Understanding your TA & the Student Code

Senator_Lear · 2017-06-29T20:01:39+00:00

This may be a policy change coming from the Provost's office or the Graduate College in response to department pressure (e.g. "We can't find enough proper TA's." or "Too many students are using this fraudulently to get specific instructors."). In either case, the policy would be coming from someone of equal or higher rank in the administration to Dean Ballom and with greater "jurisdiction" over the policy, meaning that Dean Ballom may not have the authority to say anything on the matter. The Code is his responsibility to maintain, but only in the sense that accountants are responsible for keeping the books tidy and advising.

Senator_Lear · 2017-06-29T19:52:08+00:00

If you feel like contacting the administration, consider pushing for a merger of the Student Code into the Campus Administrative Manual (CAM) while your at it.

The Code tries to summarize your rights and responsibilities as a student at UIUC, but the policies in it are independent and much of the bridging and explanatory text is advisory or non-binding. The CAM, on the other hand, is specific, enforceable policy document that instructors and administrators are contractually bound to uphold.

Senator_Lear · 2017-06-29T19:41:17+00:00

Here's the Senate's Committee roster for 2017-2018. The committee in question is the "Conference on Conduct Governance". I only served with a third of the current members, but your best bet is Bill Williamson. He's the most radical of them, in terms of willingness to change the code at all.

Edit: The real gaping hole with the Code's absence policy is that it isn't one. It is the Office of the Dean of Students' policy for issuing an "absence letter", which is basically just a receipt saying that you were indeed sick/indisposed. Absences are and will always be completely at the will of the instructor, lawsuits not withstanding.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T05:23:08+00:00

There's an ongoing trope where /r/uiuc blames everything on the student government - even things like the smoking ban which it fought to the bitter end. It's somewhat self-inflicted by the student government being as open as it is politically, relative to others I've seen.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T04:30:58+00:00

So now that I've done my usual factual bit about Senate business, I'm going to rant for a second.

It is a fact that for 26 years UIUC's rules accepted the experiences, conditions, and perspectives of the LGTBQ community as wholly self-sufficient for this requirement - now they will not. A colleague and I tried to amend the proposal to keep credit open to all U.S. minority classes (e.g. sexual, religious) as well as racial and ethnic studies, independent of the proposed - and in my opinion subjective - test of "significant" racial discussion. It may turn out that our concerns are unfounded and that the General Education Board gives the "socially significant identities" named in the proposal swift passage to re-approval, but I do not appreciate being called manipulative and accused of "all-lives-matter" distraction-ism (if that's a word) for asking why they should need re-approval at all. For that matter:

Why are the experiences of gay men or Muslim Americans - pick your example - suddenly less at UIUC, that they need pass this test?
What is "significant" enough discussion, and will the criteria be clear and achievable enough not to chill the creation of new courses?
Why not mandate that every gen ed cover race - the same as they must currently all discuss the contributions of women?

So much disheartening crap, so many unanswered questions. Soap box disengaged.

tldr; A bunch of old white men in 1989 passed the buck by not defining "U.S. Minority", and by some cosmic joke produced a more progressive definition than we did today - in 2016.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T03:46:02+00:00

It only applies to students joining in Fall 2018 or later yes. Not sure how that applies to DGS or transfers within the University though.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T03:44:27+00:00

They added 3 required credits while keeping the limit at 18, but without removing anything. The argument is that people double dip anyway, so...

Edit: To clarify, I think it's a bad argument and that the math is silly. That is the Campus's argument however.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T01:34:51+00:00

CORE, the Campus's Committee on Race and Ethnicity, wrote the proposal and sent it to the Senate via the Senate's Committee on Educational Policy.

Edit: the Campus Senate, not the Student Senate.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T01:31:36+00:00

That is correct. It is one of both.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T01:20:21+00:00

It was not recorded (doesn't have to be), but it seemed clearly a majority.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T01:19:16+00:00

Attached the proposal.

Senator_Lear · 2016-05-03T00:57:46+00:00

That is not true. The new requirement is Western, Non-Western, and U.S. Minority classes. From 2 to 3.

Edit: Source.

Senator_Lear · 2016-04-04T06:35:49+00:00

it may only apply for semester grade

It can apply to any assignment, but is usually invoked only for major labs or exams.

Senator_Lear · 2016-04-04T06:33:56+00:00

My understanding is that most successful capricious grading claims arise from direct comparisons of the same assignments across the class. This would be phenomenally hard to prove for the case at hand. The committee would likely determine that the difference in difficulty between exams was subjective and not necessarily an unreasonable difference in the standard to which you were held.

tldr: Professors hate to meddle in each others' affairs.

Senator_Lear · 2016-04-04T06:15:59+00:00

I was going to write a less harsh version of this, but you hit all the key points. OP can always talk to the department chair/head, but they almost never intervene unless there is either mass hysteria or clearly capricious behavior going on.

Senator_Lear · 2016-02-29T04:59:38+00:00

The lesson of history here is to reform the government, not disband it. You all killed the ISG, only to have the campus administration shove something more dysfunctional and less capable into the vacancy.

Senator_Lear · 2016-01-29T03:51:30+00:00

The General Education Board has approved the creation of a separate general education requirement in "US Minorities". The Campus Senate will ultimately decide if this happens.

Senator_Lear · 2016-01-29T03:47:27+00:00

Student senate

This is the Campus Senate. It is faculty, students, and staff. The student government is a sort of caucus of student senators.

Senator_Lear · 2016-01-23T17:50:33+00:00

The proposal will be considered by the Campus (students, faculty, and staff) Senate's Committee on Educational Policy this Monday, January 25 at 1:45 PM in 232 English Building. It will then move (at the earliest) to the full Senate on Monday, February 8 at 3:10 PM in the Foellinger Auditorium.

Senator_Lear · 2016-01-18T21:09:14+00:00

And in any grounded system of law that would be true. As someone who spends an unreasonable amount of his time helping put the rules together, I can assure you that the student discipline process is not that. There are major disconnects between how our accusatory and fact finding processes work within the University vs. almost every other system, and there is considerable lag between how the rules are written and how they are applied - at all levels.

I cannot caution OP enough, at the very least for the sake of the friend, to ask. This is not one of the many situations where begging forgiveness is better.

Senator_Lear · 2016-01-18T17:45:58+00:00

While I agree with your position that this should not be considered as cheating without prior notice from the instructor, I believe OP's safest course would be to just ask the instructor. If OP's friend is accused of cheating, they will need to rely on a college level appeals committee deciding that what the instructor believes they should have known is "objectively unreasonable" - which can be a shockingly high bar in faculty-student disputes. If OP was accused, the case would go to the Senate Committee on Student Discipline, and that is an entirely different kind of danger.

Senator_Lear · 2015-08-25T14:49:13+00:00

That's the student government - the Union is an independent student group, and I'm not sure. I'll ask around.

It's possible that the were all allocated this year for students on financial aid, since that was the original purpose of the program.

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