. It’s important to keep in mind that a hybrid class does not mean less work than a regular, face-to-face class; it means some of the work and time we would spend sitting in a classroom we will spend working outside of class and writing online (such as online discussions with classmates and me about our readings and your writing).

In sum, you can expect to spend approximately two hours in class on Tuesday and ten hours outside of class on this hybrid course. Outside work includes reading course texts, writing blog responses to course readings, and drafting and revising your major projects. At times, you will also be asked to collaborate with some of your classmates on course reading responses outside of class. I try to assign larger amounts of homework between our online sessions Thursday and our in-class meetings on Tuesday and keep outside work between Tuesday and Thursday lighter. However, you may want to look ahead on the course schedule and compare it to your other classes to see if there are certain weeks where a lot will be expected of you so you can manage your time accordingly.

What if I have a disability?

Baruch College is committed to making individuals with disabilities full participants in the programs, services, and activities of the college community through compliance with Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990. It is the policy of Baruch College that no otherwise qualified individual with a disability will be denied access to any program, service, or activity offered by the university. Individuals with disabilities have a right to request accommodations. If you require any special assistance or accommodation, please contact the Office of Services for Students with Disabilities at (646) 312-4590, and let me know as soon as you can, ideally during the first three weeks of the semester. I encourage persons with disabilities or particular needs that impact course performance to meet with me to co-design accommodations.

For additional information see: http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/facultyhandbook/DisabilitiesInformation.htm

A Note About Academic Integrity

I’ll expect you to compose your projects ethically, meaning that if you use the work of others you cite that work, and that all work in this course is original, composed for the first time for this course, and is entirely your own, to the degree that anything we write is entirely our own. All students enrolled at Baruch are expected to maintain the highest standards of academic honesty, as defined in the Baruch Student Handbook. Plagiarism is the act of presenting another person’s ideas, research or writing as your own, such as:

• Copying another person’s actual words without the use of quotation marks and footnotes (a functional limit is four or more words taken from the work of another)
• Presenting another person’s ideas or theories in your own words without acknowledging them
• Using information that is not considered common knowledge without acknowledging the source

Plagiarism is a serious offense that, if done knowingly and depending on the severity and other factors, can result in a failing grade (or worse) and a mark on your permanent academic record. If you ever have any questions or concerns about plagiarism, please ask me. You can also check out the online plagiarism tutorial prepared by members of the Newman Library faculty at http://newman.baruch.cuny.edu/help/plagiarism/default.htm and Baruch College’s academic integrity policy at http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/academic/academic_honesty.htm.