We are living in difficult times and everyone is facing numerous struggles, whether personal, political, or societal. As such, I commit to try to be as caring and compassionate as possible, foregrounding flexibility, transparency, and an acknowledgment of our shared personhood in challenging times. I ask that each of you do the same toward all of us (including me!). If things become particularly difficult for you, please reach out to your Dean for assistance, and let me know that something is going on—whatever you feel comfortable sharing is fine, but it’s always better to inform faculty immediately that you are facing challenges rather than waiting until things have gotten severe.

Accommodations & Support:
Any student with a disability or who otherwise needs accommodation or assistance should make arrangements with me as soon as possible, and consult the Disability Resource Center for more assistance. If you know that you will have conflicts due to athletics or other college activities, you must notify me in advance and arrange to make up missed work – athletic absences are not excused and it is the student’s responsibility to make all arrangements.

Students may find it helpful to seek academic support for their coursework. The Center for Teaching, Learning & Research has many resources available, including writing, time-management, and study skill assistance. The Counseling Center is a useful resource for one-time or ongoing support.

Communications:
Students are expected to check their Middlebury email accounts daily and monitor this website for information. I will check email regularly during the work week – if you email me asking for a response and do not receive one within one working day (M-F), assume that your email may not have been received. Voicemails will typically be answered less promptly. Students are encouraged to actively participate in the online spaces designated for the course, both through postings on this website and the class Discord server. Posts and online conversations should be made in the spirit of mutual respect, constructive criticism and commentary, and a supportive learning community.

Privacy:
Conversations and presentations within the space of this class—both in-person and online—are considered private, to be shared only among those of us in the course. Any recording, photographs, and screen-capture of voices, images, and text produced by students and faculty alike cannot be shared without permission of those authors/speakers. At the end of the semester, it is expected and encouraged that students will share some of their finished videos publicly online, but it is not a requirement to do so.

Academic Honesty:
All work you submit must be your own and you may not inappropriately assist other students in their work without credit, in keeping with the Middlebury College Honor Code. There is a no-tolerance policy for academic misconduct in this course! The minimum penalty for academic misconduct will be a failing grade (F) for the course – further academic and disciplinary penalties may be assessed. The definitions of plagiarism and cheating used in this course are consistent with the material in the College Handbook, Chapter V.

As generative AI (like Chat-GPT) has emerged recently, there has been a lot of conversation about how such tools might be used in college classrooms. My policy is that all sources should be clearly cited, including AI—if you were to use such a tool, document how you used it. Like with other sources, all direct quotations must be indicated and cited. But I’d encourage you to not use AI because it probably won’t help you achieve the goals of this course: to understand and create videographic criticism. I’m swayed by this essay by Jonathan Zimmerman and I hope you are too.