Statement of Academic Policy and Statement of Academic Integrity

Pre-registration

Pre-registration for courses scheduled to be offered the following semester is conducted during the second half of the semester. All registered students who plan to return to the College the following semester are expected to participate in pre-registration. The College may prevent students from pre-registering for the following semester, if they have failed to meet financial or other obligations to the College. It is presumed that students who fail to pre-register and who are not expected to graduate or who have not been accepted for participation in study abroad or exchange programs, are withdrawing from the College at the end of the semester.

Changes in Registration: Adding and Dropping Courses

All requests to change courses must be made in person at the Office of the Registrar. Registration is not complete until appropriate registration forms have been completed and students have paid (or made arrangements to pay for) tuition and fees. Students are enrolled only in those courses for which they are formally registered. Deadlines for adding and dropping courses are listed on the academic calendar.

During the first ten days of the semester students may add or drop courses in the Registrar’s Office without permission of the instructor, unless a course is closed or requires written permission. After the first 10 days of the semester, petitions for late registration will only be considered by the ASC in very unusual circumstances. Such petitions, with supporting documentation, including a letter of support from the instructor of the course, must be submitted to the Registrar for the Academic Standards Committee.

After the tenth day of the semester but before the final date to withdraw, students may withdraw from courses without grade penalty after obtaining the signature of the instructor on the appropriate withdrawal form and after turning the form in to the Registrar’s Office. Requests for permission to drop a course after the withdrawal deadline will only be approved by the ASC under unusual circumstances. (See “Late Withdrawal Grades” under “Grades.”)

Students who stand accused of academic dishonesty in a course prior to the withdrawal deadline may not drop that course while the accusation is under investigation by the Academic Standards Committee. This prohibition shall remain in effect should the student subsequently be found culpable. In any case in which a student stands accused of academic dishonesty but is NOT found culpable, he or she shall be given the opportunity to withdraw from the course either within one week of the disposition and notification of the case or in accord with the normal deadline date, whichever is later.

Forms for adding or dropping courses after the specified deadlines are available from the Registrar’s Office.

Cross-Registration

CMC Students register on their own campus for all courses open to them at the other Claremont Colleges, subject to the following conditions:

• Freshmen or sophomores may register for one course per semester outside CMC
• Juniors and seniors may register for up to one-half of their total semester course load outside CMC

During registration, students will receive information on programs and off-campus courses not considered cross-registration for CMC students. These courses are not subject to the limitations stated above and include the following:

• Joint Science courses
• Lower level language courses
• Military Science courses
• Black Studies courses
• Chicano Studies courses
• Physical Education courses
• Theatre Courses
• Media Studies (MS) Courses
• Gender and Women’s Studies Courses

Several CMC departments also have arrangements for joint and cooperative programs with departments at one or more of the other Claremont Colleges under which their courses are excluded from cross-registration restrictions.

It is, however, the privilege of each individual college to restrict cross-registration in their courses, even if the course is not considered cross-registration under the rules listed above.

Other exceptions to cross-registration restrictions must be approved by the Dean of the Faculty. Forms for this purpose are available from the Registrar.

Course Load

The normal course load is four courses per semester. The College usually limits the number of courses students may carry to a maximum of four-and-one-half courses per semester, in addition to any physical education and other non-credit courses. Students who have earned a B (9 00) average in the preceding semester may petition to register for an overload (more than four-and-one-half academic courses). All petitions for an overload must be submitted to the Registrar and approved by the Dean of Faculty. Forms to petition for an overload are available from the Registrar’s Office. Students may not overload during pre-registration. New students may not take an overload during their first semester at the College (with the exception of declared Management-Engineering, Science and Management, Physics, and Applied Biology majors).

The minimum full-time course load is three full academic courses per semester. Students who wish to carry less than three courses must petition the ASC in writing for permission to attend the College on a part-time basis. The request should include the reason for the request as well as the student’s plans for completion of degree requirements. Part-time students usually are not eligible for on-campus housing.

Students on probation are normally required by the ASC to carry the equivalent of four academic courses.

Repeated Courses

Students may only repeat a course if they receive a grade of F. In such cases, both grades will be included on the transcript. Students may not earn credit for a course when they have already completed another course in which mastery of the subject area is presumed. For example, students who have completed French 33 may not subsequently take French 2 for credit; students who have completed Math 30 may not subsequently take Math 21 for credit. Students who repeat a course or take a course that is a prerequisite for one previously completed, will not receive credit for the second course.

However, the Colleges do offer some courses that have a different context each semester and may be repeated for credit. The catalog descriptions identify these courses. For information on the calculation of a grade of F in the grade point average, see “Grade Point Requirements.”

Class Attendance

Students are expected to attend regularly all classes in which they are enrolled. Instructors have the privilege of establishing regulations regarding attendance in their classes .

Final Examinations

Students should expect final examinations in all courses. Final examinations are scheduled according to a five-college rotating agreement, based upon the day and time courses are offered. Final examination schedules are published prior to pre-registration and cannot be changed by the instructor. (Only the Dean of the Faculty may change final examination times.) Final examination times for courses meeting at non-standard times are arranged by the instructor in consultation with the students to avoid conflicts with other courses. No tests of any kind are to be given during the last week before final exams, except for graduating seniors in the Spring.

Seniors expected to graduate in May cannot take the regularly scheduled finals during the spring semester. Instructors may require these seniors to take final examinations prior to the due date for senior grades. Other (non-graduating) seniors must take the regularly scheduled final exams in the spring.

Challenge Examinations

New students from high schools without an Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate program (AP or IB), or from high schools with limited AP and IB offerings, may petition the Academic Standards Committee for permission to take a challenge examination and receive credit for college-level high school courses similar to AP or higher-level IB courses. Students may only request challenge examinations in subjects for which CMC grants AP or IB credit. Students who received low scores on AP or IB exams, and students who completed an AP or IB course in high school but did not take the exam, are not eligible for challenge exams.

Interested students must discuss the challenge examination application procedure with the Registrar and submit a petition to the Academic Standards Committee prior to the 10th day of the semester. Challenge examinations must be taken before the last day to withdraw from classes. The ASC will consider all appropriate existing college policies when considering an application for a challenge exam and will ensure existing policies are not violated. Challenge exams do not count toward the residency requirement or full-time status determination. Students must petition for a challenge examination during their first year at CMC.

The ASC will refer approved petitions for challenge examinations to the appropriate department chair, who will make arrangements for the tasks of writing and supervising the examinations. CMC’s academic policies for AP/IB courses and grades will be applied to challenge examinations, and students may not receive credit for more than four AP/IB and challenge examinations. For details, see “Credit and Placement for Advanced Placement (AP) and International Baccalaureate (IB) Exams.” The fee for a challenge exam is $250 per course, payable by cash or check at the time of registration.

Students who are fluent in a foreign language but have not taken a language placement exam during orientation may request the chair of the Modern Language Department to arrange a language competency test. Students who pass this test (with a grade of C or better) will have completed their foreign language requirement. There is no fee or credit for this test and the results are not recorded on the CMC transcript. Foreign students may not take a challenge exam to receive credit for courses in their native language(s).

The challenge exam policies do not affect the right of departments to give oral or written placement tests (without credit) to students interested in enrolling in more advanced courses without having completed all prerequisites. The ASC may offer students the opportunity to take examinations for credit and/or placement when considering transfer credit or other academic requests.

The results of challenge exams are recorded on a student’s official transcript, but no grade points will factor into the student’s GPA. Students may not challenge a given course more than once.

Independent Study

Qualified students may design a course in an area of study not covered in the regular curriculum. Interested students must prepare a full statement of their intended program of study, including a bibliography and an outline of the research or study planned. Independent studies must be approved and supervised by a faculty reader who must meet with the student on a regular basis and supervise the work. Independent studies are taken for a letter grade unless the supervising faculty reader requires otherwise; they may be for a full or for a one-half course credit. Independent studies must result in a paper of substantial length unless the faculty reader and the Dean of the Faculty explicitly approve another project. Registration procedures and deadlines for independent study are identical to those of regular courses. Petition forms are available from the Office of the Registrar.

Independent studies will only be approved if there is a valid academic reason for students to take an independent study. Only students with a GPA of B (9.00) or better during the previous semester at CMC may petition for an independent study. Juniors and seniors may not take more than one independent study per semester, unless the Academic Standards Committee grants them permission to do so because of the existence of compelling academic reasons (such as an off-campus internship). Freshmen and sophomores will not be allowed to take an independent study, unless the Academic Standards Committee grants them permission to do so because of the existence of compelling academic reasons. Independent studies in the area of a student’s major must be approved by the appropriate department chair in advance of registration. Petitions which require the approval of the Academic Standards Committee must be given to the Registrar, in a timely manner, for submission to the ASC prior to the last day to add a course.

Individual faculty members ought not (and untenured faculty may not) oversee more than a total of five independent studies and senior theses per semester. An exception will be made for faculty members who supervise an independent study taken by several students at the same time. Such an independent study will be counted as one independent study for the supervising faculty member.

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