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Conversation among generous interlocutors is one of the primary ways that knowledge is created within the English discipline. That knowledge may be later translated, built upon, and codified into articles and papers, but the start of the idea, or an ideas maturing to the point of being worth writing down, frequently happens in the context of talking with another person.

Our goal is to practice this within the classroom as well, but that can't happen if there aren't people in the classroom.

So this assignment exists to incentivize people being in the classroom.

To earn credit for this assignment:

1. Attend class and arrive on time.

See this Canvas page for details on how the Attendance Assignment grade is calculated. The default late credit policy will be used.

To disincentivize students from attending class while sick, all absences due to illness will be excused as long as that request has been submitted via email to the instructor in a timely fashion (e.g. a week following the student's return to the classroom). Penn State Policy E-11 details other unavoidable circumstances that may cause one to miss class; instances of those will be evaluated on an individual basis as needed.

Note that, per the Policies page of the syllabus, students with nine or more absences may fail the course based on their attendance record alone. This remains the case regardless of whether the absence was excused for the purposes of this assignment, and regardless of the causes for the absences.