This material is not a complaint about a...

This material is not a complaint about a...

Audio by Paper2Audio

This material is not a complaint about a personal grade. It asks you to re-examine the 25-point participation component of Bioethics E.A: the published grading criteria, the scoring method actually used, and whether that measurement method was valid. The point is simple. In the syllabus, the 25 points were described as a participation grade including not only attendance but also discussion and engagement with class activities. In practice, however, unless both the attendance check and the questionnaire were completed, the class was treated as an absence, and each absence cost 5 points — an operation with very large impact.

The criterion shown first was Contribution to Class: a 25-point, holistic view of participation. The actual operation shown later treats the class as an absence unless two online steps — attendance registration and the questionnaire — are both completed, and 5 points are lost per absence. This gap is the heart of the matter. This is not a request to give me points; it is a check of whether the mechanism that moves 25 points actually measured real participation.

This appeal rests on three independent pillars. First, whether a significant scoring condition was disclosed while students could still act on it. Second, whether the questionnaire truly measured physical attendance and thoughtful participation. Third, whether such an unstable measurement should be linked to a large 5-point deduction per instance. Even if one is explained, the others remain.

Evidence A is the syllabus. The 25 points are described as Contribution to Class, including attendance, participation in discussions, and engagement with course activities. It states class participation is evaluated not solely on attendance. So the official information students could read before enrolling described these 25 points as an evaluation of overall participation, not a simple attendance score.

Evidence B is the Moodle post of August 7. It explains that a class counts as attended only when both the attendance check and the questionnaire are completed; missing either counts as one absence; each absence deducts 5 points; and five or more absences make attendance 0. This differs substantially from the multi-faceted participation grade in the syllabus. And while the post says the grade breakdown was as previously explained, it gives no indication that this specific 5-point scheme had been explained in the syllabus or in class.

The published criterion was an overall evaluation including attendance, discussion, and engagement. In the actual operation, whether two digital steps were completed became the decisive condition. The questionnaire functioned not as a supplementary record but as a gate that can override the other participation factors. Even with attendance registered and the student present, a single missing questionnaire could make the class an absence.

Classes ran April to July. On June 29 I reported by same-day email that a connection loss prevented me from completing the questionnaire. On August 7 the specific two-step requirement and 5-point scheme were explained on Moodle, and that post stated the grading process was completed. I want to confirm whether the 5-point scheme was disclosed during the class term, while students could still change behavior.

If back in April a student had known a missing questionnaire would cost 5 final points, behavior would change: reporting instability instantly, saving the completion screen each time, prioritizing successful submission over answer quality. Learning this in August cannot send anyone back to April–July. So this is not merely insufficient explanation; it removes the student's ability to act.

A questionnaire submission proves a Moodle account operated the form in that time slot — not that the person stayed in the room. A missing questionnaire only proves submission did not succeed; connection trouble, a failed send, running out of time, or a long answer all produce the same state. So questionnaire submission is neither a sufficient nor a necessary condition for physical attendance.

This questionnaire was not protected by a separate, in-room-only password, and the questions appear on the answer page rather than only inside the room. So a student not in the room could, with the attendance password obtained externally, answer once the time arrived. I am not alleging misconduct by any student; the problem is that, structurally, the mechanism cannot distinguish physical presence from remote completion.

In my June 29 email I reported that a sudden internet disconnection prevented me from completing the questionnaire and that only my attendance could be recorded. The issue is not a request to create attendance afterward. In the records, attendance registration remains 1.00. The question is whether that existing positive record may be voided by a missing questionnaire alone and treated as an absence with a 5-point deduction.

The syllabus states active, consistent, and thoughtful engagement is evaluated. But in class it was said that even one character was enough. That produces a reversal: a student who sends one character in time keeps the point, while a student who writes carefully at length but misses the deadline is marked absent. What is measured is not thoughtful participation, but whether Moodle received a submission before the deadline.

Even viewing the questionnaire as part of a class activity, the most that “incomplete” tells us is that part of the activity was incomplete. Converting that into the physical fact of not being in the room requires separate grounds, and linking that finding to a large 5-point deduction requires explicit syllabus disclosure and a valid measurement method.

On April 13, attendance is 1.00 and the questionnaire is missing. On April 20 there is a genuine absence due to illness, with neither. In the Moodle records these are clearly different states, yet under the later rule both can be processed as the same absence. The grading algorithm discards a meaningful distinction the university's own system preserves.

On June 29 as well, attendance is 1.00 and only the questionnaire is missing. So the issue is not that attendance was not registered; it is whether, despite attendance being registered, the class may ultimately be converted to an absence because of the missing questionnaire. Without preserving this distinction, a genuine absence and a procedural failure are treated the same.

The April 13 lecture material and the June 29 Brain Death material each have same-day access records. On their own they do not prove being in the room — I acknowledge that. But combined with the attendance-1.00 record, they are supplementary, contemporaneous records of engaging with the class page that day. The main evidence is that Moodle distinguishes full absence from attendance-registered-questionnaire-missing.

The June 29 email reported, on the same day, that a connection problem prevented completion of the questionnaire. Again, this is not a case of not participating, but of the submission process not completing. I asked about submitting or certifying the questionnaire. It is a report of a technical problem, not a refusal to participate.

In the instructor's reply it is explained that technical problems must be reported during class, that attendance cannot be verified afterward, and that the same rule must apply to all. This does not remove the problem; rather, it shows the remedy depended on the short window during or immediately after class.

First, whether the student knew in advance how important that reporting duty was for avoiding a 5-point deduction. Second, right after class is a short transition period, overlapping with students leaving, the next students entering, and instructors changing. Third, being unable to report is not proof of not being in the room. So this remedy window alone is not a reliable safeguard against false absence.

One absence ruling is 5 of the 100 final points, 20% of the 25-point participation grade. Prorated over 14 classes it is about 1.79 points per class, but in operation it is 5 per instance. So a misclassification has very large impact. Attending 12 of 14 but ruled 2 absences gives 15/25; attending 9 of 14 but ruled 5 absences gives 0/25. This is a fixed-penalty scheme, not proportional evaluation.

Here I also confirm the relationship with a.p.u's official pages. The Credits page describes a 2-credit lecture as 14 classes. The Class Absences page states an approved absence request does not mean the class is attended, and absence handling is the instructor's individual judgment. The explicit auto-F below three-quarters attendance appears, on the official pages, as a rule for language-education courses.

So Bioethics' −5 per absence, reaching 0 of 25 at five, is hard to explain as a direct implementation of a general lecture-wide auto-F rule confirmable on the official pages. It is a course-specific, significant condition — which is why it needed clear advance disclosure. (Sources: a.p.u Credits, Class Absences, and Japanese & A.P Languages attendance-rule pages.)

The instructor explains the same rule is applied for fairness. Formal consistency matters. But if the measurement itself can mark a truly present student absent while accepting completion from outside the room as present, then using the same method on everyone still does not make the measurement accurate. Equal treatment does not equal valid assessment.

My records are not a request for special treatment for me; they are a concrete example that this method can produce misclassification. The same method was applied to all enrolled students, and fully reconstructing every student's session-by-session presence, discussion, and engagement is now difficult. So the question is not whether to restore my two classes, but how to fairly handle this 25-point component.

The clearest, fairest handling that does not put the record's uncertainty on students is to treat the 25-point participation grade as full marks for all enrolled students. This is not special treatment: since the same defective method was used on everyone, the same correction applies to everyone. When a test question itself is defective, students are sometimes all given the points rather than failed on it. The same applies here — so the requested handling is 25/25 for all enrolled students.

I do not present an alternative handling. Individual re-investigation cannot fully reconstruct every student's past presence, remarks, and engagement. Erasing the 25-point component after the fact changes the participation opportunity that existed in the syllabus.

Leaving only some deductions still keeps the flawed method's uncertainty in students' grades. The only way to address all four problems — undisclosed, unmeasurable, non-proportional, applied to all — at once is to not apply deductions based on the scheme and grant 25/25 to all.

What I ask you to confirm is not emotion but records: whether the syllabus explicitly stated the 5-point scheme; where the same rule was explained during the April–July term; whether the August 7 post was the first written explanation of the specific algorithm; whether the questionnaire had any technical limitation to confirm in-room presence; and how days with attendance 1.00 and a missing questionnaire were converted into an absence.

To maintain the deduction one must simultaneously explain: the specific 5-point rule was disclosed in advance; the questionnaire validly confirmed physical presence; a missing questionnaire proves absence; the one-character vs thoughtful-engagement contradiction can be explained; there is a basis for voiding attendance-1.00 records; the short window sufficiently prevented misclassification; and the fixed deduction is proportional. All must hold together.

For these reasons, regarding the 25-point Contribution to Class in Bioethics Spring 2026, I ask that deductions based on the attendance-check plus questionnaire scheme not be applied, and that full 25 points be granted to all enrolled students. This is not favoritism. The significant 5-point scheme cannot be derived from the syllabus at enrollment; questionnaire submission is neither sufficient nor necessary for physical attendance; a single misclassification moves 5 final points and 20% of participation; and the same method was applied to all. So the handling that leaves no student disadvantaged, creates no special treatment, and avoids reconstructing everyone's past presence is 25/25 for all enrolled students.

You have reached the end of the text.