Faculty members are testing a syllabus section that assists students with special religious needs.
A “religious accommodation” section is in the syllabuses this semester for some courses across the university. The section reads that students should discuss with their instructor any forms of religious observance that may affect their participation in the course, such as specific prayer times, holidays, dress, or fasting at the beginning of the semester. It also reads that students must give their instructor written notice of holiday-related absences two weeks ahead of time.
Dr. Charles Neff, vice president for university-church relations, said, in the past, these kinds of issues were handled one-on-one between deans and faculty. The section, he said, is meant to encourage those conversations to happen earlier.
“What the policy proposal is intended to do is to promote a window in which those conversations happen at the beginning of the semester,” Neff said.
The section is not a required policy yet, Neff said, but members of the Interfaith Advisory Council are attempting to make it one. In the Fall 2017 semester, the council proposed the section in response to student claims of not being able to take religious holidays off due to schoolwork. In the Spring 2018 semester, the section was sent out to the deans of each school to suggest that faculty include it in course syllabuses and test if it was effective.
Neff said professors in Petree College of Arts & Sciences included it, as well as all those in Kramer School of Nursing and Wimberly School of Religion. Many professors kept the change in their syllabuses this semester.
“My experience with OCU is that this is an accepting place of people of all faiths and traditions, and there’s high faculty/staff acceptance as well as student acceptance, and this really just kind of crystallizes what we believe in as a university,” Neff said.
“It helps to formulate our position in a way that makes it clear to all students, faculty and staff that we value religious accommodation, and we value all religious traditions within the scope of the university.”
Neff said, because the feedback from the spring semester was all positive, the council decided in late April to push the process of making the section a policy more earnestly this semester.
The section also is intended to be open-ended, Neff said. The section reads: “the instructor, at his/her own discretion, will make reasonable accommodations wherever possible.”
“In certain cases, accommodation may not be possible because of the nature of the performance or because of the team schedule, but all indications are that our faculty and staff try to be as accommodating as possible within the bounds of their class, performance or sporting event,” Neff said.
Lisi Levy, acting sophomore, said the section makes her feel more respected as a Jewish student.
“I feel like I am not letting my schoolwork down as much because it’s in the syllabus,” Levy said. “I think there’s just a bit more of a higher standard of respect for what I practice.”
Neff said there will likely be an Interfaith Advisory Council meeting this month to refine the final proposal and submit it to the university policy committee for approval.
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