2015-47

Arizona State University
University Senate
Spring 2015

Senate Motion #2015-47

Motion Introduced by: Student-Faculty Policy Committee, Chair Leonard Gordon

Date of First Reading: January 26, 2015

Date of Second Reading: February 23, 2015

Title of Motion: How Long Students Should Wait for an Absent Instructor

Action Requested: 

The Student-Faculty Policy Committee and the University Academic Council recommend approval of this motion.

Background/Rationale: This policy proposal consideration occurred after the historic rain storm in September 2014 which resulted in many instructors being late to their classes. This event highlighted a policy need more generally. The ASU CLAS Senate through Jill Kolp reported to the Student-Faculty Policy Committee the raising of the issue at the CLAS Senate meeting of September 22, 2014.  The issue of concern raised was whether the University had a policy about how long students in a brick-and-mortar course were required to wait if their instructor was late to class. It was reported that many students had requested a policy to know what was expected of them.  The CLAS Senate after discussion concluded that this was a matter of sufficient importance to refer to the Student-Faculty Policy Committee. The Committee after discussions advanced the motion to establish a university policy of how long a student was expected to stay in class when an instructor was late. The SFPC motion held that there should be a university policy established, to be implemented and determined by the individual instructor to communicate to each class at the beginning of the

Motion Request: It is the policy of Arizona State University that all classes make clear to students what is expected of their obligation to stay in class when the instructor is late to class and 2- the particular time obligation is to be determined and clearly communicated to the class by the instructor.

In the event the instructor fails to indicate a time obligation, the time obligation will be 15 minutes for class sessions lasting 90 minutes or less and 30 minutes for class sessions lasting more than 90 minutes.