The information on this page is especially for faculty who are designing their F20 course syllabi. It was developed in consultation with the implementation committee that is concerned with teaching and advising. Comments and questions can be posted below in anonymity.
| Sept 2 (Wednesday) | Instruction Begins |
| Oct 14 (Wednesday) | Break Day No classes. No assignments due. |
| Nov 14 (Saturday) -Nov 16 (Monday) | Study Days No classes. No assignments due. |
| Nov 17 (Tuesday) – Nov 24 (Tuesday) | Semifinal Exam Days No classes. Classes that do not have a scheduled semi-final are allowed to have assignments due. See below. |
| Nov 25 (Wednesday) – Nov 27 (Friday) | Thanksgiving Break |
| Nov 30 (Monday) | Instruction Resumes–All Classes Online |
| Dec 16 (Wednesday) | Instruction Ends |
| Dec 17 (Thursday) – Dec 21 (Monday) | Final Exam Days “Normal” exam period rules apply. |
Notes
Class Days
The F20 distribution of class days is as follows: (M,T,W,R,F) = (13,13,13,13,13). The normal fall semester distribution is (13,14,13,14,14). Therefore, “normal syllabi” will probably have to undergo some adjustment.
Scheduling
The Office of University Registrar posts the official academic calendar, the class roster, and the F20 course schedule . Here is information regarding the scheduling of online prelims.
Semifinals and Finals
The notion of a “semifinal” was specified for students in this policy statement. Here are some practical details for faculty:
- Instructors have the option of giving in-person exams for any course, regardless of its instruction format (i.e., including online and distance learning asynchronous courses).
- Instructors (through their department) have to request a semi-final slot. They should specify whether they are requesting an in-person or online semifinal slot. Semi-final slots are 2.5 hours.
- A course can have a university-scheduled semi-final or an online final, but not both.
- The usual final exam period rules apply to the fall 2020 semi-final and final exam periods.
- As usual, instructors may self-schedule and assign a take home project, paper or exam to be due during the semi-final or finals periods.
- If a course has an in-person semi-final, then an alternative assessment must be made available for students who are taking the course remotely or who have a pandemic-related accommodation. Students who have health-related concerns about taking in-person exams during the fall 2020 semester should contact Student Disability Services (SDS) as soon as possible. You will be asked to complete a Disability Self-Disclosure Form and then be assigned an SDS counselor, who will work with you to determine reasonable accommodations.
- Instructors do not need to provide 24-hour windows for exams taken online (as was the case in spring 2020).
The 4:25-7:30 “Free Zone”
The same rules apply but the list of allowable exceptions now includes a few courses that had to be scheduled into this period for various reasons, e.g., classroom availability.
Flexibility
Given the extraordinary situation, instructors are urged to be flexible whenever approached by a student who has to deal with an academic conflict or any kind of pandemic-related constraint.
I am teaching a smallish (<26) in-person u/grad class with no Final or Semi-final exam. But a major part of the course is to work in a team of 2-3 students to prepare an in-class 15 min presentation. This year the presentations will be done via Zoom, and I would like to do them during the semi-finals period, when most of the students are still on campus. (1) Is this OK, and (2) can I self-schedule the presentations, or do I need to request a "slot"? Usually the process takes 2 full class periods, or at last 2.5 hours, depending on the class size.
You can self-schedule this kind of thing during the semifinal period. Common sense scheduling with your students to make sure you do not collide with any of their other semifinal week obligations will work just fine. Give your class a heads up about this plan on day 1.
CVL
Thank you for posting the “details and guidelines relevant to syllabus design.” I am teaching a small seminar for Ph.D. students, all-online; it meets Fridays. It’s a new-to-me syllabus, so I have been working on it for several weeks now. I will not be having a semifinal. My questions:
1. Do I understand correctly that I am not permitted to have an online session of the class on Friday, November 20 (even for a graduate class with no semifinal)?
2. If so, is this still true even if it turns out that none of the students enrolled in the class has a semifinal in any of their other classes either?
3. If I am not having a semifinal, am I at least permitted to assign reading for that week? (I assume the answer to this question is yes, since the details you’ve sent around say that we may have assignments due that week if we are not having semifinals).
Thank you for the clarification.
For #3 the answer is yes.
A process for seeking exceptions to the no-class rule for semi-final period has not be given. This needs to be clarified. For the record I personally would approve your request as the DoF provided you accommodate all students who could not attend. because of activity in another class.
CVL
Thank you for your reply. In light of this, I intend to keep the assigned reading for that week on the syllabus. I will inform students that there will be no formal class session that week unless a process emerges for the approval of an exception to the no-class rule. If no such process emerges, I will either schedule an alternative make-up session to discuss that material after the semifinal period, and/or schedule entirely voluntary online office hours sessions for discussion of that material for students who wish to do so and whose schedules permit. I’ll assume this is acceptable unless I hear otherwise.
I am replacing the traditional 2 prelims and a final in my 4-credit class with 7 hour long, online mini-exams (these have the same questions as in the past but half as many).
1. Do I count these as “exams” in the context of our semi-final and final? This relates to whether I can also have an assignment due in the semi-final exam period (and one of these mini-exams).
2. I would like to schedule these to minimize conflicts, using the Thursday evening time slots like in the past. Do you see procedural issues with doing that?
3. If #2 is allowed, I assume I will go through the normal departmental procedure to schedule them.
Semifinals only enter the picture if you request to have an in-person semifinal slot. You are free to use the semifinal period for an online mini-exam. Scheduling in the semifinal period has yet to be worked out. Likewise for evening prelim slots.
CVL
I am (yet again) surprised by the Fall 2020 schedule. What if my class is not having a semi-final? Are classes cancelled for ALL classes Monday 11/16 through Tuesday 11/24? Study days and cancelled classes are pointless for classes that are not hosting semi-final exams. It seems a waste of 4 valuable in-person sessions.
This was the choice of the implementation committee and you have it right–no classes during those 8 days. For a student with no semifinals the online fraction of the semester begins Nov 14. not after Thanksgiving.
CVL