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Certain content is required in all course syllabi, and the Freedom in Learning and ADA statements are specified in DSU Policy 1.9; BOR Policy 2.7.3.A Syllabus Guidelines; BOR Policy 2.7.3.A Syllabus BOR Required Policy Statements; SDBOR Policy 2.7.3A(2) Syllabi Template; BOR Policy 2.7.3.B Learning Management System Administration Guidelines outlines the information to be made available to students and the associated posting requirements, ensuring students have access to accurate and timely information on the courses in which they are enrolled. Note that course syllabus must be available and posted in the LMS system no fewer than three (3) working days prior to the start of the term by the instructor of record. Dr. Chris Olson has created a DSU Accessible Syllabus Template, and items for each of the required statements from AAC guideline are included in the template. Using this template will ensure a syllabus meets the Board of Regents syllabus requirements and that the result is ADA compliant.
If the course is a general-education course, the syllabus must include the general-education goal and the student-learning outcomes associated with the course. See BOR Policy 2.7.3.A Syllabus Guidelines for a complete list of SD BOR approved general-education courses by goal area, with the specific learning outcomes.
For online courses, additional items in Dr. Olson’s template address the AAC BOR Policy 2.3.8 Distance Education. Additional items required to meet the Quality Assurance requirements that are not part of Dr. Olson’s template can be addressed in the course syllabus.
Faculty members are expected to maintain an office schedule that provides for reasonable on-campus accessibility during the work week of a semester. The requirement for faculty office hours will be two hours per week for each section taught spread over a minimum of three days with a maximum of eight hours per week. Faculty teaching online sections during the academic year and during the summer session will create a comparable schedule to be available to students. Notice of the availability of the office hours or equivalent should be provided to the students on the syllabus.
Faculty members are encouraged to make office hours information available as well on course D2L page as well as the Trojan Connect portal. For more details related to office hours, see the related DSU Faculty Workload Guidelines. For more on the Trojan Connect list of office hours, see the related Trojan Connect page.
When faculty members are not available for a class session, they should notify the students and college’s office as soon as possible. They should also, if possible, make alternate arrangements for coverage for that class meeting.
All faculty and students are urged to use their own discretion in deciding whether they can safely commute to campus. Faculty who are unable to reach the work site should contact their college office as soon as possible and post a notice on their D2L course websites, so that students will be able to make an informed decision about their own travel. Faculty should accommodate students missing class under these circumstances. For those who must travel to reach campus, please use discretion in deciding whether you can safely get to class. There may be times when the weather conditions do not justify cancellation of all classes but may prevent certain employees from getting to the campus.
If severe weather mandates the cancellation of classes, the Campus Alert System will be used to send an email alert to all DSU students, faculty, and staff registered in the system. The alert system can send notifications via email, phone call, and text message. For instructions on updating campus alert system see DSU Campus Alert System. Notification will also be sent to DSU’s email system, KJAM radio, DailyLeaderExtra.com, the Sioux Falls television stations, and several radio stations, while being posted on DSU’s website.
For more resources regarding inclement weather, see: the Board of Regents’ BOR Policy 4.1.11 Emergency Closing, DSU parking procedures (which includes snow removal in campus parking lots), City of Madison snow-removal information, and winter-weather travel information from the South Dakota Office of Emergency Management.
DSU expects faculty teaching credit-bearing courses to include appropriate procedures for evaluating student performance at the end of the course. All classes are required to schedule activities during finals week to meet the expected time requirements for a given credit hour.
The provost prepares the fall and spring finals schedule, with the most current exam schedule listed in the academic calendar. To determine the final exam slot, locate the final exam schedule under the academic calendar on the DSU website and the time slot that corresponds with the weekly schedule for a class. Online courses may schedule final-evaluation activity during the last, regularly scheduled class period or during finals week at the regular class time.
No student will be required to participate in more than three evaluative activities on any one day of the final week. The dean will coordinate and approve the necessary rescheduling. Any changes or deviations in the schedule for an individual student must have advance approval of the dean in whose college the course is taught.
It is the obligation of each instructor to report midterm deficiency grades and final grades in Self-Service Banner. The deadline to enter grades is no later than three days following midterm and no later than three days after the final day of the semester. At midterm, only deficiency grades are posted. The purpose of a deficiency grade is to inform students and their advisors that a student is in danger of not successfully completing a course. Deficiency grades should be given to students currently earning a D or F in the course. Valid final grades are A, B, C, D, F, I (Incomplete), S (Satisfactory), U (Unsatisfactory), RU (Remedial Unsatisfactory), RI (Remedial Incomplete), and SP (Satisfactory Progress-for Math 095 only). For students receiving a midterm deficiency or a final grade of an F, U, or RU, instructors must also enter the last date of academic activity. This data helps to determine the return of financial aid.
A grade of I (Incomplete) may be given at the end of a term when an undergraduate student has successfully completed the major portion of the course requirements but is unable, for reasons beyond the student’s control, to complete the requirements of the course in the term in which the student is registered for credit.
It is the obligation of each instructor to inform students at the beginning of each course of the objectives, requirements, performance standards and evaluation procedures for the course. This information should be incorporated into the current syllabus for the course. The university has a formal grade appeal process that is found in the university catalog under University Policies or DSU Policy 03-30-00.
Academic misconduct takes place whenever a student is suspected of some form of academic dishonesty, which includes, but is not limited to, cheating, plagiarism, fabrication, obtaining an unfair advantage, falsification of records, and unauthorized access to systems.
A faculty member suspecting academic dishonesty must follow the specific process defined by DSU and SDBoR policy. The basics of the process are that the faculty and the student may come to an informal resolution on their own. In this circumstance, the faculty member is expected to inform the Student Conduct Officer of the mutual resolution. If an informal resolution is not met, the faculty member must provide a signed form documenting the dissent which will be formally processed through DSU Policy 1.8 and SDBoR Policy 3.4.1.
Desire2Learn (D2L) is the university’s official Learning Management System, as defined by the SD BOR Policy 2.7.3B. By policy, faculty members are not allowed to use other LMS systems, and are expected to use D2L for their primary coursework correspondence in their classes. A course template is provided to faculty and should not be heavily modified, so that students have a consistent experience across all courses. Faculty are encouraged to allow students to access D2L courses up to 30 days before the official start of the term and are required to have courses active on the first day of the term. Course syllabus must be available and posted in the LMS no fewer than three (3) working days prior to the start of the term by the instructor of record. No other content may be due before the course begins.
Student opinion surveys are a required component of the evaluation of faculty members with teaching responsibilities. They provide useful feedback to faculty members that can inform improvements in teaching, course organization, course content, and assessment. All SDBOR universities use the IDEA survey from Anthology to collect data on students’ opinions. DSU creates an IDEA survey each term, and faculty must identify the intended outcomes from an IDEA-prescribed list for each course prior to the end of the term.
It is recommended that no more than three outcomes be selected per course, to facilitate the most appropriate weighting of students’ responses. The university alerts students of their access to student-opinion surveys during the final two to three weeks of the term, not including finals week. Students will be notified through email, with periodic reminders to improve response rates. Following the conclusion of the term, faculty have access to students’ ratings and qualitative comments. The ratings will be reviewed as a component of the Faculty Annual Review and Promotion and Tenure Review per SD BOR Policy 4.4.4, and DSU Policy 1.15.
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) provides comprehensive civil-rights protections to individuals with disabilities. Title II of the ADA states, in part, that “no otherwise qualified disabled individual shall, solely by reason of such disability, be excluded from the participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subject to discrimination in programs or activities sponsored by a public entity.”
To ensure equal-employment opportunities to qualified individuals with a disability, the SD Board of Regents will make reasonable accommodations for the known disability of an otherwise qualified individual, unless undue hardship on the operation of the business would result.
Employees who may require a reasonable accommodation should request the reasonable accommodation with their immediate supervisor. The supervisor, along with the office of human resources, will engage in an interactive process with the employee to determine if reasonable accommodations can be made.
DSU wants to provide every student with the opportunity to learn, but students learn in different ways. Students should request an accommodation, and the ADA coordinator will work with the student to find a solution that will help them succeed. The ADA coordinator will also assist the student in the installation and training of assistive technology as needed.
Student education records are official and confidential documents protected by one of the nation’s strongest privacy protection laws, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). Educational records, as defined by FERPA, include all records that schools or education agencies maintain about students. FERPA affords students certain rights with respect to their educational records. No individual or organization outside the institution shall have access to nor will the institution disclose information from the student’s educational records without the written consent of students except in certain instances. The full list of instances is listed on the Registrar’s webpage.
Dakota State University maintains a fundamental commitment to excellence in teaching and learning. Consequently, it is imperative that those who are part of the instructional process possess communication skills that enhance the understanding and assimilation of knowledge. Although mindful of potential discrimination concerns, the university believes that the understandable communication of English is a necessary condition of employment for those who teach. All instructors, including teaching assistants, adjuncts, and regular faculty, should speak English clearly enough for reasonably conscientious students to comprehend.
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