Attendance
Summary:
- Class attendance (in the synchronous meetings) is required.
- If you are going to miss class, let us know. Letting us know afterwards is better than nothing.
- If you do not intend to attend “nearly all” of the classes, please do not take this class.
- Be aware of the class schedule
Class attendance is required. It is my job to make sure that your time in class is well spent and worth it. It is your job to be there. Sometimes the value in a class experience may not be obvious to you. And sometimes, I’ll do something experimental which may fail. If you don’t feel like I am keeping up my side of this deal well enough for you to keep up yours, let me know.
Being present in an online class is an interesting question. There is the “attendance” part (we know that you are in the BBCU session), but there is also the “attending” part (that you are paying attention and participating).
Classes will be interactive - this is an experiment, but even the “professor’s monologue” parts will have some interaction (polls, side chat, …). Other aspects will be interactive (small group design exercises).
If someone’s attendance and participation is perceived to be a problem, we will penalize them. Generally, missing 2-3 classes is OK. More than that, we’ll need to discuss. (The “drop 2” policy applies.)
We understand that it is impossible for everyone to be at every class (even the instructor misses some classes). Things happen – bad and good. You get sick, you need to go to a family reunion in honor of your grandmother’s 100th birthday, you need to go to Stockholm to get a Nobel prize, your alarm clock breaks and you sleep through class…
Missing class because of a technical difficulty is still missing class (see Technology Failures). That’s why we have the drop 2 policy. If your technology is so unstable that it causes you to miss class repeatedly, you may need to upgrade.
If you are going to miss class, let us know. If you can’t tell us before, please tell us afterwards. Please send a Piazza message to the TA and the instructor. Telling us why you are missing (or missed) class is optional. We will try to keep track of who comes to class, but, admittedly it’s an imperfect process given the size of the class. If we notice that you’re missing and you didn’t tell us, that’s not good.
The range of reasons people have for missing class is broad – and it’s difficult to judge what is “legitimate” or not. We won’t judge your reasons. If at the end of the semester, your attendance is a problem, we may penalize you.
If you know that you will miss a lot of classes, or do not intend to come to class “nearly all of the time”, please do not take the class. This class requires you to show up. If you know that you cannot (for example, if you know you will be traveling extensively to interview), you probably should not take this class.
You cannot “make up” in-class classwork. In general, there is no way to “make up” what happens in class. Generally, you cannot make up an in-class experience (since you didn’t experience it!). In some cases, we can make the class materials available to you after class, and we might give you partial credit for doing what you can (see In Class Experiences).
In-class experiences will give us one tool to gauge who is at class. Do not try to game this. Cheating the system will be penalized. If you miss an experience, you miss the experience.
Online attendance is figured out using BBCU and Canvas logs. If you think this might affect you negatively (e.g., your internet connection flakes out, you connect via phone so it doesn’t register you) please inform the course staff (private message to the TA and Professor) so we can count you correctly.
Please come on time! If you come late, you will disrupt your classmates. Please try to be on time.