Amended by the: Accepted and Implemented by the: Action by the:

University Senate April 16, 1998 Administration May 27, 1998 Board of Regents - no action required

1. Standard Class Schedule and Class Period

a) Each campus of the University shall adopt a standard class schedule of 50-minute classes with an appropriate change period between classes. These class schedules will be reported annually to the Senate for information. Classes of lengths other than 50 minutes are permitted, subject only to the Senate policies governing the relationship between contact hours, credits, and student workload.

b) Examinations during the term (e.g., mid-terms) shall be given only during the regular class sessions, and may not be held at times other than the regularly scheduled class period, subject to the following conditions:

• Exceptions may be made by instructors only for the purpose of giving make-up exams.
  
• Any examinations outside of regular class time during the term must be approved by the dean of the college.
  
• Any examinations to be held outside of regular class time must be listed in the published class schedule.
• Accommodation must be provided to any student who encounters an academic conflict, such as between an examination scheduled outside of regular class time and the regular class period of another course, or if two exams are scheduled to be held simultaneously outside of regular class time.
  
• Take-home examinations, by their very nature, are specifically exempted from this policy.

2. Overlapping Classes

No student shall be permitted to register for classes that overlap. Classes that have any common meeting time are considered to be overlapping, as are any back-to-back classes that have start and end times closer together than the standard change period for that campus.

Only under extenuating circumstances shall petitions for overrides for such conflicts be permitted, and shall require the signatures of all faculty members involved. The decision to approve or disapprove such a petition for override is entirely discretionary with each faculty member involved.

3. Mandatory Attendance at First Class Session

Students must attend the first class meeting of every course in which they are registered, unless they obtain prior approval from the instructor (or department, if appropriate) for an intended absence before the first class meeting; without such prior approval, a student may lose his or her place in the class to another student.

If a student wishes to remain in a course from which he or she has been absent the first day without prior approval, the instructor should be contacted as soon as possible. In this circumstance, instructors have the right to deny admission to the class if other students have been admitted and the course is full. Instructors are, however, advised to take into account extenuating circumstances (e.g., weather) which may have prevented a student from attending the first class session. Absence from the first class session that falls during a recognized religious holiday (e.g., Rosh Hashanah) does not require instructor approval, but the instructor must be notified of the absence and the reason; in this instance, the place for the student will be retained.

Students must OFFICIALLY cancel any course for which they have enrolled and subsequently been denied admission.

4. Final Examinations

a) All classes that normally permit undergraduates to enroll shall follow a standard examination schedule. The final examination period for day school and University College, at the close of each session, shall be extended over a five or six-day period. For courses that do not run for a full semester, the final examination shall be administered (or due, in the case of take-home or other out-of-class examinations) on the last day of the course.

b) Each campus shall decide whether or not to have a study day. For those that choose to have one, the final examination period shall begin on the second day after classes end, with the day after classes designated as a study day. In the event classes end on a Friday, final examinations shall not start until the following Monday.

c) The requirement that the final examination schedule be five or six days shall not apply to units which have been granted an exemption from the University calendar, pursuant to the provisions of the Semester Conversion Standards.

d) Instructors are not permitted to hold their final examinations ahead of the regularly scheduled time except under such unusual circumstances as may be approved by the Senate Committee on Educational Policy.

e) There shall be no other exceptions from the University final examination schedule unless (1) proposed by the instructor, (2) with the unanimous consent, via written secret ballot, of the students, and (3) with the concurrence of the department chair. The appropriate campus scheduling office shall be notified of any change. This prohibition precludes moving a final examination from a scheduled time to study day or to the last or earlier meetings of the class (with the exception of (1) laboratory practicums, which may be given during the final week of classes during the normal lab period, and (2) take-home or other out-of-class finals, which may be distributed prior to the final exam week but which may not be due before the scheduled final exam for that course.

f) All requests for adjustment of final examination hours must be made on the form provided by the scheduling office and submitted at least a month before the beginning of the examination period.

g) Final examinations for summer session shall be scheduled during the regular meeting time of the course on the last day.

h) Students with final examination conflicts, or with three (or more) final examinations in one calendar day, or who have agreed to reschedule a final (in accord with the provisions of section 3, above) will be expected to make the appropriate rescheduling arrangements with the instructors by the end of the second week of the term so that conflicts will be eliminated. Instructors must agree to give an alternative final examination to any student having examination conflicts or three (or more) examinations in one calendar day.

i) The Committee on Educational Policy shall have the authority to grant waivers to the provisions of this policy, and shall report such waivers to the University Senate at its next meeting.

5. Classes and Events during the Study Day/Finals Week Period

a) No classes will be permitted after the last day of instruction for any course that normally includes undergraduate students.

b) No University-sponsored extra-curricular events which require the participation of students may be scheduled from the beginning of Study Day to the end of Finals Week. Exceptions to this policy may be granted ONLY by the Senate Committee on Educational Policy through whatever procedure it determines most feasible. The Senate also advises all faculty members that any exemption granted pursuant to this policy (that is, with the explicit authorization of the Committee on Educational Policy) shall be honored and that students who are unable to complete course requirements during Finals Week as a result of that exemption shall be provided an alternative and timely opportunity to do so.

6. Implementation

It shall be the responsibility of senior academic officers on each campus to enforce these policies. Each campus shall adopt additional regulations to implement these policies, as it deems appropriate. All such regulations will be reported annually to the Senate for information.

For Information:

The Senate Committee on Educational Policy has been deliberating, for the last year, a policy to bring order to the present rather chaotic rules, or lack thereof, governing the scheduling of classes and final exams. With this policy, a draft for discussion, SCEP proposes that the Senate establish clear policy for the semester conversion.

Section 1: This provision simply incorporates long practice into existing policy.

Section 2: This is proposed as new policy. As a result of the discussions surrounding class scheduling, an associated problem became apparent to SCEP: with the self-registration system now in place, students are notified that class times overlap but are not prevented from registering for such classes. As a matter of sound educational policy, students should not be permitted to do so.

The Registrar's office has informed SCEP that it will seek to incorporate this restriction into the new registration system the University is purchasing, so that the system will automatically prohibit students from registering from overlapping classes or classes that are too close together.

SCEP recognizes that if the provisions of the Standard Class Schedule and Period were strictly adhered to, there would be no classes starting and ending with fewer than 15 minutes between them on either of the Twin Cities campuses, but SCEP also recognizes that class schedules are not always as neat and orderly as might be wished for in an ideal world.

Section 3: This is proposed as new policy, but incorporates practice that is spelled out in each class schedule and been in place for a very long time.

Section 4: Most of the provisions of Section 3 replace by modification previous policies governing final examinations (adopted February 19, 1931 and February 20, 1992) or elevate long, sound practice into policy. This is an issue related to the "user-friendliness" of the University and to graduation rates: conflicts in scheduled final examinations need to be minimized and these changes should help achieve that end.

As soon as the Registrar is able to incorporate appropriate software, students will be notified of overlapping finals at registration and faculty will be notified via class lists.

Section 5: Section 5(a) is new. It was brought to SCEP's attention that faculty sometimes hold a regular lecture during examination week (which in some cases interfered with students' other exams) or hold a lecture during the first hour of the examination period and then conducting the final examination during the remaining hour(s). Both practices seem to SCEP to be unfair to the students and are now prohibited.

Section 5(b) is existing policy.