Policy Information for Instructors
English Composition Program

Course Organization

All instructors are required to distribute a printed syllabus to students on the first day of the course. This syllabus should clearly outline course objectives, required texts, grading standards, and a calendar of activities listing due dates for assignments. Any subsequent adjustments should be clarified in a revised syllabus. 

All composition faculty are required to submit a syllabus to Department of Literature and Languages secretary Joyce Vernay in AUD 724 during the first week of the term.

Faculty Performance

Faculty evaluations are one means of gauging instructors' success in the classroom. The university asks students to complete a standardized evaluation form at the end of each term for each course. In addition, the writing program uses a narrative form which allows students to reflect in their own words (though anonymously) on the semester's learning experiences. The program coordinator carefully reads these evaluations, shares them with instructors, and sponsors individual and group activities that address faculty development needs.

Attendance

Because the composition classroom is a community of working writers who learn from each other and support each other's growth, it's important that students attend regularly. Consequently, the program has had a long-standing attendance policy: 6 absences from a course that meets twice weekly, or 3 absences from a course that meets once weekly can result in a failure. Instructors should print this policy in their syllabi.

Academic Integrity

The university code of student conduct prohibits academic cheating in any form, which includes plagiarism. Because plagiarism is often committed without full awareness of what it is, or why it's wrong, instructors in the Writing Program have a special responsibility to instruct students at every level of the composition sequence (but especially in ENG 102 and LIBS 201) in the "hows" and "whys" of academic integrity. In ENG 100, instructors should focus on how textual appropriation (commonly referred to as "quoting"), textual ownership (or "originality"), and collaboration function in academic writing. By the end of ENG 101, students should be able to work confidently and more or less correctly with two or more outside sources. ENG 102 and LIBS 201 emphasize synthesis, analysis, and accurate documentation of multiple published sources. At every point in the composition sequence, instructors should help students understand how "quotation" helps communities of writers create new knowledge, and how academic honesty protects the validity of the knowledge that writers create.

Instructor Desk Copies

Desk copies are available directly from the publisher only. The bookstore will not obtain or make texts available. The program director usually has instructor copies of the standard handbook on hand. In the case of reading anthologies chosen by individual instructors, the director can expedite desk copies from the publisher, especially for instructors who are assigned sections shortly before the beginning of the term. Instructors should contact the director with the author, title, publisher, and ISBN so that she can obtain the desk copy promptly.

Office Hours

All instructors will hold one hour of office conferences per week for each section taught. Some prefer to schedule periodic conferences for all students in their sections. Instructors of evening courses should plan to hold hours before class, since most students cannot stay on campus after an evening class.

Composition Program Communications

Instructors at both campuses are assigned Roosevelt voicemail and email accounts, as well as physical mailboxes (see below for locations).  Email is the primary means of communication between the university and instructors, on the one hand, and between students and instructors, on the other.  Instructors who wish not to check their RU email accounts should arrange to have RU messages forwarded to the email addresses they check regularly.

Auditorium (Downtown) Facilities

Composition faculty share an office in Room 642. This is a locked office with keypad access. Desks are shared by more than one instructor; instructors may label a desk drawer, a filing cabinet drawer, and a bookshelf for their materials.

Access to the main office of the Department of Literature and Languages, Room 724, is available 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Each instructor is assigned a mail slot in the rack on the right wall of Room 724. Instructors should check their mail slots for communications that may be pertinent to their section(s), or announcements that they may be asked to make to their students.  In order to facilitate communication with students, instructors can access their assigned voice-mailboxes from inside or outside the building.

Instructors of evening classes should allow plenty of time for photocopying materials for their courses. Large photocopy orders may also be left for production with Office Services, Room 835. Form for charging the order are available from Office Services; orders take at least two days for delivery.

Schaumburg Campus facilities

Adjunct faculty share office space in the larger open area in the center of Room 600, the College of Arts and Sciences suite. Each instructor is assigned a particular desk that is reserved for use on her or his teaching days.

All faculty are assigned mailboxes in the Mailroom located down the corridor to the right after entering the building through the main entrance. In order to facilitate communication with students, instructors can access their assigned voice-mailboxes from inside or outside the building.

The Arts and Sciences photocopier is located behind the secretary's desk in Room 600. Instructors may process larger orders in the copy room next to the mailroom.

Libraries

The downtown library is available for reserve material as well as for checking out material that may be useful for composition courses. The Robin campus library, by contrast, is largely online. Robin instructors and students may order materials for delivery from the downtown library via the van that runs between campuses several times per day.

The staff at both libraries is available for assistance with research and interlibrary loan (utilizing the Illinois-wide library network of which Roosevelt is a part). Instructors may schedule bibliographic instruction sessions by calling the reference desk at each campus library (downtown: x3643; Robin: x7980).