Program expectations of students

Preparation:  Do the work.  Show up.  Bring relevant texts and tools.

The assignments are designed to help you to explore, examine and practice using concepts and texts from the class.   Workshops are designed to support that exploration and meaning making in collaboration with your peers.  For the workshops to be productive learning spaces for both you and your peers your attendance and advanced preparation will be essential.  Missing assignments or missing 2 or more of the scheduled program activities may result in loss of credit.

Should you need to miss class for any reason, you must:  (i) contact your seminar faculty before class/field work; (ii) contact your field placement site at the beginning of the day; (iii) get the workshop information from your peers and make up the work (i.e. do the learning); and (iv) make arrangements for how you will get work to peers that they are depending on; and (v) send written work to your seminar leader via email on the day it’s due.

Engagement & professionalism:

  • ŸEngage fully in all classes, seminars and program activities by (i) generating and sharing ideas and critiques; (ii) encouraging others to generate and share their ideas and critiques; and (iii) listening attentively.
  • Ÿ Actively address confusion by asking questions of other students, faculty and using resources such as academic advising and the writing center.
  • Ÿ Do whatever is necessary to be alert and attentive from beginning to end of all program activities.
  • Investigate and attend to all expectations of field work site in responsible and professional manner.  (Please see field work handout for more information about this expectation)
  • Come well rested and sober to class and to field placement.

Timeliness:  Turning your work in on time will not only allow you to fully engage the learning opportunities in workshops, it will also allow us to read, comment on and return your written work in a timely manner.  We expect you to be proactive in addressing time management issues.  We will also speak directly to issues as needed.    If circumstances prevent you from completing work on time, communicate with your seminar faculty your plans for completing the work.   

Technology:   Our expectation is that cell phones and other related technologies will be off and that lap tops will be closed during all class activities.  If there is a workshop where a laptop will be useful, we will let you know.

Portfolio:  Keep and organize all of your program work in a 3 ring binder.  You will need this work both as resources to refer back to and as a tool for self-assessing and documenting your learning.  The portfolio should be clearly labeled, organized and have your work thoughtfully sorted into the following sections:

  1. Class paperwork
  2. Educational Autobiography
  3. Learning
  4. Development
  5. Library Research
  6. Field work (including notebook containing field notes and field journal entries)
  7. Other stuff

Self-evaluation:  We believe in the importance of students being involved in describing and evaluating their learning as part of this important document.  The registrar will not consider your transcript complete without it.

  • ŸBring an official self-evaluation of your work to the evaluation conference of your final quarter in the program.
  • ŸSubmit two copies of your self-evaluation to the registrar’s office.

Faculty evaluation:  Students evaluations of our work have been useful to us as tools for refining our teaching practice.

  • ŸPlease write an evaluation of your seminar leader that (i) captures something s/he did that helped your learning, and (ii) anything that could help your learning better should we work together again in the future.  We will also ask students to write a program evaluation that, among other things, will give you a chance to address how well we collaborated as a team.
  • ŸYou have two available paths for submitting the faculty evaluation.  You can give it to me in the evaluation conference, or you can turn it in to Sheila Sawyer (the seminar 2 program secretary, Sem2A-2117), who will pass it on to me after my evaluations are complete. 

Meeting with faculty:

  • Participate in a short meeting with faculty during weeks one and five of the quarter as a way to invite and deepen the dialogue about your work and learning.  
  • Participation a final evaluation conference during eval week, December 12th-16th, Monday through Friday.   We will have conferences with each of you that week.  Do not make travel plans that week without first consulting with your seminar faculty.

Credit policy:  We will award each student 16 credits per quarter, for completing assignments, meeting the expectations of assignments and for good attendance at all program activities.  We may award less than sixteen credits for work which fails to meet these criteria.   You’ll receive a notice if we see patterns that put you in danger of losing credit (e.g. fifth week warning).      

Receiving credit indicates that a student has fulfilled the college level requirements and standards of the program.   Students are only evaluated for the work they receive credit in.  The evaluation is then used to describe the quality of their work.  That evaluation will then describe both strengths and weakness that work.

Recognize from the onset, that we will evaluate your work, not by comparison to the work of other students, but by looking for evidence of growth in your skills, creativity, discipline and commitment from the beginning of the quarter to the time you leave the program.

OTHER COMMUNITY RESPONSIBILITIES:

Academic and personal conflicts are common and to be expected in academic communities.The CARE network (Sem2E-2109, x5219) is a great campus resource to tap for “clear, accurate and consistent information about how to address conflicts; and supporting those recovering from conflict.  The Social Contract lays out expectations about how all of us should deal with such conflicts:

Evergreen can thrive only if members respect the rights of others while enjoying their own rights. . . All [members of the community] must share alike in prizing academic and interpersonal honesty, in responsibly obtaining and in providing full and accurate information, and in resolving their differences through due process and with a strong will to collaboration. (The Social Contract–WAC 174-120-020)

Accordingly, as is consonant with Evergreen’s mediation process, we expect all members of the program to abide by the following principles of honest and face-to-face resolution of conflicts:

  • An individual should take up any grievance with a student or faculty with that person first and only then, if the results are unsatisfactory, ask for consultation with another member of the faculty.
  • Refrain from negative gossip in regard to any grievance.
  • In the event you do not feel successful in resolving a conflict, bring your concerns to the attention of your seminar leader or to the faculty team. Any conflicts that cannot be resolved by your own efforts, those of your seminar leader, or the faculty team, will be referred to our program dean or other mutually agreed upon mediator.
  • Any disputes about credit or the content of an evaluation must first be addressed to the faculty member who wrote the evaluation.  If a student is not satisfied by a discussion with the faculty member involved, the issue will be brought before the faculty team. Final decisions about credit and evaluations will be made by the program faculty.

Drug and Alcohol Policy:

All members of this community must refrain from the use of alcohol and drugs during all program activities, including field work. Failure to comply with this expectation will result in disciplinary consequences such as loss of credit, being exited from the program and or even possible expulsion from the college.

Academic Honesty:

In an academic community, sharing and taking responsibility for our own ideas is vital. At the same time, acknowledging our use of other people’s ideas is equally important. The work we submit must reflect our own ideas. When we are incorporating the views of others we must acknowledge our sources. Since much of the work in this program will be collaborative and the ensuing ideas will reflect the contributions of more than one person, we must get into the habit of acknowledging the people and ideas that have influenced us. There will be many times when we will be asked to take individual positions–in essays, research projects, and seminar discussions–and we must assert our own distinctive interpretations and judgments. The final work we do must reflect our own judgment and analysis while also recognizing the contributions of people who have influenced our learning.

Failure to make such acknowledgments or to present the work of others as our own is plagiarism.  Any student who plagiarizes material may lose credit, be asked to leave the program and may be required to leave the college. Because college policy makes the consequences of plagiarism so severe, ask your faculty members if you have any questions.

Also, it’s vital and expected that each assignment be an original piece of work (i.e. the piece has never been submitted to, or has not been the basis for an assignment in another program)