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According to the U.S Department of Education, a student achieves minimal participation for a class by committing just one participatory action. This action need not be satisfied exclusively by class attendance. The act of participation must be specific to the learning of course content. The student “earns” his or her aid money for that class by committing that one act of learning. The question that the instructor must answer is: did the student take any action at all as an active member of that class — even if only one time? If so, then the student "minimally participated”.
Beyond attending one class meeting, a student will have minimally participated by:
- Submitting one class assignment, essay, quiz or exam
Note: how the assignment will contribute to the student’s final grade — if at all — is the instructor’s decision.
- Participating in one Blackboard on-line discussion
- Downloading Blackboard course content (not just the syllabus)
There may be other actions beyond those listed above that would constitute participation. If a student takes a small step in the learning process, that act is just enough to make him an actual class participant for Title IV purposes.
The best faculty can do is to make a reasonable effort that is appropriate to each as individuals to know if the student has or has not minimally participated. But if the instructor does not have records indicating that a withdrawn student has participated, then by default the student has not participated. In these cases, the instructor should affirm “no participation” in Online Class Grading.
If the instructor affirms non-participation and the student can produce no evidence convincing the instructor to reverse the designation, then the non-participation stands. The offices of Student Accounts and Student Financial Aid will accept the instructor’s designation as absolute.
One other point: the offices of Student Accounts and Student Financial Aid are not at liberty to interpret an instructor’s non-response as meaning that the student did not participate. The Department of Education will not accept the absence of a response as the instructor’s affirmation of non-participation. From the Department’s point of view, a non-response is too ambiguous fails to affirm non-participation by the student.
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