At issue: Saturday class replaced with other Saturday class
Our take: This doesn’t help anyone.
Just so you know, Emerson moved the make-up day—not that any students would be aware of that.
The faculty received an email on Tuesday containing details about the Saturday make-up day moving from April 8 to March 25. This announcement came without a change to the online calendars and resources, and without any notice to the students.
As we wrote two weeks ago, Saturday classes are a waste of time for both the student and the teacher. Students have to juggle extracurriculars and work while their professors have to balance child care and finding time to grade. Now the date for the make-up classes has been moved up to, giving everyone even less time to prepare. Hopefully, no one in the cast of Octavia Butler has a Thursday night class, or else they’ll have to skip the Saturday make-up class to perform. Plenty of other student performances, practices and job shifts take place that day, too.
We pointed out two weeks ago that students who work on Saturdays have to choose between losing hours at work or missing class time. This adjustment is just another blow to those who need to make that decision—again.
And with such short notice for professors and faculty, many are likely to decide they also do not have time for these Saturday courses. Professors may have children, other jobs, or just other commitments they made in advance of this switch. The April 8 snow day has been on the calendar all semester, allowing professors time to prepare for this situation. We wouldn’t blame a faculty member for canceling this weekend class—people make plans in advance. But that doesn’t excuse our administration for putting us students in a position where we might lose out on class time included in our tuition.
It’s bad enough that our go-to college policy is to make up snow days on the weekend. But if Emerson administration is going to put students, faculty, and staff’s weekend plans on hold, they need to give us ample warning. And they have to keep us informed.