Democracy in action, or an excuse to not work?
I report, you decide: Over 100 professors lighten class loads for Election Day
A newly organized group on campus is working to make it as easy as possible for students to join the Election Day efforts today.“Penn Votes and Volunteers 2024″ is a coalition of 20 student organizations ranging from the Black Wharton Undergraduate Association to the InterFraternity Council. These groups have joined together under the leadership of Political Science professor John DiIulio to e-mail professors who teach classes or hold recitations or lab sessions on Tuesdays.
These professors have been asked “to kindly refrain from giving an exam, having work due or requiring mandatory class attendance on Election Day … without otherwise making alternative arrangements such as makeup classes for student volunteers,” according to the request sent out by PVV.
Full disclosure: I had short, election-related papers due in two classes yesterday. Today is a grad seminar, so nothing due but reading. Still, people work real jobs and manage to vote, so why do students, who are likely in class an average max of 3 hours in a given day, need a lightened load so they can vote? What, there are spending so much time trying to figure out who to vote for they can’t study for an exam?
Of course, I get grumpy about this kind of thing, as my students know.
Update: Evidence that Harvard agrees with my stance.
I let my research methods class out of class tonight, but they’re out getting wet conducting an exit poll… so it’s not like they’re getting to skip.
Comment by Chris Lawrence — Tuesday, November 2, 2024 @ 11:51 am