TELEPHONES
Office Voice Mail: 303.556.8465
Department Staff: 303.556.4893
Fax: 303.556.6038

CONTACT INFO
E-mail is the best method for contacting me. If you need to miss a class session, review the calendar on the syllabus. It's fine to send an e-mail to give a heads up. Be sure to check the calendar at the end of your syllabus to find out what you have missed and need to recover. Please ask a fellow student to lend to you any handouts that you may have missed so that you may copy the material.

DEPARTMENT POLICIES
Please refer to the department web page for information on department policies.

GRADES
I assign percentage scores to the exams and exercises that you complete during the semester. This percentage grade is then converted into a letter-grade scale. I give grades of plus and minus which convert to scores that affect your GPA . (Please note that there is no grade of “A+.” The computer grading system at UCD is not set up to accept an “A+.”) 
 

(no “A+” allowed) A  92.5%-100% A- 89.5%-92.4%

B+ 87.5%-89.4% B  82.5%-87.4% B- 79.5%-82.4%

C+ 77.5%-79.4% C  72.5%-77.4% C- 69.5%-72.4%

D+ 67.5%-69.4% D  62.5%-67.4 D- 59.5%-62.4%

F 0%-59.4%

ATTENDANCE
The official departmental policy on attendance is as follows: Any student who misses 20% of the semester (a total of three weeks of class) will automatically fail the course. This translates to a total of nine class sessions for those classes that meet three times a week and six class sessions for those classes that meet twice a week. Attendance is a key issue in foreign language learning, and failure to come to class deprives you of the necessary exposure to the language. It is my commitment to provide you with the best possible instruction. If you miss class sessions, you are depriving me of that privilege. Also, by signing up for a course, you are contracting to attend that course. If you miss a class session, you are violating that contract and depriving yourself of the fullest possible experience.

HOMEWORK
Even though there may not be a specific assignment after any given class, you have homework every day in German. Please refer to the calendar in your syllabus and keep abreast of the material. The responsibility of coming to class prepared every day rests squarely on your shoulders. Not only do you hurt yourself when you show up to class unprepared, but you create a disadvantage to all the other members of the class as well.

WORK LOAD
The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences recommends to students that for each hour of class time, two to three hours of study time is required outside of class. This means that a three-credit course requires six to nine hours outside of class and that a five credit course requires ten to fifteen hours of outside study. Most students find foreign language courses as difficult as any other courses on campus. The work load and complexity of material can be every bit as demanding as an equivalent course in Physics, Math, History, Economics, or Biology. If you plan on earning an “A”, you should expect to put in 6-12 hours a week of outside work for each three-credit course and 10-15 hours a week for each five-credit course.

NATIVE SPEAKERS OF GERMAN
UCD sometimes hosts exchange students from Oldenburg. These students may be available to help you with grammar, pronunciation and fluency. Please seek out these people as they can be a useful resource. Ask the Office of International Education for a “conversation partner” if you are interested.

TUTORING
The Department of Modern Languages collects a small course fee from each student enrolled in langauge courses to help maintain ancillary services. This includes the language lab and tutoring. Please take advantage of the tutor. For students having difficulty with the language, the tutor will help explain difficult concepts and work on drills to provide students with added practice in the language. For more advanced students, the tutor is an excellent resouce for working on pronunciation and topics not covered in detail during class sessions. You are already automatically paying for this service so please consider visiting the tutor for an hour a week.

INCOMPLETE COURSE WORK
Except in the instance of an extreme emergency, I do not assign the grade of incomplete. I will give an incomplete only in a proven and documented emergency and only under the following conditions. The student must meet all of these conditions in order to qualify for an incomplete. These conditions are in accordance with the university's uniform grading policy:

You must complete at least 75% of the course.
This includes a minimum of 12 weeks of attendance.

You must be passing the course.
I will not assign an incomplete to you if you are failing this course.

You must provide written documentation.
Proof of a true emergency to the D.M.L. and the C.L.A.S.

We must arrange the incomplete on time.
It must be before the final day of classes prior to the beginning of final exams.

You (or I) must fill out an incomplete agreement form.
Be sure to attain all the required signatures.

You must make up the incomplete within a calendar year.
Your grade will otherwise revert to an F.

You may NOT re-take a course to make up the work for an incomplete.
You are allowed only to finish the incomplete material and nothing more.

The philosophy behind an incomplete is as follows: A student, who is performing well in a course, suffers an unpredictable emergency near or at the end of the semester. This emergency prevents the student from satisfactorily completing the course. That student takes a brief leave of absence from the course to settle the outside business and then returns promptly (usually within a semester but no longer than a year) to complete the remaining work in the course. The student and instructor draw up a contract to outline the necessary components of the remaining work. Upon completion of that work, the student receives a letter grade which replaces the grade of incomplete.

REPEATING A COURSE
If you decide to re-take a a course, you must re-register for the course and pay the appropriate tuition. The grades for both courses will appear on your transcript. Most courses are considered "non-repeatable" in terms of how they count toward your graduation. In other words, your transcipt will show both grades for a repeated course, but you will be allowed to count a repeated course only once toward graduation.

ACADEMIC HONESTY
Do not cheat. Types of cheating include (but are not limited to): copying from other student(s) on written exams, falsely representing material as your own when in fact it was created by someone other than yourself, using hidden materials on closed book tests, etc. Infractions against academic honesty will be punished in accordance to their severity. This can range from earning a zero on an assignment, to failing a test, to failing the course, and (in severe instances) being expelled from the university.

EXPLANTION OF POLICIES
If any of the above policies or suggestions are unclear, please come to me in person and ask me to explain them to you in further detail. They are meant as helpful guidelines.