Attendance
Policy
Michael Taber
St. Mary’s College of
Maryland
Executive summary:
Don’t exceed the two-week mark!
You have sensibly
chosen a small college. If you had wanted to be facelessly anonymous, you could
have chosen to enroll at Enormous U. Directly relating to each other about
matters of (I’m sure you’ll come to agree) great importance to us as
individuals and as members of communities is the best of college experiences.
This course is structured
as a seminar. That means we use real-time, in-person discussions to explore,
understand, and even disagree about the text assigned. Even though I have
guideposts for the discussions, the presence or absence of individuals in a
class on a given day will shape how that day’s conversation unfolds and what
new understandings we develop as a class. Missing class isn’t just about
missing the content. In this course, it’s not just about “what we go over,” but
“HOW” we go over it that’s critical for your learning. That’s why showing up
matters.
For at least this
reason, regular attendance at, and participation in, the class are central to
this course. (Besides, it’s well-nigh impossible to do well in this course
without regular attendance, and difficult without regular participation.)
Except for absences due
to participating in approved college activities (like athletics or traveling to
a conference), everyone is allowed two weeks’ worth of absences (excused or
unexcused) per semester without automatically failing the course. (That is, six
absences for a MWF class, and four for a TuTh class.)
Having one additional absence—excused or unexcused—will result in failing the
course, despite the quality of the rest of the student’s work. (Unless cleared with the professor, arriving to class more
than 15 minutes late or departing from class more than 15 minutes early counts
as an absence.)
(Students using an
approved ADA accommodation for “modified attendance policy” will be granted one
extra absence; so the grade wouldn’t be affected even with absences of 2 weeks
+ 1 class, but would automatically become an F upon the 2 weeks + 2 classes.)
An exception to the
preceding is for students who are forced by quarantine rules to stay away from
classes. In such cases, the student should contact the instructor ASAP—and in
any case, prior to the first class missed due to quarantining.
The first recourse
students should use to catch up when absent—for any reason—is to look for a communication
from their Back-Up Buddy, a system to be explained and signed up for in class.
Students can also contact the instructor for added assistance, of course.
As I hope is obvious—or
soon will be once the semester starts—the fact that you are allowed some absences without any
automatic loss of grade should not be interpreted as a recommendation to
actually use said absences. Not only do you want to avoid imprudently
and prematurely emptying your bank account only to find out that you’re getting
walloped with a cold or some other less than quarantining bug near the end of
the semester, but your ability to make sense of the material, your ability to
become fluent in philosophically informed ways of thinking, and your ability to
succeed in your assignments would be unhappily compromised in proportion to
your number of absences.
Send
me mail: mstaber
at smcm dot edu
Go to Michael Taber's home page.
Go to the SMCM home page.