What to Expect for Remainder of Winter Quarter (from the COE Student Advisory Council)

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Dear fellow Civil and Environmental Engineering students,

The College of Engineering Student Advisory Council (COESAC) has received a great deal of feedback about students’ experiences as a result of the impacts of COVID. We appreciate all of the input and ask you to continue to reach out to us or our department SAC so that we can better support each other. By now, we have all seen President Cauce’s email about the University’s plan to return primarily to in-person instruction. As students, we have all experienced how challenging the past two years have been; it is important that we work together as learners navigating our education during a global pandemic and partner with our instructors to advocate for our needs.

With the return to in-person instruction announcement by President Cauce, we wanted to make sure that students know what they can and cannot expect from your UW instructors. In short, professors should be clear about their sick policy and you should not feel pressured to attend class in person if you are ill or need to isolate/quarantine due to COVID. There should be clear and fair expectations set by your professor about what to do if you are sick, how the absence will be treated, and how you can achieve the learning outcomes for the course.

Additionally, we want students to know what to do if they become ill or have a COVID exposure by highlighting the University’s updated COVID Quarantine and Isolation page and flowchart. For everyone’s protection, please do not go to class if you aresymptomatic, even if you think “it’s not COVID.” Please isolate, get tested, and notify your professors that you will be absent until you test negative or complete your period of isolation if you test positive. Activate/install WA Notify on your phone ASAP, the UW COVID EH&S team relies on it for support with contact tracing and close contact notifications.

If you feel that an instructor has not been clear with their expectations about how they will accommodate students, here are some steps that we encourage you to take (in order):

  1. Speak with or email your TA about your concerns
  2. Have a conversation with or email your professor with suggestions or specific requests. Here are some templates if you need help to get started: https://docs.google.com/document/d/15Kf2zlKuR-FkkOZf3wRVF9nci0y3kiScBMQXUQareN8/
  3. Email the department chair of your class. For Civil and Environmental Engineering, you can email our chair at lowes@u.washington.edu. You can find all of the College of Engineering department chairs here: https://www.engr.washington.edu/about/leadership#chairs. If the class you are concerned about is outside of the College of Engineering, we encourage you to reach out to that department. If you need help with reaching out, we can help connect you.
  4. Email the College of Engineering Academic Affairs Office at coeacaff@uw.edu

We also understand that there is a power dynamic that can make it difficult to start a conversation with your professor. Here are some additional suggestions or options that can help:

If you have other feedback for the College or University, we encourage you to reach out to us. The purpose of COESAC is to represent the voices of students throughout the College of Engineering and to partner with College leadership as we seek solutions for the many unique challenges we are facing during this pandemic. If you feel there are other ways that the College can support you and your learning, please make your voice heard.

If you’d like to learn more about COESAC: https://www.engr.washington.edu/students/student-advisory-council.

If you’d like to learn more about CEE Student Advisory Board: https://www.ce.washington.edu/current/student-advisory-board.