Teaching How-to: Chapter 2.2: Logistics Before the First Day

Including basic course details ensures that students can easily access resources, attend sessions on time, and communicate with you. Be sure to provide: 

• Your name, pronouns, and preferred form of address.
• Your preferred contact information (email, office location).
• Course number and/or section/lab number.
• Class date, time, and location.
• Office hours date, time, and location.

You may also want to provide directions to the building or classroom if these locations are hard to find, or give students an estimate of how long it takes to get there through the announcement setting on your LMS. This helps students arrive prepared and minimizes confusion, especially in the first few weeks of the semester.

Clearly define the goals and outcomes of your class, section, or lab. If you’re a TF teaching as part of a larger course, explain how your activities and materials contribute to the broader course objectives and what unique value students will gain from participating that they wouldn’t get from lectures alone. This can encourage deeper engagement in discussions, labs, review sessions, and office hours. 

If you’re a TF, consider working with the lead instructor to reinforce these goals and outcomes during lectures early on in the semester. This helps students see how your class supports their learning experience and aligns with the overall course objectives, incentivizing them to engage more fully in both.

This section of your syllabus or policy sheet articulates the key principles that shape your teaching and interactions with students. Statements allow you to reflect on your values as an instructor and communicate them clearly, setting expectations for the learning environment while aligning your approach with broader goals such as inclusivity, accessibility, and academic integrity. They also serve as a foundation for handling classroom dynamics, assessment, and student support throughout the semester.

While the examples below are common types of statements, they’re not exhaustive. 

Depending on the nature of your course, you may want to include additional statements. For instance, if your course involves fieldwork or takes place on specific land, consider adding a land acknowledgment statement to recognize the Indigenous communities connected to that space. Customizing your policy sheet in this way fosters a thoughtful and context-aware learning environment. 

As you draft these statements, reflect on your teaching philosophy and consider reviewing Universal Design for Learning (UDL)  and Equitable Teaching guidelines when drafting these statements.

Teaching Philosophy

Describes your teaching values and approaches. See Ch. 2.1, “Getting Ready to Teach,” for guidance writing this statement.

Positionality

Acknowledges how aspects of your identity and experiences shape your role in your classroom, department, discipline, and academia. This can be combined with your teaching philosophy. See Ch. 2.1, “Getting Ready to Teach,” for guidance writing this statement.

Accessibility

Explains your approach to accessibility and accommodations. While the goal is to optimize accessibility and reduce the need for special accommodations, it’s important to guide students toward resources such as Yale’s Student Accessibility Services . Some institutions require specific language to be used in this statement for legal purposes. For additional information and guidance about writing accessibility statements, visit the Poorvu Center’s “Accessible Teaching ” and “Include a Syllabus Statement” pages. 

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging

Describes your stance on Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB). What steps do you take to create an equitable and welcoming learning environment?  This may overlap with your positionality statement. Some institutions require specific DEIB language for legal compliance. See the Poorvu Center’s “Diversity Statements” page for further guidance about writing a diversity statement. 

Academic Integrity

Defines what academic integrity means in your course, including policies on plagiarism, citations, collaboration, AI, translation tools, grammar checkers, and calculators. Consider reviewing your teaching philosophy for inspiration. Some institutions may have specific language they require instructors to include for legal purposes. See the Poorvu Center’s “Academic Integrity Statements” and “AI Guidance” pages for more details. 

Group norms are the shared expectations that inform how students and instructors interact with one another in a learning environment. Establishing these norms early on fosters a respectful, collaborative, and equitable classroom culture. Rather than imposing the norms unilaterally, consider discussing norms with your students and updating the policy sheet to reflect the conversation. This ensures that the norms are transparent, written down, and accessible to everyone, serving as a reference point throughout the course while giving students a voice from day one.  

You can formalize these norms into a community compact or group agreement, outlining the behaviors and values that everyone commits to upholding. This may include expectations around participation, communication, collaboration, and respectful engagement with diverse perspectives. A strong community compact should also outline procedures for addressing conflicts or breaches, creating a safe space for students to voice concerns and work toward collective solutions. See Ch. 2.3, “The First Day,”  for additional guidance. 

The syllabus or policy sheet is a great opportunity to demystify the whens, wheres, and whys of office hours. Office hours let students ask questions, seek clarification, and engage in one-on-one conversations that may not happen during class. However, many students are unsure about how or when to use office hours, so setting clear expectations can help them feel more comfortable setting up a meeting with you. Consider addressing: 

• What office hours are for. Can students drop by for informal chats, or should discussions focus on coursework? 
• How students can attend. Do you offer virtual or in-person sessions? Can they schedule meetings with you outside of office hours? 
• Why office hours matter. How can students benefit from one-on-one conversations with you?

Framing office hours as a welcoming and accessible space encourages students to take advantage of this resource and reduces any hesitation or uncertainty students may feel about attending. 

Including a communication policy in your syllabus ensures transparency about how and when students can contact you. Clear expectations reduce misunderstandings and can help students feel comfortable reaching out while respecting your time. A well-defined policy also encourages professional communication skills and maintains a healthy work-life balance by setting boundaries that prevent burnout, ensuring you can dedicate time to other responsibilities while still being accessible to your students.

Most graduate instructors prefer using their Yale email for communicating with students, though some may choose to give out their phone number in specific situations, such as during fieldwork excursions. Yale doesn’t expect nor require you to share your personal contact information with students, and you may decide that your own boundaries preclude sharing your personal email or phone number. If you do choose to give out your phone number, make sure you’re absolutely clear about when it’s acceptable to call or text. 

Be explicit about when you plan to monitor your e-mail inbox and how soon students can expect a response. For example, you might specify that you only respond to emails during the work week and between the hours of 9 to 5. Alternatively, you might ask students to allow you 24 to 48 hours to respond. Setting and communicating these boundaries is just as important for you as it is for your students because it helps balance your accessibility with other personal or professional responsibilities. 

Take the time to clearly define what counts as participation. Is attendance enough, or do students need to actively contribute? If so, in what ways—verbal discussion, online forums, weekly reflections, office hours? Consider incorporating UDL and equitable teaching practices when determining these policies to accommodate different learning styles and needs. 

If your course has an attendance component, you should specify how often students can miss class before this impacts their grade, how late they can be before they’re counted as absent, and how you keep attendance.

Whatever your attendance policy, it’s important to reflect on whether it aligns with your teaching philosophy and equitable practices. 

Clarify what types of additional resources you’re willing to provide in your course. These can look like study guides at key points in the course, supplemental worksheets or practice problems, as well as any policies on self-made study guides for exams. When deciding whether to provide structured resources for your students, consider how these fit into your teaching approach and added preparation time. 

There’s a lot to think about when you decide how to handle late assignments and whether to offer extensions. The best practice is to set clear, transparent policies on deadlines and extensions. You might want to think about the following questions: 

• Are deadlines firm or flexible? 
• How should students request extensions? Do they need to propose a new deadline within a specific timeframe? 
• What counts as a foreseeable or unforeseeable circumstance? If there are foreseeable circumstances, how should they proceed? If there are unforeseeable circumstances, what should they do? 

Often, having a generous but firm policy around extensions can help students understand what type of flexibility exists in your course. For example, some instructors offer one extension per semester, with no questions asked. Others offer 24-hour extensions for students who visit tutoring services or the writing center. This kind of clarity also means that you spend less time making decisions on the specific circumstances around a late assignment. 

No matter what policies you set, keep in mind that students experience all kinds of unforeseen circumstances, like illness and family emergencies, that may require you to be more flexible. At Yale, students can request a Dean’s Extension for serious circumstances, though instructors may not be given details. You can find more information about coursework completion policies here. 

This section should cover a description of your chosen grading style as well as the different types of assignments students are expected to complete. See Ch. 5.2, “Grades and Grading,” for a list of various grading styles and their descriptions. You might also choose to include a points or percentage breakdown for the semester’s assignments, in addition to any standard rubrics you’ll be using for assessment. Providing rationale for grading choices makes discussions about grades run smoothly, giving both you and your students the tools to advocate for keeping or changing grades. 

Will students have opportunities to improve their work? If so, what will this look like? How many resubmissions are allowed per semester? What is the deadline for make-ups? How do make-up assignments align with the course objectives? 

Consider how your approach to designing rewrites, re-submissions, or make-up work incentivizes student learning and equity. For example, you might allow students to make up missed presentations by submitting a recorded video or a written summary; this would be an application of UDL because it offers multiple ways for students to demonstrate what they’ve learned. Another option is to allow one or two re-submissions per semester, giving students the opportunity to revise and improve without adding an unmanageable workload for either party. The specific policies will depend on your course content and goals.

Ensure that your policies are clear, consistent, and communicated to all students. If adjustments are necessary at any point in the semester, update the syllabus or policy sheet and notify the class.

Yale University provides a lot of resources you and your students may choose to take advantage of in order to enhance your class experience. Consider including these resources in your syllabus or classroom management system: 

• Academic support - Poorvu Center, Writing Center, Academic Strategies Program, Center for Language Study, tutors, etc.
• Online resources - Recommended websites, podcasts, tutorials, etc. 
• Library support - Course- or department-specific librarians, reference materials, etc.
• Technology support -  Software access, troubleshooting guides, etc.
• Mental health support - On-campus counseling services, student wellness programs, peer support networks, crisis hotlines, accommodations through Student Accessibility Services, mindfulness and stress management resources, etc.