From Elizabeth.Bradley@Colorado.EDU Fri Feb 27 11:05:18 2009 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.2.4 (2008-01-01) on research.cs.colorado.edu X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-4.4 required=5.0 tests=ALL_TRUSTED,AWL,BAYES_00 autolearn=ham version=3.2.4 Date: Fri, 27 Feb 2009 11:05:18 -0700 From: Liz Bradley To: Karl.Mueller@Colorado.EDU, Martha.Hanna@Colorado.EDU, e.scott.adler@Colorado.EDU, helen.norton@Colorado.EDU, Joseph.Jupille@Colorado.EDU, Bob.Sievers@Colorado.EDU, Stephen.Jones@Colorado.EDU, lizb@research.cs.colorado.edu, David.Clough@Colorado.EDU, tsnow@origins.Colorado.edu, Michael.Bohn@Colorado.EDU, Cecelia.Barry@Colorado.EDU, Barbara.Bintliff@Colorado.EDU, carly.robinson@Colorado.EDU, kathleen.majewski@Colorado.EDU, dustin.farivar@Colorado.EDU, theodore.snow@Colorado.EDU Subject: 2/25/09 meeting follow-up Reply-to: lizb@cs.colorado.edu cc: julie.manning@Colorado.EDU A quick report on our meeting on wednesday...as always, please chime in if I've forgotten or mangled anything. _____________________________ - Our motion about COIA passed with one dissenting vote. - There are now **two** faculty seats on the scholarship appeals committee, which will be filled on a case-by-case basis by members of the BAB and the IAC. Remember: those appeals happen at awkward times and on short turnaround. Having insisted upon this representation, we need to follow through. - Julie Manning will be coming to the March meeting to give us a quick compliance briefing, which is a prerequisite to sitting on that appeals committee. - We looked over NCAA 2008-32-A (per Barbara Bintliff's suggestion) and saw no problems with it, or with any of the legislative updates that I sent around last month, courtesy of Julie Manning & Dave Clough. - We finalized the motion+report about academic/athletic conflicts, as you observed from my email asking for your vote. I've now received six yesses, which amounts to a majority, so I've gotten us on the BFA execcomm agenda for March 16th. This means that the "notice of motion" and the actual vote will likely be at the April & May BFA meetings, respectively. (Unless we encounter resistance, of course. One never knows.) The latest version of the motion is attached below. If you haven't voted yet, please do; I'm probably supposed to keep track of # of yeas/nays. - We had a long discussion about conflicts that arise in conjunction with CLUB sports, which are coming to a head and can no longer be ducked. Our motion contains a "further moved..." bullet that asks the BFA to address all conflicts, but in the meantime, I will work with the club sports coordinators to bring their process more in line with Athletics'. The main points: - letter should look like the ones Kris sends out, but should clearly distinguish that this is a club sport and should line up with CU policy, not mis-state it - student, not coach, should initiate contact - appropriate rules about when that needs to happen - coaches to be briefed on policy - competitions not to be scheduled during finals Please let me know if I have missed anything, either in the letter or the spirit of what we want to happen here. I've posted the NYT article about club sports that Ted passed along on our webpage. - Lastly, we had a great presentation of class & major choice among SAs, plus GPA trends. (Dave, can you please send me a pdf of those slides, so I can distribute it to people who weren't able to come?) At our next meeting, we will revisit these data (hopefully augmented with some control data that lets us make good comparisons to the overall CU population) and decide: - whether we need to worry about anything in there - what we should do about that - what I should report to the BFA about all of this Have a nice weekend. Liz __________________________ ADDRESSING CLASS CONFLICTS Motion Bullets: - It is the student-athlete's responsibility to notify instructors at the beginning of the semester about any known conflicts between classes or tests and athletic events. - For conflicts that arise during the regular term, instructors have full authority to decide whether and/or how to accommodate those conflicts. - While an instructor has the right to refuse to allow make-ups or other accommodations, he or she is permitted to provide such accommodations. - Intercollegiate varsity athletics competitions during final exams, which are normally forbidden by university policy, must be approved by the BFA Intercollegiate Athletics Committee. Student-athletes involved in these competitions must then work with their instructors in regard to any missed work. Further moved that: - The BFA consider a general statement of policy in the case of accomodation of conflicts that arise when students are representing CU-Boulder. - The attached report be reviewed on an annual basis by the IAC, and be sent out to all teaching faculty at CUB by the BFA before classes start every year. *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** Report: This motion summarizes campus policies and practices regarding conflicts between classes and athletic events. This information is intended to help guide decisions about how to deal with conflicts when they arise, and it may be especially useful for new or junior faculty. Because this document was prepared by the BFA Committee on Intercollegiate Athletics, with the cooperation of the Department of Athletics, it focuses on conflicts between classes and NCAA-sanctioned intercollegiate varsity sports scheduled through the Department of Athletics. It does not address conflicts involving club sports (www.colorado.edu/rec-center/programs/club-sports). Students participating in NCAA-sanctioned intercollegiate competitions are representing CU-Boulder. As such, they are bound by the CU honor code and the student-athlete code of ethics, which can be found at [[get from Ceal & fill in]], as well as by general policies of CU-Boulder (www.colorado.edu/policies/appealsguide.html) and the specific policies of the Department of Athletics. Normally, schedules for these competitions are known well in advance. It is the student-athlete's responsibility to notify instructors at the beginning of the semester about any known conflicts between classes or tests and athletic events. To facilitate this, the Office of Academic Support Services in the Department of Athletics identifies potential conflicts and provides written notifications about them to each student-athlete, for hand delivery to their instructors. When these conflicts interfere with the learning goals of the course (as, for example, when athletic team practice conflicts with a required weekly lab), that student generally should not enroll in that particular course during the term in question. Conflicts can sometimes arise with little advance notice, however - e.g., when a student-athlete makes the travel roster and/or qualifies for a game or tournament at the last minute. In that event, the student-athlete may be unable to provide much advance notice of an upcoming absence. The BFA Intercollegiate Athletics Committee strongly encourages instructors to try to resolve the resulting conflicts in ways that neither unduly penalize the student-athlete nor provide him or her with an unfair advantage. For conflicts that arise during the regular term, instructors have full authority to decide whether and/or how to accommodate those conflicts. While an instructor has the right to refuse to allow make-ups or other accommodations, he or she is permitted to provide such accommodations. Examples of accommodations include, but are not limited to, allowing assignments to be turned in late, scheduling early or make-up tests, or excusing the absence in classes where attendance is taken. The Office of Academic Support Services in the Athletic Department can help in several ways when conflicts arise. For instance, should the absence occur on the day of a scheduled quiz or exam, members of the Office of Academic Support Services staff or the faculty athletics representative can assist in proctoring the quiz or exam at a convenient time for the faculty member and student-athlete. During final exams, when university policy generally forbids participation in athletic competitions, any exceptions must be approved by the BFA Intercollegiate Athletics Committee as well as by the instructor involved. Recent examples include several track athletes and a soccer player who were invited to Olympic qualifying events during spring semester exams. In those cases, with the concurrence of the instructors and in consultation with the Office of Academic Support Services in Athletics, our committee authorized exceptions. To avoid any real or perceived pressure, CU policy forbids coaches from initiating contact with instructors regarding schedule conflicts, grades, or academic progress. Faculty may be contacted, however, by the staff of the Office of Academic Support Services to provide notification about a student-athlete's injury, surgery, or illness; to assist in rescheduling exams, tests, or quizzes; or simply to check on the progress of a student-athlete in a particular course. Any instructor who feels that inappropriate contact has been made should contact the Faculty Athletics Representative, the Athletic Director, the Director of Academic Support Services (http://tinyurl.com/b6sywe), or any member of the BFA Committee on Intercollegiate Athletics (http://tinyurl.com/anpck2). There is no rule forbidding instructors from contacting athletics staff. In fact, the Office of Academic Support Services welcomes communication with instructors regarding their concerns about class conflicts, as well as about matters involving attendance, academic performance, or classroom behavior.