Policies

Attendance

Classes missed will affect your final participation grade. However, TWO classes may be missed without a large effect on your final grade. Save these for genuine emergencies. Your final course grade will drop one full letter grade for each additional class missed, i.e. If you miss 3 classes and the original final grade earned is a “B” it will drop to a “C”.

Students who are casual about taking absences should not expect leniency when an absence is truly needed. Serious illness and family emergencies are excused absences – You just need to communicate with your instructor.

To be counted in attendance, you must be present for the entire class session, unless excused early. Attendance at all scheduled critiques is mandatory–even if your own project is not complete.

Punctuality

All students must be consistently on time for class. Likewise students who disappear during class or leave early without an explanation will be accounted tardy. If you are tardy it will affect your final participation grade. Every 3 tardies will be counted as an official absence.

Deadlines

Please view deadlines as a critical professional responsibility.

Late work is accepted only until the next scheduled course session and will be dropped one full letter grade, after that it is a zero.

Students must have their projects fully prepared and ready to be critiqued or turned in on the due date. Work not turned in at the designated time is considered late. You also must be present for critique or final presentation even if your work is not complete.

Accommodations

WWU courses are intended for all students, including those with visible or invisible disabilities. If at any point in the quarter a student is not able to fully access the space, content, and experience of a course, they should contact the Disability Access Center (DAC) to discuss potential accommodations. Students already approved for accommodations by the DAC should send their Faculty Notification Letter through the myDAC portal as early as possible in the quarter, then reach out to their faculty to discuss how approved accommodations apply to specific coursework. Any student with questions about disability accommodations can contact the DAC for more information, temporary assistance, or connections to other resources at Disability Access Center (Links to an external site.) or 360-650-3083.

Technical Difficulties & Service Failure

Technical difficulties, hardware/software problems, and network failure are never an acceptable excuse for not meeting a deadline. Students are challenged to acquire the life skill of working in advance of deadlines and backing up work. Students should always backup their work to the cloud or a flash drive. Never work directly from the (U) Drive or your flash drive, because it is much slower and can cause problems. Work on the desktop and remember to save to your flash drive or cloud when you are finished.

Technical Instruction

With the extreme amount of technical possibilities, limited class time, and problems that always seem to occur with technology, I may not be able to answer all of your specific technical problems immediately. I will of course do my best to help everyone, but I expect you to explore the technical problems on your own using the provided links and recommended reference books and each other. This is a great opportunity for collaboration and an essential part of learning how to survive in the industry after you enter the design field. You will be learning how to learn, how to problem solve.

Asset Creation

Assets are photos, illustrations, icons, images, sound, video or any other media element which is incorporated into a project.

Every element must be original or completely copyright-free. That goes for sound and video as well. If it is copyright-free and you use it – still make it your own.

It is a win-win situation if you try and create original work. It is a much better portfolio piece when you create everything and no explanations are needed to differentiate your skill-set from someone else’s.

Critiques

Each project will be presented and critiqued with oral and/or written peer comment. Imagine that you are presenting your project to a client, creative team members or a prospective employer in a professional environment.

Professionalism & Courtesy

As designers-in-training you are expected to conduct yourself in a professional manner. Poor classroom behavior will affect your final participation grade. This aspect is comprised of conduct, participation, and preparedness. All work is expected to be presented and discussed professionally.

Western’s Policies

Syllabi@WWU

https://syllabi.wwu.edu (Links to an external site.)

This link includes the following policies:

  • COVID-19 Safety Information for Students
  • Academic Honesty: Integrity, Academic Honesty, Plagiarism
  • Accommodations: Disability Access Center, Religious Accommodation
  • Ethical Conduct with WWU Network and Computing Resources
  • Equity, Equal Opportunity & Civil Rights: Your Civil Rights and How to Protect Them, Gender Neutral Restrooms, Structural Equity and Bias Response
  • Finals Info: Finals Preparation Week, Finals Week
  • Medical Excuse Policy
  • Student Conduct Code