Attendance & Absence

You are expected to remain in residence in or near Sheffield throughout Semester 1 and 2. Absences require written (email) permission from the programme director. If you are unable to remain resident in Sheffield during the summer months while writing your dissertation, you should make sure that you are easily contactable during this time.

You are expected to attend all contact hours, and to be fully enagaged in those contact hours. (This means, among other things, withholding from using a mobile phone unless specifically directed to do so by the session leader.) If you are ill or otherwise need to be absent from a supervision or class, you must email the module convenor or module tutor and let them know as soon as possible. If the illness or other reason for absence is on going, please contact your personal tutor and talk to them about what you should do. It is your responsibility to catch up with what you have missed - this means taking active steps to do this yourself (checking online resources, speaking with classmates, doing reading to compensate for the missed classes), not simply contacting the tutor and asking for a run-down of everything you missed.

Where necessary, Leave of Absence (permission to be absent for a given period on personal, medical, financial or academic grounds) can be granted, and usually enables students undergoing difficulties to avoid academic or financial penalties. Please get in touch as soon as you think there may be a problem. The worst thing to do is to bury your head in the sand: remember we’re here to help you.

If staff are ill or otherwise absent from classes, they will inform the English Reception staff, who will endeavour to notify students, especially those living outside Sheffield, if classes have had to be cancelled or postponed.