Confessions of a well-intentioned but misguided (and hopefully former) a**hole
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- Module: Care and Equity
In the space below, brainstorm the MOST restrictive, oppressive course policies you can imagine. You can choose to frame these around a course you teach, or you can just come up with a list that could apply to any courses. Be as heavy-handed and authoritarian as you like; it’s okay if the rules you write make you uncomfortable.
Oppressive Course Policies
Attendance
Your presence is important not just for your own growth and understanding, but for your classmates and the professor. If you cannot attend class, please let me know as soon as possible.
- Excused absences are defined as absences stemming from (a) participation in University-sponsored activities, or (b) compelling and extenuating circumstances beyond a student’s control. To be counted as an excused absence, it is your responsibility to provide proper documentation to me as soon as possible. This could include a doctor’s note, obituary or funeral notice, etc.
- More than 3 unexcused absences will negatively impact your participation grade.
- More than 7 absences (excused or unexcused!) will result in automatic failure for the course.
- It is your responsibility to catch up on any class material you miss from being late or absent. First get notes from a classmate, and then come see the professor if you still have questions.
- Late arrivals are a distraction and negatively impact the learning environment for everyone. Students who enter class after the start of the class session will be marked down as late. Frequent lateness will impact your participation grade (3 late arrivals = 1 absence).
- This is a low-tech class. You do not need a laptop, tablet, cellphone, or other device during most class sessions, and these should be turned off or put on silent mode before the start of class. Not only are these distracting to you, your classmates, and the professor, but research shows that students retain more information by taking notes by hand.
- Use the bathroom or water fountain before the start of class.
- Wait until the end of class to put away your notebook and pack up to leave.
Grades
The grade you receive, either on an individual assignment or as your final grade, is not the starting point of a negotiation. It is your grade unless an error has been made. If you are struggling in the course, please come for help during the semester when there is still time for me to help you. Take advantage of my office hours or make an appointment with me. I am eager to help you succeed in this class, but you need to make the first step of asking for help if you need it!
Participation
Your participation grade is based not just on attendance but also the quality of your involvement in class activities (discussion, group work, simulations, reflective writing, and so on). It is worth 10% of your total grade for the course.
Oppressive Course Policies Reflection
I actually went back to my earliest syllabi from when first started at PSU, and was blushing as I copied and pasted them.
Damn, I was an a**hole. A very well-intentioned a**hole. Some of these policies I created myself, and some were suggested to me by PSU faculty who mentored me during my early years. But regardless, they were MY policies for MY classes, and I know for certain that when I stuck to them, I harmed students. I remember distinctly having a conversation with a student who was really struggling but wanted to catch up in my class, and I had to tell her that given her high number of absences, regardless of how much she tried to recoup her losses, she could not pass my class. Ooof. I also remember having a student in consecutive semesters, and remarking to him how much I appreciated him contributing to our discussion during the first day of the semester. He said, “Yeah, you gave me a bad participation grade for no reason last semester, so I am trying to talk a lot this time!” Props to him for being honest.
I think certainly these policies wanted to instill a sense of authority and fear into my students — scare them into being good workers.
Referring back to the rules you wrote, now write the OPPOSITE of each of them in the space below. Reframe each rule by imagining what it would be if you tried to completely counteract its purpose.
Rewritten Course Policies
These policies are from recent syllabi, though pasted below not necessarily in the order they appear. I also have a HELP! page where I link to lots of campus resources around academic, financial, and personal help.
A Note About Open Education
The underlying philosophy behind the types of assignments and the ways that they are assessed in this course is Open Education. This is a big umbrella term that encompasses a lot of different learning and teaching practices that are meant to reduce barriers and give more agency and freedom to students. For you, this means:
- Using free materials to reduce costs/barriers
- Choosing the format of some assignments so that you can best show the knowledge you have gained and hone skills that matter to you
- Instead of traditional letter or number grades, receiving feedback and opportunities for revision from your professor, and allowing you to self-assess your work and assign yourself a final grade.
Attendance
Try your best to attend every class session – it helps you and makes class more fun and interesting for everyone. I am required to take attendance by PSU for financial aid verification. Class is not recorded for viewing later or virtual Zoom attendance. (PSU’s Official Excused Absence Policy is not relevant to this class since attendance doesn’t have a direct effect on your grade.)
Making Up an Absence
If you are absent, meet with me as soon as you can to make a plan for making up class activities that you missed. Checking Canvas is not sufficient by itself for making up an absence.
Late Work
Due dates are there to help you stay on track and not get overwhelmed when work piles up week after week. But if you think that you will need extra time, contact me as soon as possible with your request and a suggested alternative due date.
Technology (Laptops, Tablets, Phones)
Try your best to use technology responsibly so that it does not impede your learning or distract others. We will sometimes use laptops in class activities, so come to class with your devices fully charged. (If you don’t have access to a laptop or tablet, you can check out equipment for free from the Help Desk in the HUB.) At some moments, I may ask you to put away devices to allow for focused offline work.
Assessment
I will give you feedback on your work, but will not assign points or letters to any assignment. You will have an opportunity to redo and revise most assignments. My hope is that working without grades and with second chances gives you the freedom to focus on your learning goals and needs.
What about the Canvas gradebook?
Canvas is the place where you turn in many assignments. It’s also a repository that holds information and helpful materials related to our course. I do not use Canvas to calculate your grade. I will mark assignments as “complete” or “incomplete” which is just a rough way to see if something was submitted or not, but not a judgement of its quality or completeness in meeting assignment expectations. So, if you see a number or letter in the Canvas gradebook, please ignore it and instead focus on my written feedback.
How will I know my overall course grade?
You will complete periodic self-assessment reflections, where you discuss your progress for the course learning goals. At the end of the course, you will propose a final grade that you justify in a narrative reflection. We will meet to discuss your reflections and make any adjustments if needed.
Participation
Class more fun and rewarding if everyone participates. But “participation” is much more than just speaking up during a class discussion, and I want you to think of participation and class engagement as a set of skills that you can improve. At the start of the course, you will set participation skill goals to work on throughout the semester.
Rewritten Course Policies Reflection
Ok, I know these are not perfect, but I feel so much better sharing these policies here! Sometimes my high level of flexibility for late work or revising assignments makes for an unpredictable and challenging workload for me. Sometimes the lots of feedback, no number or letter grades approach can mean students put my course on the back burner, or do not know where to prioritize their time and effort. Sometimes students personalize their time in my courses in ways that I would not. But the tone and content of these policies feel so much more in line with the kind of educational experience I want to facilitate: open, flexible, personalized, growth-oriented, humane.
Reflect upon the experience of writing both sets. How did writing these rules make you feel? How were the two experiences different? In your own courses, are your policies more like one set or the other? Put yourself in the shoes of a student again, and re-read the rules. How do they feel now?
