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Office of Academic Administration and Student Affairs

Asst. Dean Stephen D. Sowle

Weeks of June 22 and June 29, 2015
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Spring 2015 Class Ranks. Cumulative GPAs through the Spring 2015 semester, and Spring 2015 class ranks for J.D. students, are now available through Web for Students (click on the Spring 2015 link under Grades and Rank in the left-hand menu). Students who graduated in the Fall or last Summer will find their final class rank under the Fall 2014 or Summer 2014 links. Class ranks are based on cumulative (not just Spring semester) GPA. For those students who transferred into Kent in January, please keep in mind that you will not receive a class rank until you have been here for two semesters. The GPA cut-offs as of the end of the Spring 2015 semester are available by clicking here

Note to Spring graduates: For J.D. students who just graduated, this information constitutes their final GPA and class rank. Graduating students should wait until later this week if they wish to request transcripts reflecting their class rank and/or graduation honors, as the Registrar's office is in the process of entering the information.

Note to first-year full-time students: If you are a first-year full-time student, the cumulative GPA for you in Web for Students includes all of your coursework through the end of the Spring semester. However, as previously announced, class ranks were determined by excluding Legislation or any elective course taken, in order to ensure that all first-year full-time students were assessed on a common set of courses. Likewise, probation and dismissal decisions, eligibility for Law Review, and eligibility for merit scholarships are based on first-year performance excluding Legislation or any elective course taken.

New Chicago-Kent Law Review Members. I'm happy to announce that the students listed below have been invited to join the Chicago-Kent Law Review based on their academic performance:

Naomi H. Bensdorf Frisch Bryce T. Hensley
Terrence R. Brennan Jeffrey T. Michalik
Molly J. Davis Andrea I. Savageau
Nicholas J. DeRyke Symone D. Shinton
Maxwell Eichenberger Theresa L. Starck
Jennifer Ellenby Karen E. Vaysman
Alexander J. Halaska Karolen S. Younan
Selma Haveric  

Law Review Summer Candidacy Program. For those interested in Law Review but who did not "grade on" based on their academic performance, the Law Review also holds a Summer Candidacy Program to "write on" to Law Review. Section 1.12 of the Student Handbook explains the eligibility criteria for both grading on and writing on to Law Review. This year’s Summer Candidacy Program will run from Monday, June 22 through Monday, July 6. For details, click here.

For first-year full-time students, the minimum GPA of 3.00 for eligibility is based on your grades excluding Legislation or any elective courses taken (as with the class rank calculations). However, because the cumulative GPA published on Web for Students includes Legislation and electives, please contact me if you have any uncertainty as to whether your academic performance qualifies you to take part in the candidacy program. 

Summer 2015 Exams.

•Exam Schedule. The final exams for the Summer term are listed in the Schedule of Classes available here. You will be notified of the classroom assignments for your exams prior to the start of exam period.

•Exam Reschedule Requests: June 25 - July 1. The Student Handbook requires that you take your final exams at the times scheduled unless you have an exam conflict (as defined below), or you have a "serious illness or other extraordinary or compelling reason" beyond your control. If you have an exam conflict or believe you have other reasons justifying the rescheduling of an exam, please complete the Final Exam Reschedule form. To complete the form, log into Web for Students and navigate to the Final Exam Reschedule form in the left-hand menu. The form will be available beginning Thursday, June 25; the deadline for submitting an exam method request is Wednesday, July 1, at 5:00 pm. If your request is approved, you will be notified after the deadline about the rescheduled date, time, and location of your exam. Under current policy, a student is deemed to have an "exam conflict" if the student has two exams at the same time, or has two or more exams with starting times less than 24 hours apart.

•Exam Method Registration: June 25 - July 1. Students have three choices for taking most exams: handwriting the exam, taking the exam on their own laptop computer, or taking the exam on a lab computer. Some professors do not permit one or more of these options (e.g., some require all students to hand write the exam).

Assuming your professor has authorized you to take the exam on computer, we will assume you are taking the exam on your own laptop unless you submit an Exam Method form. You need to register your exam-taking method only if you wish to hand-write the exam, or take it on a lab computer (subject to space availability). Please check with your professor if you are uncertain whether computer use will be permitted for your exam. If you choose the lab computer option but there are not enough spaces available, we will conduct a lottery after the close of the exam method registration period to determine who can use the lab computers. (This usually is not necessary, but occasionally we have more requests than we can accommodate for lab computers.) 

To complete the form, log into Web for Students and navigate to the Exam Method Registration form in the left-and menu. The form will be available beginning Thursday, June 25; the deadline for submitting an exam method request is Wednesday, July 1, at 5:00 pm.

Notice about SofTest: Students taking exams on laptop must download and install the SofTest exam-taking program. You will receive information from the Information Technology Services department about when and how to do this. Even though you do not need to submit an Exam Method Registration form to use your laptop for exams, you do need to download and install SofTest.

Unless a professor specifies otherwise, SofTest is configured to lock students out of other programs and services on their computers for the duration of the exam. This means that, unless a professor specifically authorizes access, students will not have access to notes, outlines, or other materials stored on their hard drive or the network.

Notice About Borrowing Laptops from the Computer Center: The Computer Center has a limited supply of laptop computers reserved for use in emergency situations that arise during exam period. Please contact Dean Sowle if you opt to take an exam on laptop, and your laptop suffers unexpected problems that cannot be remedied before your exam. The Computer Center's laptops also may be used (subject to availability) if your computer has problems immediately before or during an exam, as long as the problem is not due to your failing to properly configure or register your laptop to run the SofTest program. Because of limited supply, the Computer Center's laptops are not available for general loaning purposes during exam period. However, if you have exceptional circumstances that you believe justify borrowing a laptop for an exam, please contact Dean Sowle to discuss your situation.

Notice to Hand Writers: Students who are hand writing an exam will be placed in the same room used by laptop users for that exam. Hand writers will not be put in a separate room.

Availability of Professors' Old Exams. Many professors make their old exams available for students to review. Information about accessing old exams is available by clicking here.

Notices to Graduating Seniors. If you are graduating this semester, please read the information below about your Kent email and network accounts, and your locker. If you have any questions, please let me know.

•Email, Network, and Print Accounts. Email accounts: Your Kent email account is for life. You can continue to use your Chicago-Kent email as long as you chose to do so. Network accounts: Your network account will be deactivated on Monday, August 3 (the first Monday after the July bar exam). Print accountsYour free printing quota will be reset to zero on Monday, May 18 (the first Monday after Commencement). You can use TechCash funds to print and copy until August

•Clearing Out Lockers. Please clear your lockers out no later than Friday, July 31. Anything left in lockers after that date will be removed. If you are unable to clear your locker out by that date, please contact me to make arrangements for your locker contents to be set aside for you. Note: This applies only to graduating students. If you are not graduating, you do not need to clear your locker out; you will keep your current locker until you graduate. 

•Student Health Insurance.
 If you have student health insurance through IIT, your coverage will end on August 13, 2015.

Dean's Certificate for Illinois Bar.
 We will mail a Dean's Certificate to the Illinois bar examiners for every graduating student after final grades for the Spring semester are received and processed, and we can confirm completion of all graduation requirements. We compile the list of graduating students from the list of those who submitted Applications for Graduation listing Spring 2015 as their final semester.

Bar Exams in Other Jurisdictions. If you plan to take a bar exam outside of Illinois, you should provide the Registrar with appropriate forms for the Law School to complete as soon as possible. 

Changes to Academic Regulations. The Law School faculty, at its May 12 meeting, adopted the following changes to the Law School's academic regulations, effective with the Summer 2015 term:

*Students who take a class pass/fail are now eligible to receive the CALI Award for the class.

*The following specialized Professional Responsibility classes are exempt from the mandatory curve: Ethics and Advocacy; Practice and Professionalism; and Professional Responsibility: Business Ethics.

*The 16-credit limit on taking clinical courses and externships has been increased to 24 credits.

*The cap of 19 credits on all variety of pass/fail credits has been eliminated.

*Part-time students may now take up to 13 credits in a regular semester (Fall or Spring) without special permission. If you are a part-time student and wish to take 12 or 13 credits in the Fall, please contact Dean Sowle to have your maximum credits adjusted in the system (we will need to make this adjustment manually for the Fall, as part-time students were already coded for 11 credits maximum prior to the rule change).

*Subject to the limitation for full-time first-year students mentioned below, students may now work more than 20 hours a week if they take 13 or fewer credits in a regular semester (Fall or Spring). Students are still prohibited from working more than 20 hours a week if they take 14 or more credits. Full-time first-year students are prohibted from working more than 20 hours a week even if they take 13 or fewer credits (e.g., full-time summer-start students, who take only 13 credits in the Fall, are still limited to working no more than 20 hours a week).

Code of Conduct Revisions. Pursuant to changes in the federal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), the Law School revised its Code of Conduct last year to comply with the VAWA's requirements that schools prohibit certain specified categories of sexual misconduct; provide definitions of those offenses, and the definition of consent, consistent with applicable provisions of federal and state law; and institute certain procedural provisions in cases involving allegations of sexual misconduct. In response to final federal regulations issued by the Department of Education pursuant to the VAWA amendments, the Law School faculty, at its May 12 meeting, considered and approved certain revisions to the Code of Conduct changes made last year. The revisions are available by clicking here.

Joke of the Week. A barking dog never bites. Well, at least not while it's barking.

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