Attendance/Absences

You are expected to attend all meetings of your courses. You will not be penalized for an absence during the semester due to unavoidable or legitimate circumstances. Such circumstances include verified illness, participation in intercollegiate athletic events, subpoenas, jury duty, military service, bereavement, or religious observances. Such circumstances also include activities sponsored by the University if identified by the senior academic officer for the campus or his or her designee as the basis for excused absences. This does not include voting in local, state, or national elections. Instructors must be notified at the beginning of the term about such planned absences and arrangements to make-up required work. Instructors are not required to accommodate makeup of laboratory experiences or examinations to suit students’ personal convenience or to accommodate situations such as vacations.

School of Nursing instructors determine and inform you of the policies and procedures regarding absence from class, laboratory, and examinations. Makeup work is determined at the sole discretion of the instructors. They are not obligated to afford or arrange practicum make-up times due to an absence unless it is due to one of the excused circumstances noted above.

Unexcused Absence in a Practicum Course

The School of Nursing pre-licensure programs partner with clinical agencies to meet national and state guidelines for pre-licensure education. To effectively educate, assess, and evaluate student outcomes, faculty need the designated practicum time to observe and guide students in each practicum setting. Students are expected to maximize their learning at each practicum site by attending all practicum days for the course (as outlined in each course syllabus).

All pre-licensure students are expected to attend all practicum experiences as designated by each practicum course unless the student meets one or more of the criteria stated in the University Policy: Makeup Work for Legitimate Absences. Or, accommodations have been determined based on joint agreement between the Disability Resource Center Services Liaison, the program director(s), and course faculty. This accommodation must be documented in an accommodation letter from the Disability Resource Center.

An unexcused absence in a practicum course will result in a 1 “step” grade reduction on the course grade scale applied after the final course grade has been calculated for that course (for example B+ to a B).

The following is the procedure that course faculty adhere to for unexcused absences:

1. Course faculty will include the policy statement in the course syllabus (in practicum courses).

2. Course faculty will keep documentation of student unexcused absence (e-mail, notes of student meeting, etc. ).

3. Course faculty will notify the student as soon as an unexcused absence has been verified regarding the consequence of the final course grade reduction.

4. Following the calculation of the final course grade at the end of the semester, the grade reduction as stated about will be applied to the final score and the corresponding letter grade will then be entered into the gradebook as the final grade in University grade platform.