Approval of Previous Minutes —

Approval of meeting minutes from meeting on October 22, 2024. Minutes approved by acclamation. 

New Business —

Charlotte asks the committee if they could look at the Final Exam Policy and possible concerns regarding the language and where clarification could be helpful:

• This can then be discussed at SenEx. 
• Possibly a Process Flow or FAQ could be helpful in the short term if the policy language can’t be changed in the near future. 

At the last meeting, Casey shared some options for the Fall 2025 calendar to present to KU leadership (followed by Kansas Board of Regents):

• The best option looks to be moving the start date of the Fall 2025 calendar up a week so that the fall semester starts on August 18, 2025. 
• The semester will then also end a week earlier. Fall Break will be 8 weeks into the semester. 
• There have been conversations with the Provost on the updated timeline.

Most are in favor of the August 18th start date:

• The biggest challenge and concern are 9-month faculty go on contract on August 18. 
• Need to give faculty and GTAs enough time to prepare. This is why initially the earlier start date wasn’t used. 
• However, there have been conversations in Provost office, Faculty Affairs, and HR to try and work around this. 
• The first KU football game is on Saturday, August 23. If the start date is later, there may be conflicts with football and orientation activities. 
• Taking everything into account, the August 18th start date has many in favor. 
• After University Senate votes on the August 18th start date, it will go to Provost Office. 
• There should be enough time between Summer Pay and when the fall semester begins. 

Charlotte received questions from School of Social Welfare surrounding Saturday classes within 8-week modules. Casey shares that Saturdays, which coincide with University-defined holidays, must also be off in the modules. 

Casey is meeting with School of Social Welfare to discuss this so the Calendar Committee doesn’t need to do anything further. 

The Final Exam policy: USRR 1.3.2 has been a source of increasing confusion among faculty and staff regarding what is allowable, so a goal is to try and make the policy clearer. 

Many faculty are having different types of assessments outside of final exams which the policy doesn’t directly address. 

What are the primary points of confusion? Would a FAQ or decision tree be helpful? 

USRR 1.3.2:

• If a “take home” exam or an online exam is given in a class with a regular meeting time, it may not be due prior to the end of the regularly scheduled final exam period for the class. If a proctored or online exam is given for an online course, the due date shall be noted in the course syllabus. 
• The word “period” can create confusion as it’s not very clear and could be interpreted differently. 
• What does the timeframe of “period” relate to?  Can this be clarified to be more specific?
• Projects, performances, paper, and other coursework may be due during finals week only in lieu of a final exam.
  • The due date isn’t very clear for this
  • What is the due date if an exam is proctored?

People often aren’t intentionally trying to violate the policy but they’re not sure what they can do.

• A glossary of terms at the beginning may be helpful.
• What are the standard classes and the expectations? What are the expectations of modules? What are the expectations of online classes? 
• It may be helpful to separate things out rather than meld together as the policy is currently doing. It seems that continually adjusting the policy can create more confusion. 

What is the intent of the policy? 

• Part of the intent is to create some protection over having too much due in the last couple weeks. However, the policy can create confusion with this regarding projects, papers, and section + final exams. 
• Should the policy be broken down into various sections that address things separately such as standard exams, online classes, and other subsets of final exams. 
• Would the committee be able to take various pieces of the policy and look at the language? 
• The University of Colorado has some good suggestions on final exam policies.