Duke Attendance Policy
- Thread starter Soleilpie
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Soleilpie said:
I'm not sure if there's an "official policy," but in practice students generally do whatever works for them. Sometimes that means skipping lectures during the week before a big exam, to squeeze in enough study time. For some of my classmates that meant never going to anatomy lab, because they felt their time was more efficiently spent reading a color picture atlas of anatomy at home (and they did VERY well in the course!). I've found the administration and advisory deans to be very supportive of students doing whatever they need to do in order to succeed. The fact of the matter is, we all learn differently, and the administration seems to really recognize this. Of course, if you're skipping classes like crazy and then failing exams, I'm sure someone would step in. But as long as you're doing well I don't think it's really an issue at Duke.
But there ARE some settings where attendance is at least informally taken, such as in small group settings like pathology lab, neuroanatomy lab, pharmacology small group, etc. I'd estimate that these account for about 1/3 of curricular time in the first year. Attending these makes good sense though, as your grade for these components is based on your interaction with the instructor and your participation, so if you skipped too many of these the professor wouldn't even know who you were! It's also pretty necessary to attend these sections, otherwise you'd never get to see the path specimens, for example, and would probalby fail the practical exam at the end of the course.
Does that make sense? Just out of curiosity, why did you ask this question?
Tommy,
Thank you so much for your reply. It made perfect sense and this is what I've heard in the past about the med program at Duke. I asked not so that I could skip classes should I ever be so fortunate to get into Duke, but because a student in another program at Duke is having some issues with an unprofessional instructor who has taken to demeaning students for not showing up for class. This student is going to be meeting with this instructor today and wanted to bring up the attendance policies of other programs in order to get across that everyone has different learning styles and that students can excel even if they miss a class or two or three. From what I gather, this instructor is offended easily and seems to be unable to react diplomatically. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping that this meeting won't affect my friend negatively afterwards. Again, I appreciate your input. 🙂
Thank you so much for your reply. It made perfect sense and this is what I've heard in the past about the med program at Duke. I asked not so that I could skip classes should I ever be so fortunate to get into Duke, but because a student in another program at Duke is having some issues with an unprofessional instructor who has taken to demeaning students for not showing up for class. This student is going to be meeting with this instructor today and wanted to bring up the attendance policies of other programs in order to get across that everyone has different learning styles and that students can excel even if they miss a class or two or three. From what I gather, this instructor is offended easily and seems to be unable to react diplomatically. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping that this meeting won't affect my friend negatively afterwards. Again, I appreciate your input. 🙂
