As students at this university, we are each ultimately in charge of our own academic outcomes and experiences. To suggest otherwise, to revert back to a helicopter-parent-esque model of supervision and mandating reminiscent of middle and high school years, would be, in a word, ridiculous. The vast majority of Bucknell students are legally adults and all of us pay, in some capacity, to be here. Perhaps that’s why the sudden uptick in stringent absence policies across classes and disciplines is so bothersome to me. Is my handling of my academic career not, at the end of the day, at my discretion?
I am a student who feels physical pain if I don’t go to class. I had perfect attendance records in high school and near-perfect attendance throughout my semesters here at Bucknell. I say this not to brag, but to establish credibility— I do not hold this opinion because these updated absence policies negatively affect me, but because they unnecessarily constrain and worry me. In reading the syllabi for my classes this semester, almost all of them had near-identical statements eliminating the distinction between “excused” and “unexcused” absences. The uncanny similarities in phrasing and execution lead me to believe that this new policy has a larger reach and deeper root than just my professors and I can appreciate the necessity of following campus or department policy. That being said, I have not observed any suitable adjustment in relevant adjacent attendance policies and guidelines, nor has there been convincing refutation of the basic definition of “excused.”
“Excused” absences exist to acknowledge a sensible and substantiated reason why a given student has had to miss class. Medical and family emergencies are the first to come to mind, but something as simple as having the flu and not wanting to infect your whole class is (or should be) “excused” as well and to fully complete the process, professors often request a note from Student Health corroborating a report of illness. In just these past few weeks, having witnessed the illness-necessitated absences of close friends, I’ve observed that the requirement to jump through half a dozen hoops to earn an “excused” designation—letters from primary care doctors, approval from student health, follow-up emails to professors—has not changed in the slightest, with one important distinction. The end result is no longer an excused absence, but just an understanding from a professor that you weren’t lying about being sick. No matter the (documented) reason, it seems you’re still getting marked off a “freebie” absence (of which most professors offer three) and once you reach your professor’s threshold, your grade starts losing points. No longer is there a pool of excused absences given separate designation from general “unexcused” counterparts.
And I do appreciate where professors are coming from. Some students are dishonest in their assertions of illness and report fevers when they’re really just skipping because it’s too cold or they’re too tired or they just don’t want to go. I’m sure professors are trying to find a balance of leniency—and even with these updated policies, I get the impression that many professors are, on a case-by-case basis, adjusting their actual application of an absence strike depending on specific student effort, communication and circumstance and academic Deans’ offices are operating as-per-usual regarding academic flexibility—but I feel the first step should not be a universal crackdown. Bucknell’s own publicized conduct expectations place the responsibility of class attendance (and subsequent consequences) on the student themselves, which seems incredibly reasonable to me. As much as “faking” illness to get out of attendance is, in part, an issue of respect for the professor and their material, it’s also a lot to ask of already-busy professors to try to implement an overly complicated absence policy. I can appreciate the reasoning that went into a simplified policy from multiple fronts, but the execution seems ineffective and I hope that administration and departments will continue to tweak absence policy guidelines over the course of this semester and those to come.
