Class Participation and Attendance

20 course points · Two 10-point periods · Daily self-assessment

🌎 Overview

Participation is worth 20 course points, split into two 10-point periods: weeks 2–7 and weeks 8–13. Everyone receives 10/10 for the first period as part of our transition to the new system. For the second period, twenty-five daily points earn all 10 course points.

At the end of each class, take a moment to assess your contribution and submit a quick check-in. You’re responsible for keeping this record current. Submit it that day, while you can still remember what you actually did!

🤔 Rationale

A good class depends on people doing something with the material: asking useful questions, working through an idea with their group, listening carefully, or helping someone else make a connection. Your contributions might happen in the full-class discussion or in the much smaller conversation at your table. Both matter.

The check-in gives you a clear way to recognize that work and gives me a better picture of what’s happening across the room. You don’t need to be the person who talks the most. You do need to show up, get involved, and assess your contribution honestly.

🏗️ Structure

Use the participation check-in posted in your section’s Slack channel to give yourself one of these scores:

3 — Distinctive contribution. You made one or more contributions that meaningfully helped the class or your group learn. Describe one in a sentence.
2 — Solid day. You paid attention and participated in the day’s discussion, group work, or other activities.
1 — Present, but not engaged. You were there, but you weren’t meaningfully involved in the day’s work.
0 — Absent. You weren’t in class. Submit a check-in with a zero for the day.

A distinctive contribution might be a question that reveals an important assumption, an example that helps your group understand a concept, or a connection between today’s case and something we’ve studied before. Helping your group think carefully counts.

For a 3, write something specific: “I helped our group compare the founder’s two funding options and pointed out how taking an investor would change who controlled the next decision.” You don’t need an essay; one useful sentence is plenty.

📓 Grading

Twenty-five daily points earn all 10 course points for a period. Below that, each daily point is worth 0.4 course points. The second period is capped at 10 course points. After two unexcused absences in that period, each additional unexcused absence subtracts one daily point before conversion to the course score; the score cannot fall below zero. Contact me about excused absences or approved adjustments.

Here are examples across 12 meetings, with no additional absence deduction:

Eleven solid days + one distinctive day: 25 daily points → 10/10 course points.
Twelve solid days: 24 daily points → 9.6/10 course points.
Five distinctive days + five solid days + two absences: 25 daily points → 10/10 course points.
Ten solid days + two absences: 20 daily points → 8/10 course points.

Your self-assessment is the starting point. I’ll review the records and may follow up when a score needs clarification. Use the descriptions above to keep your scoring consistent.

A missing check-in earns no daily points. It remains a missing check-in in the record, rather than automatically becoming an absence. Attendance and submitting the form are two different facts.

Contact me about an excused absence, an approved accommodation, or a technical problem so we can document the appropriate adjustment.

⏰ Timeline

Submit by 11:59 p.m. Eastern on the day of class. Previous days aren’t open for catch-up submissions. The easiest approach is to do it before you leave.

If you need to correct a response, submit a replacement before that day’s deadline; the last valid on-time response counts.

The check-in is in your section’s Slack channel. Planned reminders are five minutes before class ends: 12:50 p.m. Eastern in 26f-5500-jw-1135 and 4:10 p.m. Eastern in 26f-5500-jw-255.

The Slack check-in has been piloted in both sections. The first period receives 10/10; keep up with the posted check-ins for the second period, which ends with week 13. You do not need to backfill classes before the system launched. Earlier small class-writing activities are covered by the first-period credit.

Source: Fall 2026 course syllabus — Class Participation and Attendance, reviewed October 7, 2026 and reconciled with John’s current instructions. Current requirements and deadlines are maintained on this course site.