Assignment Submission

Students must hand in assignments electronically by following directions on the course website. It is the student's responsibility to keep a copy of each submitted assignment and to back up verifiable, date-stamped copies of each assignment in at least two places online that can be accessed by both the instructor and student (Bb drop box, email, website and/or blog). 

Any paper-only components or appendices of assignments should be given directly to the instructor during the class on or immediately after the deadline. If it is not possible to do so, a daytime drop box is available in SS110; a date stamp is provided for your use. A night drop box is also available for after-hours submission. Assignments will be removed the following morning, stamped with the previous day's date, and placed in the instructor's mailbox.

Registrar-scheduled Final Examination:  No.  An in-class exam is scheduled in late March.

Policy for Late Assignments

Assignments submitted after the deadline may be penalized with the loss of a grade (e.g.: A- to B+) for each day late.

Writing Skills Statement

Faculty policy directs that all written assignments (including, although to a lesser extent, written exam responses) will be assessed at least partly on writing skills. For details see www.comcul.ucalgary.ca/info. Writing skills include not only surface correctness (grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, etc) but also general clarity and organization. Research papers must be properly documented.

If you need help with your writing, you may use the Writing Centre.  Visit the website for more details: www.efwr.ucalgary.ca

Grading System

The following grading system is used in the Faculty of Communication and Culture:

(Revised, effective September 2008)

	Grading scale
A+	96-100
A	90-95.99
A-	85-89.99
B+	80-84.99
B	75-79.99
B-	70-74.99
C+	65-69.99
C	60-64.99
C-	55-59.99
D+	53-54.99
D	50-52.99
F	0-49

Where a grade on a particular assignment is expressed as a letter grade, it will normally be converted to a number using the midpoint of the scale.  That is, A- would be converted to 87.5 for calculation purposes.  F will be converted to zero.

NOTE: The course website provides a grading rubric with descriptions of the qualities expected for each grade level. The instructor’s revision policy applies to only 1 individual assignment per term, on assignments submitted before Week 10.  Please see the policy on the course website.

Plagiarism

Using any source whatsoever without clearly documenting it is a serious academic offense. Consequences include failure on the assignment, failure in the course and possibly suspension or expulsion from the university.

You must document not only direct quotations but also paraphrases and ideas where they appear in your text. A reference list at the end is insufficient by itself. Readers must be able to tell exactly where your words and ideas end and other people’s words and ideas begin. This includes assignments submitted in non-traditional formats such as Web pages or visual media, and material taken from such sources.

Please consult your instructor or the Writing Centre (SS 106, efwr.ucalgary.ca) if you have any questions regarding how to document sources.

Privacy

Students will be expected to read, observe and respond to each other's assignments and performance. Students will be responsible for setting their individual online content’s privacy settings so that the content is either publicly available, or only available to the members of the course. During the course, students and instructors must keep each other's non-public writing confidential to the course community. However, after the course is over you may be contacted and invited to publish some of your work or to share it with a future class as a sample.

Students with Disabilities

If you are a student with a disability who may require academic accommodation, it is your responsibility to register with the Disability Resource Centre (220-8237) and discuss your needs with your instructor no later than fourteen (14) days after the start of the course.

Students' Union

For details about the current Students' Union contacts for the Faculty of Communication and Culture see www.comcul.ucalgary.ca/su

"SAFEWALK" Program -- 220-5333

Campus Security will escort individuals day or night -- call 220-5333 for assistance. Use any campus phone, emergency phone or the yellow phone located at most parking lot booths.

Ethics

Whenever you perform research with human participants (i.e. surveys, interviews, observation) as part of your university studies, you are responsible for following university research ethics guidelines.  Your instructor must review and approve of your research plans and supervise your research.  For more information about your research ethics responsibilities, see

The Faculty of Communication and Culture Research Ethics site: http://www.comcul.ucalgary.ca/ethics

or the University of Calgary Research Ethics site: http://www.ucalgary.ca/research/compliance/ethics/info/undergrad/

Instructor's Educational Research

To improve the quality of teaching in this subject area, your instructor and her research partners occasionally analyze data about student learning that is gathered naturally in the course of teaching, and may present these findings at conferences or in academic publications. Unless you give signed consent, data specific to your course work and participation will not be included in such research. During course evaluation time, or after the course is over, the instructor or a research associate may recruit participants or email you a request to use your work outside of the course. You are free to decline participation or withdraw participation at any time. Any signed consent forms collected prior to final grading will be held by a third party and will not be seen by the instructor until after the final grades have been submitted.

Schedule of Lectures and Readings

To be provided on the course webpage, which have a link to a Course Calendars page. The official schedule is online and is subject to change.  Any changes after the first week of class will be announced both via Blackboard email and in class.