In The News

January 30, 2003

New NU attendance policy poses problems for athletes

By Scott Craven
Norwich Guidon Staff Writer

With the start of the 2003 spring semester, the administration at Norwich University has put into effect a new class attendance policy, which could pose a problem for some student athletes.

Not much has changed in the new policy, according to Frances Burstein, the university registrar. However, she said that the previous policy had grown to be something that was very difficult to manage.

"The old attendance policy had been in effect ever since I started working for the university, which was nearly two decades ago," Burstein said. "There was also a feeling among the faculty that there were a lot of reasons that students were out of classes that sort of overlapped each other. It was time to re-look the policy and make it appropriate for today."

Also speaking on behalf of the administration, Associate Provost Joseph Byrne said, "Norwich University is an academic institution. We deliver education and we deliver instruction," Byrne said. "Our means of delivering these instructions are classes, so what the faculty wanted was more control over the attendance of classes and more limits on students' ability to miss classes."

The new attendance policy has been posted on the university's website and an additional notice has also been sent to each student's campus mailbox. But before tossing them out and flooding the mailroom floor with papers, students might want to take a closer look at some of the new rules.

While the majority of the policy has remained the same, some rules have changed significantly. Students who thought the old policy was strict should be prepared for an even tighter policy, which some faculty and staff said they plan to monitor and enforce very closely.

"I intend to have the policy interpreted in the strictest fashion," said Michael Puddicombe, associate professor of management. "I want students to be in class as much as possible. The classroom is the most important place for a student to be, and if you're not there, then you can't participate."

Puddicombe is also one of the seven members of the CASD (Committee on Academic Standings and Degrees) who recommended the new attendance policy.

According to Puddicombe, the issue with the new policy was trying to strike a balance between the requirements for students to be in the classroom versus their extra-curricular activities.

"The learning and interaction between students is one that takes place in the classroom," said Puddicombe. "Our main concern was to prevent students from missing a significant number of classes to the point that it would interfere with their learning."

One of the most significant changes to the policy is the limit of classes that an athlete can be excused from. This could possibly affect their participation during post-season play.

The new attendance policy states that instructors may deny an excused absence for such events as an athletic contest for a student who is receiving a "D" or "F" in their course.

Tony Mariano, Director of Athletics at Norwich University voiced his concern over the new policy.

"The main concern of the Academic Department is missed class time, which is certainly a primary concern of ours in the athletic department," Mariano said. "We monitor our student athletes on a regular basis, and we have a great deal of interaction with professors of students who are doing poorly or not attending class."

Only time will tell if this policy will be effective, however. Mariano points out a few areas that he foresees to be "problematic."

"I think one of the difficulties is that if there are not enough sections of a class and one of our student athletes has to take a class on a particular day where he or she may have several athletic contests, it could certainly affect their ability to participate if they need to go to that class," Mariano said.

"However, it is our hope that the professors will help and work with these student athletes and try to make it as easy for both themselves and the athletes to attend those classes and do well in them."

"What I don't want to see is a student athlete put in a situation where a conference schedule that is made up by an outside organization that the student doesn't have any control over, to prohibit them from participating in an athletic program."

According to Mariano, a way around this conflict is to give preferential scheduling to the student athletes so they can schedule their classes around games times.

"If our student athletes can't go in and schedule around those times, then we could be seeing a whole host of problems with regards to the current policy," Mariano said.

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