Academic Policies

Guidance Regarding Summer Internships (posted April 16, 2020)

Guidance regarding Summer Internships from Academic Policies Committee:

1. As always, it remains with individual faculty to determine if internships are rigorous enough to qualify for practicum and/or for credit.

2. Given circumstances, a remote internship will be allowed to count toward practicum and/or for credit. Faculty will need to evaluate the viability of these internships just as they would in-person internships.

3. The hours required for academic credit remain the same.

Policy Updates shared on 3/23/2020 by Provost

Colleagues,

I am writing to provide some further updates and guidance. For advising and registration guidance updates, you should also check My.Coe.

Course Evaluations

After consulting with the Executive, Welfare, and CAPRPT committees regarding course evaluations, I have made the decision to suspend student course evaluations for the Spring 2020 semester. This will avoid the collection of potentially skewed data because of the shift to online teaching. While initially we had hoped to give people the opportunity to choose to still use IDEA to collect the data, this limited approach would have left us with a skewed sample for the campus means as well. Individual faculty are free to develop their own instrument to ask students for feedback on their own.I will place a memo in the file of all current faculty members acknowledging the unprecedented circumstances and the resulting lack of student evaluations for the term as an administrative decision.

Executive, Welfare, CAPRPT and I encourage all faculty to write their own narratives about this term for their file. Such a narrative would describe how faculty made adjustments to their teaching and how students responded. This experience will provide a nice example of pedagogical innovation if you choose to use it as one.

At this time, I am not proposing the stoppage of tenure track faculty members’ timelines toward the tenure and promotion decision. However, anyone who feels the suspension of student evaluation data for this term will hurt their cases should feel free to request an extension of their tenure “clock” from me. I would request that any such extension requests would be made by the last day of classes in Fall 2020. I

No one-on-one classes or in-person advising

Some colleagues have asked about meeting with students who remain on campus for advising, follow-up from on-line class, etc. As important as one-on-one contact is to how we teach, advise and mentor, we are following the public health guidelines which do not support such meetings.

Because it is critical that we contain the spread of COVID19 and because there is much we don't know with certainty about its transmission, we need to be vigilant about exposure. Social distancing of six feet or more is recommended to cut down on transmission by respiratory droplets. To cut down on transmission through contaminated surfaces, surfaces need to be disinfected, and not just cleaned. The best way to avoid transmission is to keep away from others and not to touch surfaces to which multiple people will be exposed. Given these guidelines, I would ask you not to meet with your students for advising etc.even if they are living on campus.

Student Accommodations

Continuing to support students with accommodations must be part of our modality shift as well. We are going to do what several of our peer institutions are doing. For the rest of this term, all students with testing accommodations of extended time on tests/quizzes should be given double time (100% extra time). This global shift accomplishes two things:

1. It will give students operating in a new environment increased confidence that they will be successful

2. It means faculty do not have to remember which student gets which amount of time for accommodation.

Civility and Recording

Given the nature of political discourse in the United States, allow me to provide a couple of gentle cautions based on what some colleagues in my role at other liberal arts colleges are seeing.

1. Please share with your students that the Coe Civility Statement is still in effect. Civil classroom discourse is expected online. Any recorded material is only for educational purposes and not to be shared beyond that (and thus violating their classmates' privacy).

2. Coe College and yours truly wholeheartedly endorse and support academic freedom and free speech. But please be mindful as faculty that your live sessions are being recorded and could be shared out of context.

Integrity Statement

This is a statement you could use/attach to an exam or other test if you are hoping they take it without notes or other resources. However, we are still recommending you move to open book/note testing for the end of this term.

I,____________, affirm that I understand what assistance I may and may not give and receive for this test / assignment, and that I will not give nor receive any assistance that is prohibited. I understand that doing so will violate Coe’s Academic Integrity policy (2019-20 Catalog p. 43).

Registration Process Updates and Forms for Faculty

Add/drop registration cards -

We encourage you to utilize the online my.Coe registration process whenever possible. If you need to create an independent study, or a directed study then please use a “Registration Form”.

1. Students print the form - available on my.Coe and completes the form and signs it.

2. Students upload the form & emails it to o-registrar@coe.edu (copy advisor)

3. Students copy their advisor on the email sent to o-registrar@coe.edu.

4. Advisors reply to all confirming their approval.

5. If the Registrar's Office has questions, we will reach out to faculty and students.

Withdrawing from a Course

If a student needs to withdraw from a course they have until 11:59 PM on Wednesday April 1, 2020 to withdraw from a course with a “W.”

Please direct students to the add/drop registration form - available on my.Coe.

1. Students print the form - available on my.Coe and completes the form and signs it.

2. Students upload the form & emails it to o-registrar@coe.edu (copy advisor)

3. Students copy their advisor on the email sent to o-registrar@coe.edu.

4. Advisors reply to all confirming their approval.

5. If the Registrar's Office has questions, we will reach out to faculty and students.
   

Change Method of Grading

Students may elect a P/NP grade per course for the SP-19/20 term. Per the catalog faculty will still submit a letter grade for all students. Per the Covid 19 Contingency Academic Policies set 1, (approved by APC on 3/16 & 3/17/2020) students may elect the P/NP grade through the last day of the term (May 5^th).

1. Students Download the “Method of Grading” form on my.Coe.edu, completes the form, and signs it.

2. Students upload the form & emails it to o-registrar@coe.edu (copy advisor)

3. Students copy their advisor on the email sent to o-registrar@coe.edu.

4. Advisors reply to all confirming their approval.

5. If the Registrar's Office has questions, we will reach out to faculty and students.

6. The instructor may not be informed of the student’s request for P/NP grading and must provide the Registrar with an appropriate letter grade.

7. Faculty will report letter grades for all students.

8. Registrar’s office will update grades according to the received forms upon receipt of final letter grades posted to my.Coe.

9. Students may elect to change their method of grading to P/NP without penalty through the last day of courses. Students electing this method of grading will not have the selections count in their standard 4 term P/NP counts due to the unprecedented circumstances posed by COVID-19.

10. A student’s request for P/NP grading may be nullified at any time before graduation by the student’s written notification to the Registrar, the P or NP being changed to the instructor’s letter grade.

11. When students opt for P/NP grading, the Office of the Registrar converts any grade a faculty member provides of D- or better to a P, and any grade of F to an NP.

12. In order to count for Writing Emphasis credit, a submitted grade of C or higher must be earned. The Registrar’s Office will indicate on the student’s record if a P grade will count towards Writing Emphasis for classes that carry the “WE” designation.

Incomplete Grade Forms (Faculty)

If a student is unable to complete coursework for a given course, the instructor may fill out an Incomplete Grade Form, which will result in a grade of “I” on the student’s transcript until either a Special Grade Report is submitted or the deadline chosen by the instructor passes and the default grade (specified by the instructor on the Incomplete Grade Form) will replace the “I” grade.

1. Course instructor prints the form - available on my.Coe - and completes the form and signs it.

2. Course instructor uploads a scan or photo of the completed form to the I:Drive (do NOT use email since the form has a grade on it), specifically to I:\PRIVATE\REGISTRAR\Data Requests\[name of professor].

3. Course instructor emails o-registrar@coe.edu to let the Office of the Registrar know an Incomplete Grade Form has been uploaded.

4. If and when the student completes the work, the course instructor follows steps 1-3 with a Special Grade Report form.