Flexible Attendance Guidelines

When a student has a chronic condition with random or cyclical acute episodes, modifications to attendance policies may be appropriate as an accommodation.  Disability Services can suggest ‘reasonable sensitivity to disability related absences’ as an accommodation, but it is up to individual professors to decide if this accommodation is appropriate for a specific class.

Students requesting this accommodation should discuss course attendance policies, notifications of assignments and makeup assignment policies when meeting with their professors at the start of the quarter.  Attendance accommodations are not retroactive.

Faculty should review the following questions and make a determination for each class to determine whether attendance is an essential requirement for the course and what flexibility is permissible. 

• • Is there classroom interaction between the instructor and students, and among students?
• • Do student contributions constitute a significant component of the learning process?
• • Does the fundamental nature of the course rely upon student participation as an essential method for learning
• • To what degree does a student's failure to attend constitute a significant loss to the educational experience of other students in the class?
• • What do the course description and syllabus say?
• • Which method is used to calculate the final grade?
• • And what are the classroom practices and policies regarding attendance?