Handling requests for make-up work
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Mark Stellmack
Jul 16, 2013, 4:15:16 PM7/16/13
to psy_te...@umn.edu
When I was a student, I took school seriously and I made attending lectures and meeting the deadlines a top priority. (In fact, I had four years of perfect attendance in high school. One morning, I literally ran through knee-deep snow to get there on time when my ride fell through. I may be an outlier.) When I began teaching, one of the biggest surprises (and hassles) was students making excuses for missing exams or for failing to submit assignments on time. I was amazed at how lackadaisical students could be and how frivolous their excuses could seem at times. It was an attitude that was not familiar to me.
Why is it a hassle when a student makes an excuse for missing work? Three reasons come to mind:
1) You are busy. You have to write lectures and exams and homework assignments and you have other work to do. When a student wants to do make-up work, it means more work for you in some way. You may have to create an alternate form of an exam, or set aside time to administer an exam. At the very least, you will have to grade something at a time other than when you planned on doing so and keep track of student work that is separate from everyone else's.
2) It is unfair to the students who took the test or turned in the assignment on time. They all would have liked a little more time to prepare for the exam or to do the homework. From a measurement standpoint, if you are grading all of the students on a common scale, they should all be treated identically in order for the grades to be meaningful across students.
3) If you have not dealt with that kind of situation before (or even if you have), the student's request puts you on the spot and can make you feel uncomfortable. As the instructor, you want to come across as sensible, decisive, and in control (one would hope), but it is often hard to decide how you will handle the situation when the student first makes the request, especially when the student is standing right in front of you.
On the one hand, you want to be understanding and sympathetic. On the other hand, students are not always truthful and can say some pretty amazing things in order to put off doing work on time or to find out what was on an exam before they take it. When I was a student, I knew other students who would essentially plan on missing deadlines and exams at the start of the semester. It was remarkable enough that those students had so many more grandparents than I did, but it was even more remarkable that all of those grandparents passed away during our undergraduate years.
Okay, so how do you handle it? As is the case for most aspects of your course design, you have to come up with something that works for you and that fits your style. Figure out what you will be comfortable with. I tend to be more rigid as far as permitting make-up work. I have big classes and it would get out of hand quickly if a large number of people were diverging from the schedule. I have known instructors who were extremely flexible and tolerant and seemed to let students do whatever they want. It is much easier to be that way in a smaller class. Here are some general suggestions that come to mind:
- Think about it before the first day of your class. SOMETIME when you are teaching, a student WILL ask you to permit them to do make-up work. Specify a policy for make-up work in your syllabus. (Keep in mind that the University requires you to permit make-up work in certain situations.) If you want to have a specific plan for accommodating make-up requests, put it in writing. I try to be as strict as possible in my syllabus because I figure that students will always look for me to be a little more flexible than what I describe in the syllabus. If I am extremely flexible in my syllabus, students will want me to be even MORE flexible. With that in mind, I design my make-up policy so that I can appear to compromise and be more flexible when I'm really being as permissive as I intended to be in the first place. The student thinks, "Yay! He gave me a break!" and I think, "Yay! That's all I was ever going to allow anyway!"
- If your syllabus doesn't cover the specific situation, you just have to use your best judgment as to how to handle the student's request. Emergencies happen. But don't be a sap either. If the excuse sounds questionable, you have a right to ask for some kind of verification...a doctor's note, mechanic's receipt, death notice, etc. (all of which I have asked for in particular cases). If the student is a good student and this is an isolated incident, it probably is reasonable to simply permit the make-up work.
- If the student approaches you in class and asks to do make-up work and you do not know how to respond right then and there, ask the student to send you an email about the situation later so that you can look at your schedule. That will give you time to come up with a reasonable response.
- Don't get in a fight with the student. Decide how you will handle the situation so that you are consistent with your syllabus and with University policy. If you find that you have to be more permissive than you wanted to be, just do so and move on.
- Learn your lessons from the situation. Decide if there is a change you should make to your syllabus to avoid that situation in the future. Decide if you would handle that same situation differently in the future.
Again, student requests for make-up work can catch you by surprise. To some extent, you just have to gain experience with handling them. Have a plan, be sensible, and keep in mind that, ultimately, you are in charge of the class.
Why is it a hassle when a student makes an excuse for missing work? Three reasons come to mind:
1) You are busy. You have to write lectures and exams and homework assignments and you have other work to do. When a student wants to do make-up work, it means more work for you in some way. You may have to create an alternate form of an exam, or set aside time to administer an exam. At the very least, you will have to grade something at a time other than when you planned on doing so and keep track of student work that is separate from everyone else's.
2) It is unfair to the students who took the test or turned in the assignment on time. They all would have liked a little more time to prepare for the exam or to do the homework. From a measurement standpoint, if you are grading all of the students on a common scale, they should all be treated identically in order for the grades to be meaningful across students.
3) If you have not dealt with that kind of situation before (or even if you have), the student's request puts you on the spot and can make you feel uncomfortable. As the instructor, you want to come across as sensible, decisive, and in control (one would hope), but it is often hard to decide how you will handle the situation when the student first makes the request, especially when the student is standing right in front of you.
On the one hand, you want to be understanding and sympathetic. On the other hand, students are not always truthful and can say some pretty amazing things in order to put off doing work on time or to find out what was on an exam before they take it. When I was a student, I knew other students who would essentially plan on missing deadlines and exams at the start of the semester. It was remarkable enough that those students had so many more grandparents than I did, but it was even more remarkable that all of those grandparents passed away during our undergraduate years.
Okay, so how do you handle it? As is the case for most aspects of your course design, you have to come up with something that works for you and that fits your style. Figure out what you will be comfortable with. I tend to be more rigid as far as permitting make-up work. I have big classes and it would get out of hand quickly if a large number of people were diverging from the schedule. I have known instructors who were extremely flexible and tolerant and seemed to let students do whatever they want. It is much easier to be that way in a smaller class. Here are some general suggestions that come to mind:
- Think about it before the first day of your class. SOMETIME when you are teaching, a student WILL ask you to permit them to do make-up work. Specify a policy for make-up work in your syllabus. (Keep in mind that the University requires you to permit make-up work in certain situations.) If you want to have a specific plan for accommodating make-up requests, put it in writing. I try to be as strict as possible in my syllabus because I figure that students will always look for me to be a little more flexible than what I describe in the syllabus. If I am extremely flexible in my syllabus, students will want me to be even MORE flexible. With that in mind, I design my make-up policy so that I can appear to compromise and be more flexible when I'm really being as permissive as I intended to be in the first place. The student thinks, "Yay! He gave me a break!" and I think, "Yay! That's all I was ever going to allow anyway!"
- If your syllabus doesn't cover the specific situation, you just have to use your best judgment as to how to handle the student's request. Emergencies happen. But don't be a sap either. If the excuse sounds questionable, you have a right to ask for some kind of verification...a doctor's note, mechanic's receipt, death notice, etc. (all of which I have asked for in particular cases). If the student is a good student and this is an isolated incident, it probably is reasonable to simply permit the make-up work.
- If the student approaches you in class and asks to do make-up work and you do not know how to respond right then and there, ask the student to send you an email about the situation later so that you can look at your schedule. That will give you time to come up with a reasonable response.
- Don't get in a fight with the student. Decide how you will handle the situation so that you are consistent with your syllabus and with University policy. If you find that you have to be more permissive than you wanted to be, just do so and move on.
- Learn your lessons from the situation. Decide if there is a change you should make to your syllabus to avoid that situation in the future. Decide if you would handle that same situation differently in the future.
Again, student requests for make-up work can catch you by surprise. To some extent, you just have to gain experience with handling them. Have a plan, be sensible, and keep in mind that, ultimately, you are in charge of the class.
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