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Late Work Policy Options for Secondary Classrooms

Late work is of the most annoying classroom management challenges for middle and high school teachers. If your late work policy is not working out for you, there are alternate options. Let’s look at a few of the most common classroom management solutions.

Student:   “Can I turn this in?”

Teacher:  “When was it due?’

Student:  “September.”

Teacher:  “No, I’m sorry. It’s too late.”

Student:  “What do you mean? Final exams aren’t until tomorrow!”

Teacher:   “Jeremy…it’s December. That assignment was from first nine weeks.”

Student:   “Oh. Well, can’t you go back and change the grade?”

Teacher:   Sigh.

Maybe that conversation comes across as comical, but when it happens in real life (and it does), it’s enough to send us into a little bit of a crank fest. Teachers don’t need to spend hours at the end of the quarter or the semester grading a stack of papers a mile high that was due weeks ago.

A consistent late work policy helps students to learn responsibility and timeliness…both important skills for real life. What’s more, a late work policy makes classroom management more reasonable. But, should that lesson on responsibility come at the expense of relationships, learning, and confidence?

In today’s post, we’re exploring a handful of late work policy options for the secondary classroom. Needless to say, more than these policies exist, but they are among the most common that I have witnessed and experienced. If you have a different system that works, please tell us about it in the comments. Help us gather a teacher-tested bank of late work policies to help educators solve one of their most pressing classroom management issues.

Before choosing a course of action, make sure to consider both your teaching philosophy and the expectations of your administration. You will want to have a late work policy that reflects your beliefs about teaching and learning, and you also need to know that your administration will support your decisions regarding students’ grades.

5 COMMON LATE WORK POLICY OPTIONS

Don’t accept late work. period..

Why? Not accepting late work puts a strong emphasis on the importance of the work you assign. Students know you mean business, and the work from your class should be considered a priority.

Advantages:   Students will turn more work in on time because of the urgency. They will learn responsibility and the importance of deadlines. You have no paperwork headaches to deal with. By collecting more work on time, you are able to assess students’ ability with a given topic more quickly.

Disadvantages:   Parents will be upset. It penalizes all students, even conscientious ones who make a mistake every once in a while (everyone make mistakes).  The zero on the assignment won’t reflect students’ knowledge of course content. Compiling that many zeros will cause some students to give up early in the nine weeks.

Things to consider:  

• If you choose to adopt the “no late work ever” policy, I highly encourage you to seek support from your administration and to clearly communicate this policy with parents early and often.
• It might be a good idea to offer students a “Whoopsie!” pass , which students could use once…or more! per quarter. That way, every student has four times per year that he or she can legitimately make a mistake and not suffer unwarranted consequences. After all, zeros are detrimental.
• Also, consider the executive functioning of your students. I’ve seen this type of policy successfully used with enriched / advanced high school upper-level classes, but with younger students or at-risk classes, this policy would fail.
• Ask yourself how you will allow students to practice the skills so that they master the content. If we are being honest, most high school students will not complete a late assignment they know they will not receive credit for just to “prepare for the test.”

Disclaimer: I have never used this late work policy, and it wouldn’t be the one I would advocate for because it skews the overall grade, and it often causes tension between teachers and their students.

Deduct a % or a letter grade each day the assignment is late. 

Why? This approach offers students an opportunity to earn credit for their work, but there is still a learning experience involved, and students who turned the assignment in on time are rewarded with full credit.

Advantages:   More students will be passing the class because they won’t have as many zeros. The fact that students know the percentage or letter grade opportunity declines every day motivates them to turn it in more quickly. This approach is more than justifiable to both parents and administration.

Disadvantages:   It’s a little bit of a grading nightmare. Knowing how many days late the assignment would be is usually dependent on the accuracy of the date submitted (which the student typically writes on the paper). If your students are anything like mine, we’re lucky if they write down their name…let alone multiple pieces of information. In addition, because students know they will be able to receive  some credit for the assignment, they might wait until the last minute to turn it in.

• Will you have a cut off? In other words, after a certain date (let’s say a week), will students still be able to turn in the assignment?
• How will you ensure accuracy of the date the student submitted the assignment?

Disclaimer: I have used this policy in the past, but I found keeping track of how many days late an assignment was to be a little bit tedious. And, I really want my students grades to represent learning, not to reflect responsibility.

Give a % (let’s say 75% or 50%) of credit for all late work within a unit up until the unit test.

Why? Like option 1, this approach is still a major motivator. No one wants a bad grade on an assignment.  Yet, the penalty is not so severe that it causes students to fail.

Advantages:   It’s simple for teachers to grade late work because it’s all worth the same amount of credit. Students are encouraged to complete their assignments within the window that the information applies to the test.

Disadvantages:   A student who turns in the assignment one day late is earning the same amount of credit as the student who submits the assignment two weeks late. With this approach, students still don’t score well on the assignment, but the grade is not as detrimental to their overall score as a zero.

• What percentage would motivate your students to turn in the assignment?
• What percentage would keep your students passing if they demonstrate understanding of the concept on the assignment (if that’s your goal)?
• Will you automatically give students the predetermined percentage, regardless of accuracy of answers, or will points be deducted from the highest percentage they can possibly earn (for incorrect or incomplete responses)?

Disclaimer: I’ve used this policy, and it was relatively easy for me to manage, but I didn’t love how it impacted students’ grades…or how it impacted my relationship with students. I think this speaks into where the academic world is right now…caught between traditional and standards-based reporting systems.

Have a “no later than” deadline.

Why? Many times, the most value students can get from completing work comes during the unit of study it pertains to. This policy helps both to address student organization and responsibility and to keep assessing late work manageable. Basically, via this route, students can earn full credit up until the deadline you establish.

Advantages:   You don’t have to worry about students turning in assignments months after the due date. Plus, you are being flexible and responsive to student needs, within reason. When using this policy, parent communication is key. If you have given students multiple reminders to complete work and they simply just aren’t doing it, let parents know. This proactive approach will prevent you from possibly having to back-peddle on a late grade after it’s assigned. With this policy, students can always contact you to ask for an extension if they have a valid reason.

Disadvantages: With this approach, your late work stack may still be larger than normal. Depending on how long your units last, you may want to set deadlines before the unit is over. For instance if your Shakespeare unit lasts 7 weeks, you may want to have a mid-point “no later than” date to keep students from having too many assignments outstanding at once.

• Would this approach allow you to better differentiate for students?
• Could this open doors for more self-paced learning and choices in the types of assignments students are completing?
• Will you ask students to email their parents to let them know about assignment due dates to help them own their learning?

Note: With the growing movement of standards-based reporting, this seems to be a more viable option. However, you’ll have to consider what will happen if students don’t meet the “no later than date.”

Accept all late work with no penalty.

Why? Many people contend that a student’s grade should be a reflection of his or her understanding of course material. It should give an accurate picture of their mastery of standards, not of their responsibility or maturity level.

Advantages:   There’s no headache as far as figuring out how many points to take off. You just don’t! Also, students are more motivated to turn in late work because they  can earn full credit if it’s done well. What’s more, there’s a stronger feeling of trust and credibility between teacher and student when teens feel their teachers are on their team.

Disadvantages: In the “real world,” people really are given extensions. However, they aren’t necessarily given an undetermined amount of time to finish a project.

• Would it help parents to communicate late work through a separate indicator? Instead of including it in the grade, would you give students an executive functioning rating or short narrative as a goal-setting point?
• What is the best way to make this manageable? Do students have tentative or suggested due dates? Are zeros then placed in the grade book until the work is turned in, at which point they can earn full credit? If students do not ever turn the work in, do they get an incomplete or a not achieved?

Note: I’ve seen this type of policy work in situations where students can fluidly move among units without the constraints of nine week or trimester report cards. However, it could work in any situation with careful planning.

KEY CONSIDERATIONS

Teach students to advocate for themselves. Instead of receiving an angry call from a parent, if a student is upset about a late grade, they should approach you first. Of course, in order to do so, they need to have a good relationship with you. They need to know you have their best interests at heart. Taking time to invest in our students by having frequent conversations and by teaching students self-advocacy skills will pay dividends.

Differentiate.

You don’t have to stick with just one option. Choose the one that works best for students, but don’t feel boxed in. You know your students best. If a student who usually struggles works exceptionally hard turns an assignment in late but done well, you may consider giving him or her some grace. Reward their effort and their success with full credit!

Students will be more likely to hold themselves accountable to late work policies when they feel they have helped to define them. Invite students to help you create a fair late work policy at the beginning of the year. Throughout the year, check in with them to monitor the pulse.

We all have different stories. During a time period when students are struggling with social emotional issues more than ever, the conversation matters. If a student has late work, talk with them. What is going on in their life? Perhaps they have emotional situations on their plate that are preventing them from being able to focus on school work like they could otherwise.

Use a parent communication app. Remind 101. Class Dojo. There are many platforms that will allow you to send homework reminders to both students and parents. In my experience, using a parent communication reminder app reduced late work drastically.

Reflection Questions.

• What is the goal? What lesson do you want students to learn? Do they really need to complete this assignment to show they are at grade level for this skill or standard?
• How will you manage the gradebook? Will you put in zeros for assignments that are late until they are submitted? If you don’t, how will you remember to go back and enter the missing grades at a later time?
• Should your school implement some type of homework intervention system so that students who have late work can work during their lunch or study hall periods to submit missing work?
• How will you deter students from choosing to turn in work late if they know there is no penalty?
• What will you do about assignment dumping tendencies at the end of the quarter or semester?

Choosing an effective late work policy largely depends on the age, subject, grading system, and track of your students. Teachers need to select a late work policy that encourages independence, responsibility, and work ethic without alienating or punishing students punitively. Which late work policy is the “right” one? The answer is different for each instructor.

Interested in diving further into the late work policy discussion? Listen in on a podcast conversation I had with Todd Bedard from Teachers as Leaders.

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Flexibility: what to consider in late work policies.

November 16, 2018. Photo by Justin Mohling, University Communication.

Choosing a late policy that will work for your particular course and teaching style can be tricky. There are many different options available, and how well each works will depend on factors such as the discipline, course level, enrollment size, and instructor educational philosophy.

This page is designed to help you think about the different options and how they might fit with your needs. It contains a variety of examples of late work policies, annotated with things for you to consider before adopting that policy type. Some also contain ideas of situations where that policy type might work well. While this page may seem lengthy, it’s important to remember that good teaching is hard work! To support students equitably, it is critical to think about the implications for your syllabus policies on different student populations.

Before you dig in, know that this is not intended to be an exhaustive list - there are other creative options available for crafting great syllabus policies. It is also possible to mix elements of the different approaches together if none of them feel like quite the right fit. Note that these are focused on homework and project type work rather than exams. There are a lot of very interesting ways that faculty account for missed exams or students with low exam scores, but that is beyond the scope of this document.

Types of late policies that we’ve seen:

Considerations: This type of policy offers maximum flexibility for students that need it. However, instructors sometimes find that many students procrastinate too much, which can cause students to fall behind if material builds on itself. It can also be difficult to keep up with grading.

Learning happens by trying something, getting feedback, and improving. Instructors assign work because they believe it will lead to valuable student learning. Removing the ability for students to get feedback or re-do work can therefore take away the main reason you have them do the work in the first place.

When might this work well: Upper level or low enrollment courses with highly motivated students.

Considerations: This type of policy is somewhat flexible and pretty easy to implement as an instructor (it can even be automated in Canvas). However, some students may still need exceptions, so this could potentially penalize emergencies unless there is a clear section outlining exceptions to the policy.

When it can work well: This is probably the most common late work policy, and can be implemented in most courses.

Considerations: This policy works similarly to the previous one, which means there is flexibility and ease of implementation. The main difference is that this ensures a decent amount of credit for completing assignments no matter how late they are, which can encourage students to do the work that we know leads to enhanced learning. It is also less penalizing of students that have significant emergencies.

When it can work well: This can be implemented in most courses.

Considerations: This can provide some flexibility, and makes it so the instructor doesn’t have to determine what constitutes a ‘valid’ excuse. It can also be automated in the Canvas. However, students may miss out on learning experiences for missed assignments, so this may not be optimal in courses where material builds on itself and every assignment is important. There may still be some need for flexibility on more than the granted number of assignments for specific students, although this method should substantially reduce the number of exceptions granted.

Where it can work well: In high enrollment courses or classes with a large number of assignments across the semester making it difficult to give feedback on late work.

Considerations: This can be very flexible, and makes it so the instructor doesn’t have to determine what constitutes a ‘valid’ excuse. Also, unlike the policy above where assignments are dropped, here students still get feedback on late work. While there may still be some need for flexibility on more than the granted number of assignments for specific students, this method should substantially reduce the number of exceptions granted.

Where it can work well: This method can work well in most courses, although it does pose the challenge of keeping track of ‘Oops token’ use

Considerations: This can allow flexibility in particular situations, and also helps signal to students what you value most. These policies can be more ‘realistic’, since in a lot of jobs, different types of work (like presenting to a client vs independently working on a project) have very different levels of importance. However, these policies can be more complex to write, and require instructors to be very specific about which rules apply when. Also, there will still be some situations where students need flexibility beyond what is stated for that assignment type, so having a clear exemptions policy will be important.

Considerations: Allowing students to help co-create key parts of the syllabus like policies and due dates can help give them ownership and buy in for the process. You’ll also be able to avoid dates that are particularly busy for a large number of students. However, it can be difficult to find a process that achieves consensus without some students feeling unheard, and you’re unlikely to find a schedule that works perfectly for all students.

Where it can work well: In small classes or courses within a major where students already have a sense of community.

Common beliefs and practices that can be unintentionally harmful:

Requiring documentation to avoid penalties. This can add a burden to students that are already having a difficult time, which sometimes can result in them taking the 0 rather than trying to get an extension. Students can also have very severe illness (COVID-19, the flu) without getting any medical treatment that would provide documentation. Policies like this often use phrases like ‘legitimate absence,’ which can leave students questioning whether their situation counts. first-generation college students and those of marginalized backgrounds are less likely to ask for extensions than other students in situations like this, which leads to inequity.

Requiring notification ahead of time for extensions. While it’s great to encourage students to let you know ahead of time when they’ll need an extension, making it an explicit requirement for being granted extra time is problematic. The term ‘emergency’ means ‘you don’t know it’s coming,’ and if a student is having an emergency, it doesn’t make sense for them to be thinking about your course. Changing the language to something like ‘Either ahead of time or as soon afterward as possible’ signals to students that it’s still okay to contact you after a due date has passed.

Having a stated policy (like ‘no late work under any circumstance’) that differs from what you do in practice (often ‘just talk to me and we can work something out’). As mentioned above, first-generation college students and those of marginalized backgrounds tend to believe exactly what you write in your syllabus. While some students will ask for extensions with this policy, not everyone will, which creates inequity in the implementation of the policy.

Supporting your policy with ‘In the real world there are no extensions’. Actually, there are. People get sick in the real world and need extensions all the time. It can be useful to think carefully about which types of work are granted which types of extensions in your field, and use that to craft a more realistic policy.

‘If I give extensions, they won’t be prepared for their future careers’ . Time / project management is a skill that has to be learned over time. By the time they graduate, we want to ensure they have mastered that skill, but as with anything we teach, it’s not reasonable to hold 1st year students accountable for mastery. There is tremendous variation in workplace culture, so making assumptions about what students will encounter in their future careers can result in gatekeeping rather than support. The question then, is how do we design curriculum to support students through learning time management instead of using it as a reason to push them out?

‘Granting extensions to some students isn’t fair to those that turned it in on time.’ As long as you follow your policy as written, all students are being given the same opportunity for grace. Having a very stringent policy in the name of ‘equality’ is what produces inequity and makes it difficult for students with disabilities or emergency situations to succeed.

Writing a policy using harsh language. Whatever policy you choose to implement, pay close attention to the language that you use. Try to write it in your own voice as an instructor, and be sure to explain the reason you chose that policy. When you use all caps and bold font to say ‘DO NOT’ do something, it can signal to students that they don’t belong and can’t succeed in the course. Even if your policy includes penalties, find a way to phrase it in a way that signals you support student learning.

Having a vague late policy. Sometimes faculty will simply link to a university-level policy or say something like ‘late work will be penalized’. It is very important to write a policy that is specific to your course so students know exactly what to expect. Otherwise, they may make assumptions based on what they’ve experienced in other courses, which may or may not fit with how you implement your policy.

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How to decide when to be flexible

Kathy Castle, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Practice teaches large-enrollment courses and aims to be empathetic, consistent, and equitable, but it doesn't mean "anything goes."

Instead, she has created a decision tree that helps her meet her goals. Take a look and see how it might assist you in implementing flexibility in your course.

• Classroom Climate
• Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
• Teaching Strategies and Techniques

A Few Ideas for Dealing with Late Work

August 4, 2019

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Most of my 9-week grading periods ended the same way: Me and one or two students, sitting in my quiet, empty classroom together, with me sitting at the computer, the students nearby in desks, methodically working through piles of make-up assignments. They would be focused, more focused than I’d seen them in months, and the speed with which they got through the piles was stunning. 

As they finished each assignment I took it, checked it for accuracy, then entered their scores—taking 50 percent off for being late—into my grading program. With every entry, I’d watch as their class grade went up and up: from a 37 percent to a 41, then to 45, then to 51, and eventually to something in the 60s or even low 70s, a number that constituted passing, at which point the process would end and we’d part ways, full of resolve that next marking period would be different.

And the whole time I thought to myself, This is pointless . They aren’t learning anything at all. But I wasn’t sure what else to do.

For as long as teachers have assigned tasks in exchange for grades, late work has been a problem. What do we do when a student turns in work late? Do we give some kind of consequence or accept assignments at any time with no penalty? Do we set up some kind of system that keeps students motivated while still holding them accountable? Is there a way to manage all of this without driving ourselves crazy?

To find answers, I went to Twitter and asked teachers to share what works for them. What follows is a summary of their responses. I wish I could give individual credit to each person who offered ideas, but that would take way too long, and I really want you to get these suggestions now! If you’ve been unsatisfied with your own approach to late work, you should find some fresh ideas here.

First, a Few Questions About Your Grades

Before we get into the ways teachers manage late work, let’s back up a bit and consider whether your overall program of assignments and grading is in a healthy place. Here are some questions to think about:  

• What do your grades represent? How much of your grades are truly based on academic growth, and how much are based mostly on compliance? If they lean more toward compliance, then what you’re doing when you try to manage late work is basically a lot of administrative paper pushing, rather than teaching your content. Although it’s important for kids to learn how to manage deadlines, do you really want an A in your course to primarily reflect the ability to follow instructions? If your grades are too compliance-based, consider how you might shift things so they more accurately represent learning. (For a deeper discussion of this issue, read How Accurate Are Your Grades? )
• Are you grading too many things? If you spend a lot of time chasing down missing assignments in order to get more scores in your gradebook, it could be that you’re grading too much. Some teachers only enter grades for major, summative tasks, like projects, major writing assignments, or exams. Everything else is considered formative and is either ungraded or given a very low point value for completion, not graded for accuracy; it’s practice . For teachers who are used to collecting lots of grades over a marking period, this will be a big shift, and if you work in a school where you’re expected to enter grades into your system frequently, that shift will be even more difficult. Convincing your students that ungraded practice is worthwhile because it will help their performance on the big things will be another hurdle. With all of that said, reducing the number of scored items will make your grades more meaningful and cut way down on the time you spend grading and managing late work.
• What assumptions do you make when students don’t turn in work? I’m embarrassed to admit that when I first started teaching, I assumed most students with missing work were just unmotivated. Although this might be true for a small portion of students, I no longer see this as the most likely reason. Students may have issues with executive function and could use some help developing systems for managing their time and responsibilities. They may struggle with anxiety. Or they may not have the resources—like time, space, and technology—to consistently complete work at home. More attention has been paid lately to the fact that homework is an equity issue , and our policies around homework should reflect an understanding that all students don’t have access to the same resources once they leave school for the day. Punitive policies that are meant to “motivate” students don’t take any of these other issues into consideration, so if your late work penalties don’t seem to be working, it’s likely that the root cause is something other than a lack of motivation.
• What kind of grading system is realistic for you ? Any system you put in place requires YOU to stay on top of grading. It would be much harder to assign penalties, send home reminders, or track lateness if you are behind on marking papers by a week, two weeks, even a month. So whatever you do, create a plan that you can actually keep up with.

Possible Solutions

1. penalties.

Many teachers give some sort of penalty to students for late work. The thinking behind this is that without some sort of negative consequence, too many students would wait until the end of the marking period to turn work in, or in some cases, not turn it in at all. When work is turned in weeks or even months late, it can lose its value as a learning opportunity because it is no longer aligned with what’s happening in class. On top of that, teachers can end up with massive piles of assignments to grade in the last few days of a marking period. This not only places a heavy burden on teachers, it is far from an ideal condition for giving students the good quality feedback they should be getting on these assignments.

Several types of penalties are most common:

Point Deductions In many cases, teachers simply reduce the grade as a result of the lateness. Some teachers will take off a certain number of points per day until they reach a cutoff date after which the work will no longer be accepted. One teacher who responded said he takes off 10 percent for up to three days late, then 30 percent for work submitted up to a week late; he says most students turn their work in before the first three days are over. Others have a standard amount that comes off for any late work (like 10 percent), regardless of when it is turned in. This policy still rewards students for on-time work without completely de-motivating those who are late, builds in some accountability for lateness, and prevents the teacher from having to do a lot of mathematical juggling with a more complex system. 

Parent Contact Some teachers keep track of late work and contact parents if it is not turned in. This treats the late work as more of a conduct issue; the parent contact may be in addition to or instead of taking points away. 

No Feedback, No Re-Dos The real value of homework and other smaller assignments should be the opportunity for feedback: Students do an assignment, they get timely teacher feedback, and they use that feedback to improve. In many cases, teachers allow students to re-do and resubmit assignments based on that feedback. So a logical consequence of late work could be the loss of that opportunity: Several teachers mentioned that their policy is to accept late work for full credit, but only students who submit work on time will receive feedback or the chance to re-do it for a higher grade. Those who hand in late work must accept whatever score they get the first time around. 

2. A Separate Work Habits Grade

In a lot of schools, especially those that use standards-based grading, a student’s grade on an assignment is a pure representation of their academic mastery; it does not reflect compliance in any way. So in these classrooms, if a student turns in good work, it’s going to get a good grade even if it’s handed in a month late. 

But students still need to learn how to manage their time. For that reason, many schools assign a separate grade for work habits. This might measure factors like adherence to deadlines, neatness, and following non-academic guidelines like font sizes or using the correct heading on a paper. 

• Although most teachers whose schools use this type of system will admit that students and parents don’t take the work habits grade as seriously as the academic grade, they report being satisfied that student grades only reflect mastery of the content.
• One school calls their work habits grade a “behavior” grade, and although it doesn’t impact GPA, students who don’t have a certain behavior grade can’t make honor roll, despite their actual GPA.
• Several teachers mentioned looking for patterns and using the separate grade as a basis for conferences with parents, counselors, or other stakeholders. For most students, there’s probably a strong correlation between work habits and academic achievement, so separating the two could help students see that connection.
• Some learning management systems will flag assignments as late without necessarily taking points off. Although this does not automatically translate to a work habits grade, it indicates the lateness to students and parents without misrepresenting the academic achievement.

3. Homework Passes

Because things happen in real life that can throw anyone off course every now and then, some teachers offer passes students can use to replace a missed assignment.

• Most teachers only offer these passes to replace low-point assignments, not major ones, and they generally only offer 1 to 3 passes per marking period. Homework passes can usually only recover 5 to 10 percent of a student’s overall course grade. 
• Other teachers have a policy of allowing students to drop one or two of their lowest scores in the gradebook. Again, this is typically done for smaller assignments and has the same net effect as a homework pass by allowing everyone to have a bad day or two.
• One teacher gives “Next Class Passes” which allow students one extra day to turn in work. At the end of every marking period she gives extra credit points to students who still have unused passes. She says that since she started doing this, she has had the lowest rate ever of late work. 

4. Extension Requests

Quite a few teachers require students to submit a written request for a deadline extension rather than taking points off. With a system like this, every student turns something in on the due date, whether it’s the assignment itself or an extension request.

• Most extension requests ask students to explain why they were unable to complete the assignment on time. This not only gives the students a chance to reflect on their habits, it also invites the teacher to help students solve larger problems that might be getting in the way of their academic success. 
• Having students submit their requests via Google Forms reduces the need for paper and routes all requests to a single spreadsheet, which makes it easier for teachers to keep track of work that is late or needs to be regraded.  
• Other teachers use a similar system for times when students want to resubmit work for a new grade. 

5. Floating Deadlines

Rather than choosing a single deadline for an assignment, some teachers assign a range of dates for students to submit work. This flexibility allows students to plan their work around other life activities and responsibilities.

• Some teachers offer an incentive to turn in work in the early part of the time frame, such as extra credit or faster feedback, and this helps to spread out the submissions more evenly. 
• Another variation on this approach is to assign a batch of work for a whole week and ask students to get it in by Friday. This way, students get to manage when they get it done. 
• Other names mentioned for this strategy were flexible deadlines , soft deadlines , and due windows .

6. Let Students Submit Work in Progress

Some digital platforms, like Google Classroom, allow students to “submit” assignments while they are still working on them. This allows teachers to see how far the student has gotten and address any problems that might be coming up. If your classroom is mostly paper-based, it’s certainly possible to do this kind of thing with paper as well, letting students turn in partially completed work to demonstrate that an effort has been made and show you where they might be stuck.

7. Give Late Work Full Credit

Some teachers accept all late work with no penalty. Most of them agree that if the work is important, and if we want students to do it, we should let them hand it in whenever they get it done. 

• Some teachers fear this approach will cause more students to stop doing the work or delay submission until the end of a marking period, but teachers who like this approach say they were surprised by how little things changed when they stopped giving penalties: Most students continued to turn work in more or less on time, and the same ones who were late under the old system were still late under the new one. The big difference was that the teacher no longer had to spend time calculating deductions or determining whether students had valid excuses; the work was simply graded for mastery.
• To give students an incentive to actually turn the work in before the marking period is over, some teachers will put a temporary zero in the gradebook as a placeholder until the assignment is turned in, at which point the zero is replaced with a grade.
• Here’s a twist on the “no penalty” option: Some teachers don’t take points off for late work, but they limit the time frame when students can turn it in. Some will not accept late work after they have graded and returned an assignment; at that point it would be too easy for students to copy off of the returned papers. Others will only accept late work up until the assessment for the unit, because the work leading up to that is meant to prepare for that assessment. 

8. Other Preventative Measures

These strategies aren’t necessarily a way to manage late work as much as they are meant to prevent it in the first place.

• Include students in setting deadlines. When it comes to major assignments, have students help you determine due dates. They may have a better idea than you do about other big events that are happening and assignments that have been given in other classes.
• Stop assigning homework. Some teachers have stopped assigning homework entirely, recognizing that disparities at home make it an unfair measurement of academic mastery. Instead, all meaningful work is done in class, where the teacher can monitor progress and give feedback as needed. Long-term projects are done in class as well, so the teacher is aware of which students need more time and why. 
• Make homework optional or self-selected. Not all students need the same amount of practice. You may be able to get your students to assess their own need for additional practice and assign that practice to themselves. Although this may sound far-fetched, in some classes, like this self-paced classroom , it actually works, because students know they will be graded on a final assessment, they get good at determining when they need extra practice.

With so many different approaches to late work, what’s clear is that there are a lot of different schools of thought on grading and assessment, so it’s not a surprise that we don’t always land on the best solution on the first try. Experiment with different systems, talk to your colleagues, and be willing to try something new until you find something that works for you. 

Further Reading

20 Ways to Cut Your Grading Time in Half This free e-book is full of ideas that can help with grading in general.

On Your Mark: Challenging the Conventions of Grading and Reporting Thomas R. Guskey This book came highly recommended by a number of teachers.

Hacking Assessment: 10 Ways to Go Gradeless in a Traditional Grades School Starr Sackstein

Come back for more. Join our mailing list and get weekly tips, tools, and inspiration that will make your teaching more effective and fun. You’ll get access to our members-only library of free downloads, including 20 Ways to Cut Your Grading Time in Half , the e-booklet that has helped thousands of teachers save time on grading. Over 50,000 teachers have already joined—come on in.

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Categories: Classroom Management , Instruction , Podcast

Tags: assessment , organization

51 Comments

I teach high school science (mine is a course that does not have an “end of course” test so the stakes are not as high) and I teach mostly juniors and seniors. Last year I decided not to accept any late work whatsoever unless a student is absent the day it is assigned or due (or if they have an accomodation in a 504 or IEP – and I may have had one or two students with real/documented emergencies that I let turn in late.) This makes it so much easier on me because I don’t have to keep up with how many days/points to deduct – that’s a nightmare. It also forces them to be more responsible. They usually have had time to do it in class so there’s no reason for it to be late. Also, I was very frustrated with homework not being completed and I hated having to grade it and keep up with absent work. So I don’t “require” homework (and rarely assign it any more) but if students do ALL (no partial credit) of it they get a 100% (small point value grade), if they are absent or they don’t do it they are exempt. So it ends up being a sort of extra credit grade but it does not really penalize students who don’t do it. When students ask me for extra credit (which I don’t usually give), the first thing I ask is if they’ve done all the homework assigned. That usually shuts down any further discussion. I’ve decided I’m not going to spend tons of time chasing and calculating grades on small point values that do not make a big difference in an overall grade. 🙂

Do I understand correctly….

Homework is not required. If a student fully completes the HW, they will earn full points. If the student is absent or doesn’t do it, they are excused. Students who do complete the HW will benefit a little bit in their overall grade, but students who don’t compete the work will not be penalized. Did I understand it correctly?

Do you stipulate that a student must earn a certain % on the assignment to get the full points? What about a student who completed an assignment but completes the entire thing incorrectly? Still full credit? Or an opportunity to re-do?

Thank you in advance.

From reading this blog post I was thinking the same thing. When not penalizing students for homework do you have students who do turn it in getting extra points in class?

From what I have seen, if there is a benefit for turning in homework and students see this benefit more will try to accomplish what the homework is asking. So avoid penalization is okay, but make sure the ones turning it in are getting rewarded in some way.

The other question regarding what to do with students who may not be completing the assignments correctly, you could use this almost as a formative assessment. You could still give them the credit but use this as a time for you to focus on that student a little more and see where he/she isn’t understanding the content.

Our school has a system called Catch Up Cafe. Students with missing work report to a specific teacher during the first 15 minutes of lunch to work on missing work. Students upgrade to a Wednesday after school time if they have accumulated 4 or more missing assignments on any Monday. They do not have to serve if they can clear ALL missing work by the end of the day Wednesday. Since work is not dragging out for a long period of time, most teachers do not take off points.

How do you manage the logistics of who has missing and how many assignments are needed to be completed-to make sure they are attending the Catch up Cafe or Wednesday after school? How do you manage the communication with parents?

When a student has missing work it can be very difficult to see what he/she is missing. I always keep a running record of all of their assignments that quarter and if they miss that assigement I keep it blank to remind myself there was never a submission. Once I know that this student is missing this assignment I give them their own copy and write at the top late. So once they do turn it in I know that it’s late and makes grading it easier.

There are a lot of different programs that schools use but I’ve always kept a paper copy so I have a back-up.

I find that the worst part of tracking make-up work is keeping tabs on who was absent for a school activity, illness or other excused absence, and who just didn’t turn in the assignment. I obviously have to accept work turned in “late” due to an excused absence, but I can handle the truly late work however I wish. Any advice on simplifying tracking for this?

I tell my students to simply write “Absent (day/s)” at the top of the paper. I remind them of this fairly regularly. That way, if they were absent, it’s their responsibility to notify me, and it’s all together. If you create your own worksheets, etc., you could add a line to the top as an additional reminder.

It might be worth checking out Evernote .

In order to keep track of what type of missing assignments, I put a 0 in as a grade so students and parents know an assignment was never submitted. If a student was here on the due date and day assignment was given then it is a 0 in the grade book. If a student was absent the day the assignment was given or when it was due, I put a 00 in the grade book. This way I know if it was because of an absence or actual no work completed.

This is exactly what I do. Homework can only count 10% in our district. Claims that kids fail due to zeros for homework are specious.

This is SUCH a difficult issue and I have tried a few of the suggested ways in years past. My questions is… how do we properly prepare kids for college while still being mindful of the inequities at home? We need to be sure that we are giving kids opportunity, resources, and support, but at the same time if we don’t introduce them to some of the challenges they will be faced with in college (hours of studying and research and writing regardless of the hours you might have to spend working to pay that tuition), are we truly preparing them? I get the idea of mastery of content without penalty for late work and honestly that is typically what I go with, but I constantly struggle with this and now that I will be moving from middle to high school, I worry even more about the right way to handle late work and homework. I don’t want to hold students back in my class by being too much of a stickler about seemingly little things, but I don’t want to send them to college unprepared to experience a slap in the face, either. I don’t want to provide extra hurdles, but how do I best help them learn how to push through the hurdles and rigor if they aren’t held accountable? I always provide extra time after school, at lunch, etc., and have also experienced that end of term box checking of assignments in place of a true learning experience, but how do we teach them the importance of using resources, asking for help, allowing for mistakes while holding them to standards and learning work habits that will be helpful to them when they will be on their own? I just don’t know where the line is between helping students learn the value of good work habits and keeping them from experiencing certain challenges they need to understand in order to truly get ahead.

Thanks for sharing – I can tell how much you care for your students, wanting them to be confident independent learners. What I think I’m hearing is perhaps the struggle between that fine line of enabling and supporting. When supporting kids, whether academically or behaviorally, we’re doing something that assists or facilitates their growth. So, for example, a student that has anxiety or who doesn’t have the resources at home to complete an assignment, we can assist by giving that student extra time or an alternative place to complete the assignment. This doesn’t lower expectations, it just offers support to help them succeed.

Enabling on the other hand, puts systems in place that don’t involve consequences, which in turn allow the behaviors to continue. It involves excuses and solving problems for others. It may be about lowering expectations and letting people get by with patterns of behavior.

Late work is tricky. The article does mention the importance of time management, which is why separating academic grades from work habits is something a lot of schools are doing. Sometimes real life happens and kids need a “pass.” If whatever you’re doing seems to be helping to support a student rather than enabling patterns, then that might help you distinguish between that fine line. Hope this helps!

Thank you again for such a great post. Always high-quality, relevant, and helpful. I so appreciate you and the work you do!

So glad to hear you enjoyed the post, Liz! I’ll make sure Jenn sees this.

I thought that these points brought up about receiving late work were extremely helpful and I hope that every classroom understands how beneficial these strategies could be.

When reading the penalties section under point deductions it brought up the idea of taking points off slowly as time goes by. Currently in my classroom the only point deduction I take off is 30% of the total grade after it is received late. No matter how much time has gone by in that grading period it will have 30% off the total.

I’m curious if changing this technique to something that would increase the percentage off as time goes by will make students turn in their work on time.

My question to everyone is which grading technique would be more beneficial for the students? Do you believe that just taking off 30% for late work would help students more when turning in their work or do you think that as time goes by penalizing their final score will have students turn in their work more?

If anyone has any answers it would be extremely beneficial.

Thank you, Kirby

When I was in school my school did 1/3 of a grade each day it was like. So 1 day late A >A-. Two days late: A->>B+ so on and so forth. This worked really well for me because I knew that I could still receive a good grade if I worked hard on an assignment, even if it was a day or two late.

I dread it when I have missing work or unsubmitted work. I would try to get a last-minute effort to chase those needed pieces of work which could be done from those students housed in dorms on campus. It is better than not failing them for lacking to turn in graded submissions or taking scheduled quizzes. I dread this not for the students, sadly, but for likely call to explain why I did not keep physical evidence of students’ supposed learning. In my part of the globe, we have a yearly “quality assurance” audit by the country’s educational authorities or their representatives.

I am a pre-service teacher and I am in the process of developing my personal philosophies in education, including the topic of late work. I will be certified as a secondary social studies teacher and would like to teach in a high school. Your post brought my attention to some important insights about the subject. For example, before this post I had not thought to use feedback as a way to incentivize homework submission on time. This action coupled with the ability to re-do assignments is a great way to emphasize the importance of turning work in on time. I do have a follow-up question, how do you adequately manage grading re-do’s and feedback on all assignments? What kinds of organizational and time-management strategies do you use as a teacher? Further, how much homework do you assign when providing this as an option?

Additionally, have you administered or seen the no penalty and homework acceptance time limit in practice (for example, all homework must be turned in by the unit test)? I was curious if providing a deadline to accept all homework until the unit test may result in an access of papers I need to grade. From your experience, what practice(s) have you seen work well in the classroom?

My goal is to prepare students for life beyond high school and to support their intellectual, social, and emotional development during their high school learning experience. Similar to a previous commenter (Kate), I am also trying to define a balance between holding students accountable in order to best prepare them for their future lives and providing opportunities to raise their grade if they are willing to do the work.

Hey Jessica, you have some great questions. I’d recommend checking out the following blog posts from Jenn that will help you learn more about keeping track of assessments, differentiation, and other aspects of grading: Kiddom: Standards-based Grading Made Wonderful , Could You Teach Without Grades , Boost Your Assessment Power with GradeCam , and Four Research-Based Strategies Every Teacher Should be Using . I hope this helps you find answers to your questions!

Overall I found this article extremely helpful and it actually reinforced many ideas I already had about homework and deadlines. One of my favorite teachers I had in high school was always asking for our input on when we felt assignments should be due based on what extra curricular activities were taking place in a given time period. We were all extremely grateful for his consideration and worked that much harder on the given assignments.

While it is important to think about our own well-being when grading papers, I think it is just as important (if not more) to be conscious of how much work students might have in other classes or what students schedules are like outside of school. If we really want students to do their best work, we need to give them enough time to do the work. This will in turn, help them care more about the subject matter and help them dive deeper. Obviously there still needs to be deadlines, but it does not hurt to give students some autonomy and say in the classroom.

Thanks for your comment Zach. I appreciate your point about considering students’ involvement in extracurricular activities and other responsibilities they may have outside the school day. It’s definitely an important consideration. The only homework my son seemed to have in 8th grade was for his history class. I agree that there’s a need for teachers to maintain more of a balance across classes when it comes to the amount of homework they give to students.

Thank you for an important, thought-provoking post! As a veteran teacher of 20+ years, I have some strong opinions about this topic. I have always questioned the model of ‘taking points off’ for late work. I do not see how this presents an accurate picture of what the student knows or can do. Shouldn’t he be able to prove his knowledge regardless of WHEN? Why does WHEN he shows you what he knows determine WHAT he knows?

Putting kids up against a common calendar with due dates and timelines, regardless of their ability to learn the material at the same rate is perhaps not fair. There are so many different situations facing our students – some students have challenges and difficulty with deadlines for a plethora of potential reasons, and some have nothing but support, structure, and time. When it comes to deadlines – Some students need more time. Other students may need less time. Shouldn’t all students have a chance to learn at a pace that is right for them? Shouldn’t we measure student success by demonstrations of learning instead of how much time it takes to turn in work? Shouldn’t students feel comfortable when it is time to show me what they’ve learned, and when they can demonstrate they’ve learned it, I want their grade to reflect that.

Of course we want to teach students how to manage their time. I am not advocating for a lax wishy-washy system that allows for students to ‘get to it when they get to it’. I do believe in promoting work-study habits, and using a separate system to assign a grade for responsibility, respect, management, etc is a potential solution. I understand that when introducing this type of system, it may be tough to get buy-in from parents and older students who have traditionally only looked at an academic grade because it is the only piece of the puzzle that impacts GPA. Adopting a separate work-study grading system would involve encouraging the entire school community – starting at the youngest level – to see its value. It would be crucial for the school to promote the importance of high level work-study habits right along side academic grades.

I teach a specials course to inner city middle schoolers at a charter school. All students have to take my class since it is one of the core pillars of the school’s culture and mission. Therefore it is a double edge sword. Some students and parents think it is irrelevant like an art or music class but will get upset to find out it isn’t just an easy A class. Other students and parents love it because they come to our charter school just to be in this class that isn’t offered anywhere else in the state, except at the college level.

As you may have already guessed, I see a lot of students who don’t do the work. So much that I no longer assign homework, which the majority would not be able to do independently anyways or may develop the wrong way of learning the material, due to the nature of the subject. So everything is done in the classroom together as a class. And then we grade together to reinforce the learning. This is why I absolutely do not accept missing work and there is no reason for late work. Absent students make up the work by staying after school upon their return or they can print it off of Google classroom at home and turn in by the end of the day of their return. Late and missing work is a big issue at our school. I’ve had whole classrooms not do the work even as I implemented the new routine. Students will sit there and mark their papers as we do it in the classroom but by the end they are not handing it in because they claim not to have anything to hand in. Or when they do it appears they were doing very little. I’d have to micromanage all 32 students every 5 minutes to make sure they were actually doing the work, which I believe core teachers do. But that sets a very bad precedent because I noticed our students expect to be handheld every minute or they claim they can’t do the work. I know this to be the case since before this class I was teaching a computer class and the students expected me to sit right next to them and give them step-by-step instructions of where to click on the screen. They simply could not follow along as I demonstrated on the Aquos board. So I do think part of the problem is the administrators’ encouraging poor work ethics. They’re too focused on meeting proficient standard to the point they want teachers to handhold students. They also want teachers to accept late and missing work all the way until the end of each quarter. Well that’s easy if you only have a few students but when you have classrooms full of them, that means trying to grade 300+ students multiplied by “x” amount of late/missing work the week before report card rolls out – to which we still have to write comments for C- or below students. Some of us teach all the grade levels 6-8th. And that has actually had negative effects because students no longer hold themselves accountable.

To be honest, I really do think this is why there is such a high turnover rate and teachers who started giving busy work only. In the inner city, administrators only care about putting out the illusion of proficiency while students and parents don’t want any accountability for their performance. As soon as a student fails because they have to actually try to learn (which is a risk for failing), the parent comes in screaming.

Yea, being an Art teacher you lost me at “ irrelevant like an art or music .”

I teach middle school in the inner city where missing and late work is a chronic issue so the suggestions and ideas above do not work. Students and parents have become complacent with failing grades so penalizing work isn’t going to motivate them to do better the next time. The secret to teaching in the inner city is to give them a way out without it becoming massive work for you. Because trust me, if you give them an inch they will always want a mile at your expense. Depending on which subject you teach, it might be easier to just do everything in class. That way it becomes an all or nothing grade. They either did or didn’t do the work. No excuses, no chasing down half the school through number of calls to disconnected phone numbers and out of date emails, no explaining to parents why Johnny has to stay after school to finish assignments when mom needs him home to babysit or because she works second shift and can’t pick him up, etc. Students have no reason for late work or for missing work when they were supposed to do it right there in class. Absent students can catch up with work when they return.

Milton, I agree with all of what you are saying and have experienced. Not to say that that is for all students I have had, but it is a slow progression as to what is happening with students and parents as years go by. I understand that there are areas outside of the classroom we cannot control and some students do not have certain necessities needed to help them but they need to start learning what can they do to help themselves. I make sure the students know they can come and talk to me if needing help or extra time, tutor after school and even a phone number to contact along with email if needing to ask questions or get help. But parents and students do not use these opportunities given until the week before school ends and are now wanting their student to pass and what can be done. It is frustrating and sad. I let students and parents know my expectation up front and if they do not take the opportunity to talk to me then the grade they earned is the result.

I am a special education resource teacher and late work/missing work happens quite a lot. After reading this article, I want to try a few different things to help minimize this issue. However, I am not the one making the grades or putting the grades in. I am just giving the work to the students in small group settings and giving them more access to the resources they need to help them be successful on these assignments based on their current IEP. I use a make-up folder, and usually I will pull these students to work on their work during a different time than when I regularly pull them. That way they do not miss the delivery of instruction they get from me and it does not punish my other students either if there is make-up work that needs to be completed. I try to give my students ample time to complete their work, so there is no excuse for them not to complete it. If they are absent, then I pull them at a time that they can make it up.

I too agree with that there’s a need for teachers to maintain more of a balance across classes when it comes to the amount of homework they give to students.

I had a few teachers who were willing to tolerate lateness in favor of getting it/understanding the material. Lastly, my favorite teacher was the one who gave me many chances to do rewrites of a ‘bad essay’ and gave me as much time as needed (of course still within like the semester or even month but I never took more than two weeks) because he wanted me to do well. I ended up with a 4 in AP exam though so that’s good.

Late work has a whole new meaning with virtual learning. I am drowning in late work (via Google Classroom). I don’t want to penalize students for late work as every home situation is different. I grade and provide feedback timely (to those who submitted on time). However, I am being penalized every weekend and evening as I try to grade and provide feedback during this time. I would love some ideas.

Hi Susan! I’m in the same place–I have students who (after numerous reminders) still haven’t submitted work due days…weeks ago, and I’m either taking time to remind them again or give feedback on “old” work over my nights and weekends. So, while it’s not specific to online learning, Jenn’s A Few Ideas for Dealing with Late Work is a post I’ve been trying to put into practice the last few days. I hope this helps!

Graded assignment flexibility is essential to the process of learning in general but especially in our new world of digital divide

It is difficult to determine who is doing the work at home. Follow up videos on seesaw help to see if the student has gained the knowledge or is being given the answers.

This is some good information. This is a difficult subject.

I love the idea of a catch-up cafe! I think I will try to implement this in my school. It’s in the same place every day, yes? And the teachers take turns monitoring? I’m just trying to get a handle on the logistics – I know those will be the first questions I get.

I really enjoyed this post. I think it provides a lot of perspective on a topic that teachers get way too strict about. I just wonder: wouldn’t it be inevitable for students to become lazy and care less about their understanding if there wasn’t any homework (or even if it was optional)? I know students don’t like it, and it can get redundant if they understand the content, but it truly is good practice.

Hi Shannon,

Glad the post helped! Homework is one of those hot educational topics, but I can’t say I’ve personally come across a situation or found any research where kids become lazy or unmotivated if not assigned homework. In fact, research indicates that homework doesn’t really have much impact on learning until high school. I just think that if homework is going to be assigned, it needs to be intentional and purposeful. (If students have already mastered a skill, I’m not sure how homework would provide them much benefit.) Here’s an article that I think is worth checking out. See what you think.

I like how you brought up how homework needs to be given with the understanding that not all kids have the same resources at home. Some kids don’t have computers or their parents won’t let them use it. There is no way of knowing this so teachers should give homework that requires barely any utensils or technology.

I think having students help determine the due dates for major assignments is a great idea. This works well with online schools too. Remote jobs are the future so helping students learn how to set their own due dates and to get homework done from home will prepare them for the future.

This year I am trying something new. After reading this article, I noticed that I have used a combination of some of these strategies to combat late work and encourage students to turn work in on time. I only record a letter grade in the grade book: A, B, C, D, F. If a student turns in an assignment late, I flag it as late, but it does not affect their “grade”.

If a student wants to redo an assignment, they must turn something in. If they miss the due date, they can still turn it in, but lose the opportunity to redo the assignment. Students will meet with me one last time before they turn it in to get final feedback.

At the end of the grading period, I conference with the student about their final grade, looking at how many times they have handed work in on-time or late. This will determine if the student has earned an A or an A+ .

I really appreciate how your post incorporates a lot of suggestions for the way that teachers can think about and grade homework. Thank you for mentioning how different students have different resources available as well. As teachers, we need to be aware of the different resources our students have and tailor our approach to homework to match. I like the idea of grading homework based on completion and accepting late work for full credit at any time (substituting a zero in the grade book until it is turned in). This is definitely a strategy that I’ll be using!

So glad the article was helpful for you! I will be sure to pass on your comments to Jenn.

I also have been teaching for a long time and I have found that providing an END OF WEEK (Friday at 11:59) due date for assignments allows students to get the work completed by that time. It helps with athletes, and others involved in extra curricular activities. I feel this is fair. I give my tests/quizzes on the days assigned and the supplemental work on Fridays.

I personally, as a special education teach, would allow my SPED students extra time to complete the work they have missed. This is in alignment with their IEP accommodations. I would work with each one independently and have remediation with the content that they are having difficulty. This setting would be in a small group and separate classroom.

I really like the idea of a work habits grade. I struggle with students who turn things in late regularly earning the same grade as those who always turn things in on time. A work habits grade could really motivate some learners.

I’ve been in education for 37 years and in all manner of positions. I share this only to also say that things have changed quite a bit. When I started teaching I only had one, maybe two students in a class of 34 elementary students that would not have homework or classwork finished. Now, I have two classes of about 15 each. One group is often half the class on a regular basis not having homework or not finishing classwork on a regular basis- so far. Additionally parents will pull students out to go to amusement parks, etc and expect all work to be made up and at full credit. I believe that the idea of homework is clearly twofold- to teach accountability and to reengage a learner. Classwork is critical to working with the content and, learning objective. We can all grade various ways; however, at some point, the learner has to step up. Learning is not passive, nor is it all on the teacher. I have been called “mean” because I make students do their work in class, refocusing them, etc. I find that is my duty. Late work should be simply dealt with consistently and with understanding to circumstance IMO. You were out or it was late because mom and dad were upset, ok versus we went to Disney for three days and I was too tired. hmm- used to be easy with excused/unexcused absences, now there is no difference. Late with no absence? That can be a problem and I reach out to home and handle it individually at my level.

Hi Jennifer! I really like your sharing about this topic! Late work is a problem that every teacher encounters. Thank you for your consideration of this issue and the many wise ideas you have provided. Your ideas also remind me to reflect on whether my overall program of assignments and grading is in a healthy place. I was inspired by the preventative measures you listed in this post. I want to try to include my students in setting deadlines, especially for some big projects. Students will feel respected by teachers and will be more willing to complete the assignments before deadlines! As you mentioned, some teachers have made homework optional or self-selected, or even stopped assigning homework. I partially agree with that opinion. I indeed try to reduce the amount of students’ homework or even stop assigning homework sometime, but doing related practice in class instead. I believe that the purpose of homework is to aid pupils in mastering the knowledge; it is not a necessary thing.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Yang. Jenn will be glad to know that you found the post inspiring!

Thanks so much for all your insights on giving assignments or homework. All are very helpful as I prepare to return to work after an extended medical leave. It is good to refresh! Anything we require of our students should be purposeful and meaningful to them, so they will give their best to meet whatever deadlines we set. I also like asking our students when is the best time they can turn work in; this is meeting them halfway. And if one strategy does not work, there are more to try; just read this post. Thanks a bunch!!

Jenn will be glad to know the post was helpful for you, Jo!

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• Effective Classroom Management

A Headache-Free Late Work Policy

• September 23, 2019
• Laura Schisler, PhD

As a new faculty member, late work was the cause of many headaches.

• I wanted a policy that would recognize there may be valid reasons why a student might not submit an assignment on time, but I did not like the idea of then having to judge the merit of excuses that might be provided or attempt to decide if they were truthful.
• I wanted a policy that would acknowledge the merit of a completed assignment, so I did not want to deduct a letter grade or certain percentage of points just because it did not meet a deadline; a value I took to heart after reading O’Connor (2011).
• I wanted a policy that would put the responsibility for completing late work entirely on the student, so I did not want to use class time or send reminders out of what was missing and when it was due.
• I wanted a policy that would offer the opportunity for a student to submit work after it was due, but I did not want the hassle of keeping track of any new, individual deadlines and individual point deductions (Vatterott, 2009) for assignments that would occur if I allowed late assignments.

This was the biggest hurdle I saw to allowing late work—tracking who I allowed to make up which assignment for which course, and then remembering when the new deadline was based on the original due date of the assignment. Additionally, if the policy added in a penalty of a certain percent off for each day the assignment was late, the headache of determining if I was able to accept an assignment, and until when and how much it was now worth, was enough to make me consider not allowing late work at all.

Enter the Make-Up Day

In a nutshell, the Make-Up Day is a late work policy that allows submission of missed work during a 24 hour period on a scheduled day of the semester and for up to full credit on the assignment. The details of the policy were more fully developed after conversations with colleagues and trial and error. The current version I use addresses all of my previous concerns regarding late work.

The first specific element of the Make-Up Day is that the reason the assignment was missed is irrelevant.

Busy working on a project for another class? Yes, you can make it up. Completely forgot the assignment was due? Yes, you can make it up. Grandmother died? Condolences, and yes, you can make it up. This portion of the policy eliminates the need to judge whether an explanation for missing work is valid or truthful. It removes the necessity to track doctor’s notes, ask for details, or act as a human lie-detector.

The second important component of the policy is that Make-Up Day is scheduled near the end of the semester. The missed assignment can only be submitted during the day listed in the syllabus, which for me is typically the Monday two weeks before finals.

Limiting the day in which missed work can be submitted to one single day removes the challenge of tracking who owes what assignment for which class and by when. It also intentionally encourages the instructor to not schedule other assignments that are due near the Make-Up Day, in order to avoid getting overwhelmed trying to grade both late work and on-time assignments.

This arrangement also reduces any advantage a student might have when submitting assignments late, as they would be juggling material from different points in the course. A student taking a test originally scheduled for the beginning of the semester would not have the tested material as fresh in their mind. A student wanting to submit a late paper would either need to write it close to the original due date and hold onto it until the Make-Up Day or write the missing paper while at the same time working on new assignments for class. This would definitely not be an advantage, as the student would have already missed out on feedback that could have provided on the paper had it been submitted on time.

The third essential component is that any points associated with in-class assignments (e.g. daily journals, presentations, speeches) cannot be made up.

Many courses have assignments with both written and presentation components. With this policy a student would be able to submit the written paper on Make-Up Day, but not be able to earn the points they could have earned for the presentation itself. This element is a practical one as it is often impossible to replicate the classroom setting, peer feedback, and the dispositions of a student presenting if some substitute for the actual presentation was attempted.

I feel this late work policy shows understanding toward students, is manageable for a teaching schedule, and removes the burden of judging excuses when it comes to late assignments. I share the details of the Make-Up Day both in the syllabus and verbally the first day of class. While I will continue to tinker with the particulars of Make-Up Day, for now, my late work policy headaches are over.

References:

O’Connor, Ken. A Repair Kit for Grading: 15 Fixes for Broken Grades, 2 nd Edition. Boston, Pearson Education, Inc., 2011.

Vatterott, Cathy. Rethinking Homework: Best Practices that Support Diverse Needs. Alexandria, ASCD, 2009.

Laura Schisler, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Teacher Education department at Missouri Southern State University. Following a career teaching junior high and high school science, she now instructs science methods and general teacher education courses.

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Best Practices for Dealing With Late Homework

While there are different views on the use of homework, late homework may be an inevitable part of your teaching experience. If you choose to use homework, you also have to decide how you will address tardy assignments. Here, we offer ways to handle late homework.

While there are different views on the use of homework , late homework may be an inevitable part of your teaching experience. If you choose to use homework, you also have to decide how you will address tardy assignments.

Here we offer five ways the handle late homework that can help you manage the task efficiently, while still being fair to students who complete their work on time.

1. Create Consequences for Late Work

Penalizing students for turning homework in late is a common practice among teachers. If your student misses a deadline, there’s a clear, expected consequence.

Penalties, however, can also encourage students to complete the late assignment to receive partial credit. This ensures fairness — late work can’t achieve the same score as work that was submitted on time — while also giving students who turn homework in late an opportunity to learn the materials and succeed in the class, which is the ultimate goal.

2. Accept Late Work — for Legitimate Reasons

No, “my dog ate my homework” is not an acceptable reason for missing a homework deadline. But there are some situations that may warrant tardiness, such as a medical or family emergency. 

Help your students understand your expectations for accepting late work without a penalty, as well as what you’ll need to verify those conflicts (such as a signed letter from a parent, for example). This is also a great way to preempt students’ attempts at making excuses, which could reduce the number of excuses you’ll field throughout the year.

3. Put Extensions on the Table

Not every student who turns work in late is unmotivated or irresponsible. Some students might be struggling to keep up with the workload, or they could be dealing with situations at home that make managing classroom deadlines difficult. 

By encouraging students to ask for extensions, you can empower them to proactively manage their workload. Note that some students might try to take advantage of extensions to avoid late penalties. Creating boundaries, like requiring students to ask for an extension in advance of the deadline, can help.

4. Grant a ‘Next-Day Pass’

A next-day pass is a pass that grants your students the opportunity to submit a homework assignment the day after it’s due without penalty. Next-day passes afford students some flexibility that they can tap into when they need it, while also helping you eliminate the need to field excuses for late work and requests for extensions.

5. Take ‘Late’ Out of the Equation

Some teachers have adopted policies that don’t penalize students for turning work in late — no matter how late the assignment is or how many assignments are late. Instead of penalizing students for tardiness, this method grades students separately based on their ability to turn their assignments in on time. By creating a distinction between the work and deadlines, you may be able to better understand whether students who are struggling are not grasping the concepts or are dealing with other obstacles.

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Methods for Managing Late Work

Examining the reasoning behind your assessments can help shape your approach to tardy work, says Jennifer Gonzalez.

When she was teaching, Jennifer Gonzalez used to plod through a “pointless” exercise at the end of the term: allowing a few students to complete late assignments and then docking their scores by 50 percent for tardiness. In her recent blog post , she reflects on why that practice didn’t help her students and offers suggestions from other educators on how cope with late work. 

The first step, Gonzalez says, is to examine your assessment procedures as a whole. Ask, “What do your grades represent?” The emphasis should be on learning and growth, not compliance. “If your grades are too compliance-based,” Gonzalez says, “consider how you might shift things so they more accurately represent learning.” Look also at the quantity of what you grade, she advises. Many assignments function as practice, not assessment. Shift to fewer graded assignments, she says, even if it is a challenge to “convince your students that ungraded practice is worthwhile because it will help their performance on the big things.” 

The final step for evaluating your grading system is asking yourself, “What do I assume late work means?” Gonzalez confesses, “I’m embarrassed to admit that when I first started teaching, I assumed most students with missing work were just unmotivated.” But lack of motivation is rarely the cause; many students don’t complete homework because they don’t have the resources of their peers. 

The most important factor in your grading system? Creating a plan you can actually keep up with, Gonzalez says. Once you establish a system, you can develop a strategy for late work. She offers a range of possible options, curated from other teachers through social media, ranging from penalties to the elimination of deadlines. 

Many teachers still opt for penalties, and there’s a reason: “When work is turned in weeks or even months late, it can lose its value as a learning opportunity because it is no longer aligned with what’s happening in class.” If you choose penalization for tardy assignments, a reduction in points can motivate students to complete the work, even if it is late. “This policy still rewards students for on-time work without completely de-motivating those who are late, builds in some accountability for lateness, and prevents the teacher from having to do a lot of mathematical juggling with a more complex system.”

Other teachers implement a policy that rewards students who turn things in on time by allowing them to resubmit their assignments for improved grades; if the work is late the student can’t retake the assessment for more points or receive feedback. 

Punitive policies don't always work as motivators, Gonzalez says, because sometimes the reason for late work isn't related to a lack of motivation. As a result, many teachers are abandoning the practice. "Students may have issues with executive function and could use some help developing systems for managing their time and responsibilities. They may struggle with anxiety. Or they may not have the resources—like time, space, and technology—to consistently complete work at home," she writes. 

Separate Mastery From Deadlines

Some teachers use a separate assessment  to “measure factors like adherence to deadlines, neatness, and following non-academic guidelines like font sizes or using the correct heading on a paper.” Completing assignments on-time, in other words, is part of a separate evaluation from the mastery assessment--and students receive grades for both. 

“Although most teachers whose schools use this type of system will admit that students and parents don’t take the work habits grade as seriously as the academic grade,” Gonzalez writes, “they report being satisfied that student grades only reflect mastery of the content.” Because better work habits can yield better academic results, having this type of “work habits” score can be used to show students the importance of staying on top of deadlines.

Issue Selective ‘Passes’ or Use Floating Deadlines

Another popular option for late work is to anticipate it and offer a pass the student can elect to use instead. “Most teachers only offer these passes to replace low-point assignments, not major ones, and they generally only offer 1 to 3 passes per marking period.” A “next day pass” serves a similar purpose; students can use them to extend the deadline by a day. One teacher reports that the introduction of the pass gave her “the lowest rate ever of late work.” Some teachers use extension requests so students can anticipate when they might be late and write a proposal about why their tardiness should be excused. 

A floating deadline can help avoid the question of how to address late work altogether. Giving students a flexible range of dates when they can submit work allows them to take ownership in their work. “Some teachers offer an incentive to turn in work in the early part of the time frame, such as extra credit or faster feedback, and this helps to spread out the submissions more evenly,” Gonzalez writes. A variation on the flexible deadline allows students to turn in work that’s in process. Teachers then have the chance to review work and give feedback before the final grade. Students can also take responsibility by weighing in on when work should be due. “They may have a better idea than you do about other big events that are happening and assignments that have been given in other classes.”

What is the best policy on late work? The system that actually works for you. Gonzalez encourages teachers to experiment with different approaches and settle on the process that suits you and your students.

Late Work Policy for Teachers Example

Example Late Work and Make Up Work Policy

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Here is an example of a late work and make-up work policy that a teacher would hand out to students and parents at the beginning of the year. This was created using the article, How to Deal with Late Work and Make-Up Work .

To be regarded on time, work must be completed by the beginning of the period on the day it is due.

Short homework assignments will be stamped "on time" only at the beginning of the period. If we go over answers to the previous night's homework, you should copy answers while we check homework to save as a review, but you will not get credit for having done your homework. If the homework is collected without answers being given in class, you may turn it in the following day with a late penalty. Unfinished homework is not accepted.

Larger graded assignments may be turned in late with a one-grade penalty for each day late. They will not be accepted after the fourth day they are due. You may not work on late homework instead of the day's assignment. Attempts to do so will result in a zero for the late work.

In the case of excused absences , you have two extra days for each excused absence not counting the day of your return. Since your assignment will have to be changed to a comparable assignment if graded assignments are returned before yours are turned in, you should ask me if you need to get an alternate assignment so you don't have to do two instead of one. Work due on the day of an unexcused absence receives a grade of zero.

Long term assignments (assignments made at least two weeks in advance) are due the day of your return from an excused absence. If you are in school but excused from this class, you must turn in long range assignments between classes or at the beginning of lunch time in order to avoid late penalties.

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Examining the Why Behind Your Late or Missed Work Policies

Posted May 8, 2019

By Christine Harrington

We all include policies on our syllabi, often simply copying and pasting them from one version to another. But, how often do we revisit the why behind our policies? What do your policies communicate? How do your policies help and hinder student achievement of course learning goals? Are there any unintended consequences of these policies? These are important questions to consider as our policies can impact student motivation and success (Hutcheon, 2017). Let’s use the example of one such policy—late or missed work—to illustrate the importance of regularly reflecting on and revising class policy.

The why behind late and missed work policies

The primary reason behind late and missed work policies is pretty obvious. Most of us would agree that completing tasks on time is an important life skill. For example, employers expect their employees to meet deadlines on projects and be on time to important meetings. By imposing deadlines and policies related to these deadlines, we can help students increase personal responsibility by developing effective time management skills.

Another reason behind these policies relates to our own—rather than our students’-- time management. As faculty members, we are incredibly busy, juggling teaching, research, mentoring and committee work. When we set deadlines for assignments, we often do so in an effort to manage our own packed schedules. It can very time-consuming for us to accept late work at all different times of the semester or create alternative exams or assignments. 

What do our policies communicate?

Late and missed work policies typically communicate to students the importance of completing tasks on time. It is therefore important to include these policies on our syllabi (Doolittle and Suidzinski, 2010). However, the nature of these policies and the way in which we write these policies can be very important (Harrington & Thomas, 2018).

Some instructors emphasize the importance of these policies by using capital letters, bolded and larger font, and exclamation marks. These strategies will likely draw student attention to these policies, but there may be potential negative consequences as well. Students may perceive you to be yelling at them (Agger & Shelton, 2017). This approach may communicate to students that you do not believe they know how to responsibly behave. It may convey the idea that you expect them to behave irresponsibly and submit assignments late. This may negatively impact our relationships with students right at the start of the semester and may also decrease student motivation.

Strict late work policies can also send the message to students that the assignments in this course should be their priority. Although we do want students to place a high priority on school, it is important for us to recognize that this course is probably just one of many courses and that our students likely have many other competing responsibilities such as family and work. I’m sure we can all imagine a situation such as the loss of a loved one or a serious illness where we would agree that the course assignment would not be a priority in a student’s life. Strict, rigid policies do not acknowledge these situations.

What are your goals for the course and how do your policies help and hinder student achievement of these goals?

We all have identified learning outcomes for our courses. These learning outcomes are typically focused on students learning content and skills related to our discipline. In most situations, we have not identified specific outcomes related to timeliness even though we recognize the importance of students meeting deadlines. Let’s consider how strict no-late work policies or policies with significant penalties for lateness impact learning. If a student misses an assignment and is not given an opportunity to make-up the assignment, they have then missed out on a learning opportunity.

Policies that allow students to submit work late but with a penalty sound on the surface to be supportive of students, but in some cases, the penalties are so harsh that the reality is that it may not be worth the student’s effort to complete the task late. For example, some instructors have a half credit late policy. What would motivate a student to complete an assignment when the highest possible grade is an F? Late work policies that drop a letter grade for every day the assignment is late does not help a student who is in the hospital for a week or is spending several days with family after a loss of a loved one. Assuming this assignment was directly linked to our course learning outcomes, then this student may not be able to successfully achieve these learning outcomes for the course. 

Are there any unintended consequences of our policies?

Students can become very discouraged by a zero grade. In some cases, the student may decide to withdraw from the course, especially if they do not see a path toward successfully completing the course. Depending on how much the assignment or exam counts toward the final grade, it may be impossible to recover and pass the course. In this scenario, the student may have learned an important lesson about the importance of being on time, but the primary learning goals of the course were not achieved. Since our primary goal is for students to learn the course content and related skills, this type of policy may not be aligned with our goals.

Late and missed work policies can also impact students from different cultures in different ways. Let’s look at an example. For example, perhaps one of our students had a death in family or was very ill. If approached by a student in this situation, many of us would likely make an exception to the no make-up or late work policy. On the surface, this seems like a fair approach. However, not all students will approach us if we have already communicated a strict no-make up exam policy. If a student comes from a culture where it is not acceptable to challenge a policy and ask for an exception, they would probably not approach us. As a result, we would not be able to make an exception. I think we would all agree that we created policies to be fair not unfair and yet a policy such as this one does certainly seem like it gives an unfair advantage to some students.

I think we would all agree that the final grade should accurately capture whether or not a student was able to successfully achieve the course learning outcomes. Sometimes strict or harsh policies that result in zero grades impact the final grade so that the final grade does not accurately tell the story about whether a student has successfully accomplished the learning goals of the course. It’s important that our policies align to our course goals.

Suggestions for developing and communicating policies

1. Consider accepting late work. Begin by communicating the importance of completing work on time and how doing so will help them learn and succeed in the class, but then also acknowledge that situations may occur that prohibit them from doing so. I have generally found that most students really appreciate this type of policy and do not take advantage of it. If you are worried about this may negatively impact your schedule, you could establish parameters for this policy. For example, you could:

• Accept late work only during the final weeks of the semester
• Allow each student to submit a specified number of assignments late.
• Tell students that very low stakes assignments such as online quizzes can not be made up but that moderate and high stakes assignments can be made up if there is an extenuating circumstance. The rationale for different rules for different types of assignments is that very low stakes assignments won’t negatively impact the final grade as much as moderate or high stakes assignments.

2. Accurately communicate your policy. If your practice is to make exceptions when warranted, then it makes more sense to communicate this in your policy. Instead of saying “no late work will be accepted,” you could instead recognize that situations may arise that prohibit a student from submitting work on time and if this happens, they should come and talk with you. This type of policy not only more accurately reflects the practice, it also communicates to students that you care about their success and recognize that they may encounter stressors in their life.

3. Use positive language. Phrasing policies in a positive way can motivate students (Wasley, 2008). For example, instead of a policy that says no-late work will be accepted, what about having a policy that says all students are expected to complete work on time and to talk with you if life circumstances make this difficult or impossible.

4. Provide a rationale for policies. Students really appreciate it when you share the why behind your policy (Harrington & Thomas, 2018). For example, you could begin by explaining that being able to meet deadlines is an important skill. You could also emphasize how each assignment builds on the previous one and how their classmates will often be counting on them to be prepared for group activities.

5. Consider using 50 as the lowest grade. Zero grades can have a significant negative impact on student motivation and achievement. Grading systems are failure heavy- with failure being represented by approximately 65% of the grading scale. Guskey (2004) advocates for grading scales from 50-100 rather than 0-100. With 50 as the lowest grade, students are more able to recover from a mistake or missed opportunity. In many cases, students can’t mathematically earn a passing grade if they received a zero on a major assignment.

6. Use a series of formative assessments throughout the semester. Having numerous opportunities for students to demonstrate what they are learning is advantageous for many reasons. One reason is that no one grade on an assignment will determine the final grade or outcome for the course. Another reason is that students will have the opportunity to learn from feedback they have received throughout the semester.

7. Structure grading policies to account for possible missed work. Another approach is to build in a “drop the lowest grade” or “only count the highest three grades” approach for different assignment categories. This is quite easy to do in most course learning management systems. The benefits of this approach are that you don’t need to worry about accepting late work and a student’s final grade won’t be negatively impacted by missing an assignment. You will also probably find that the student’s final grade is more likely to accurately capture whether a student successfully achieve the course learning outcomes because outlier grades were removed from the calculation. 

Establishing policies that align to your course learning outcomes can play a critical role in student success. Students will undoubtedly appreciate your flexible policies and be more motivated to learn. For additional ideas about policies, read Designing a motivational syllabus: Creating a learning path for student engagement (Harrington & Thomas, 2018) published by Stylus.

Feel free to visit my website www.scholarlyteaching.org for more teaching and learning resources. You can also email me at [email protected] .

Dr. Christine Harrington is a national expert in student success and teaching and learning. She has worked in higher education for almost 20 years. She is currently an associate professor and co-coordinator of the Ed.D. in Community College Leadership program at New Jersey City University. Previously, Dr. Harrington worked as a professor of psychology and student success at Middlesex County College. She also served as the First-Year Seminar course coordinator and the Director for the Center for the Enrichment of Learning and Teaching. Christine also teaches part-time in the Learning and Teaching Department within the Graduate School of Education at Rutgers University. Recently, Christine served a 2-year appointment as the Executive Director for the Center for Student Success at the New Jersey Council of County Colleges. In this role, she assisted all 19 New Jersey community colleges with implementing Guided Pathways to improve student success outcomes.

Christine is the author of a research-based first-year seminar textbook Student Success in College: Doing What Works! 3rd edition , published by Cengage. She co-authored Dynamic Lecturing: Research-Based Strategies to Enhance Lecture Effectiveness with Todd Zakrajsek and Designing a Motivational Syllabus: Creating a Learning Path for Student Engagement with Melissa Thomas, both published by Stylus. She also co-authored Why the First-Year Seminar Matters: Helping Students Choose and Stay on a Career Path with Theresa Orosz, published by Rowman and Littlefield. She was the 2016 recipient of the Excellence in Teaching First-Year Experience award which was presented at the Annual Conference on the First-Year Experience, and the recipient of the 2016 Middlesex County College Faculty Excellence in Teaching Award. She is frequently invited to give plenary presentations at national and local conferences as well as at colleges and universities across the nation.

Agger, B., & Shelton, B. A. (2017). Time, motion, discipline: The authoritarian syllabus on American college campuses. Critical Sociology, 43 (3), 355-369.

Doolittle, P. E., & Siudzinski, R. A. (2010). Recommended syllabus components: What do higher education faculty include in their syllabus? Journal on Excellence in College Teaching, 20( 3), 29-61.

Guskey, T. R. (2004). Are zeros your ultimate weapon? Principal Leadership, 5 , 32-35.

Harrington, C., & Thomas, M. (2018). Designing a motivational syllabus: Creating a learning path for student engagement. Sterling, VA: Stylus.

Hutcheon, T. (2017). Excellence in teaching essay: Technology bans and student experience in the college classroom. Society for the Teaching of Psychology. Retrieved from http://www.teachpscyh.org/Excellence-in-Teaching-B...

Wasley, P. (2008). The syllabus becomes a repository of legalese. The Chronicle of Higher Education: The Faculty. Retrieved from http://www.chronicle.com/article/The-Syllabus-Beco...

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Teaching excellence & educational innovation, late/make-up work policy.

In writing your own late/make-up work policies, consider the following questions:

• Will you allow students to submit late work? If so, up until what point (e.g., 24 hours after the assignment is due? 1 week after the assignment is due?)? Will students lose credit for submitting work late, and if so how much?
• Will you allow students to make-up in-class exams or work? If so, do students need to request a make-up before the exams/assignment occurs? Is there a deadline after which the exam/assignment cannot be made up (e.g., after you’ve returned the exam/assignment) to other students?
• For late work or make-up work, do students need to produce documentation of their excuse (e.g., doctor’s note)? Must they submit this prior to missing the assignment or can they submit it afterwards?
• Are there some assignments that can be submitted late (e.g., homeworks) and other that cannot (e.g., exams)?

  go to checklist

Sample: Late/Make-up work policy

“Due dates for every assignment are provided on the course syllabus and course schedule (and posted in Canvas). Unless otherwise stated, assignments are due on those days. However, I recognize that sometimes “life happens.” In these instances, you may use your allotted two flex days. These days allow you to submit an assignment up to two days late without penalty. You can use these days for any assignment and for any reason. You do not need to provide me with the reason: simply email me and tell me how many of your flex days you would like to use.

Once you’ve exhausted your flex days, then point deductions will occur for any assignment submitted after the deadline. An assignment submitted 24 hours of the due date will only be eligible for 80% of the maximum number of point allotted. Assignments submitted more than 24 hours after the due date will not be accepted. If you experience extenuating circumstances (e.g., you are hospitalized) that prohibit you from submitting your assignments on time, please let me know. I will evaluate these instances on a case-by-case basis.”

Forward to Different – Late Work Policies

This raised all sorts of questions in our minds as parents and the practicality of using an academic measure (like grades) to penalize a behavioral issue (turning work in late). Before we go any further, I want to say that my daughter’s teacher is extremely supportive of the students in her class and will give them many reminders to turn in late work. This policy is a DISTRICT policy, not her belief.

I decided to post this question on Twitter to see what the teaching universe would have to say and well…it kicked up quite the hornet’s nest. As of this post, it has 185 comments and counting. (check out the full thread here , but be warned…)

As the comments and suggestions grew in the thread, battle lines were being drawn. It became clear to me that this is another institutional norm in education that we might want to re-consider when going “Forward to Different“, thus this post. What follows are summaries of the main arguments both FOR and AGAINST doing this followed by some options for helping students with their executive functioning/time management skills without punishing their grades.

The arguments FOR deducting a grade for late work

It teaches them responsibility and self-discipline. At some points the students need to learn the consequences of their actions and what better way to do this than hitting them where it hurts the most; their grade. Are their other ways we can “grade” behavior, sure, but those don’t affect the kid as much as seeing their “A” go to a “B” because they were a day late on the assignment.

There are deadlines and consequences in the real world. When you are late turning in work, your boss gets mad and sends you an angry email. Do it enough times, and you could get demoted or even fired. If you don’t turn in your taxes on time, you pay a penalty. If you don’t pay your bills on time, you could be without electricity. The real world has deadlines with often harsh penalties. Using grades teaches this to kids while their frontal lobes are developing.

If they turn it in late, they could be copying the answers from someone else. The longer it takes for them to turn something in, the more likely they could ask a friend for the answers to the work. Then we aren’t grading them on their true knowledge as they just borrowed it from someone else. Thus the penalty for tardiness of turning it in.

Not doing this teaches kids it’s ok to be a slacker. If you don’t have any penalties or consequences for late work, students can turn stuff in all the way through graduation (and even after). All this teaches them is they can blow past deadlines with no repercussions, which isn’t true in life. It encourages procrastination in students.

It makes the work more important. Without penalties for missed deadlines, it means the work isn’t that important. Not having these deductions lessens the importance of the work itself. If the student never turns in the work, then how can teachers access them on the skill? Students with great study habits can become lazy when they realize doing the work on time isn’t really that important.

Teachers have a lot of work to grade and need a deadline. This mostly applies to secondary teachers who can often have up to 180 students a day pass through their classroom door. Having hard and fast deadlines makes grading all those papers much more manageable. Allowing kids to turn in work whenever they please makes the process much more cumbersome and hard to manage on the teacher-grading side of things.

The arguments AGAINST deducting grades for late work

Grades should be used to show mastery of learning. This was by far the most mentioned response to my tweet. In a “perfect world”, we are using grades to measure the growth and mastery of student learning. Adding in “timeliness” to the equation skews that measure.

As a parent, if I see my daughter is getting a failing grade in math, I might hire a math tutor to help her. However, what if she is actually fine with math but can’t turn anything in on time. I got the tutor for the grade but in actually I should get her a tutor to teach her time management skills.

Responsibility and executive functioning should be graded separately than academic growth. Utilize a separate “graded” section that covers soft skills so we can also measure growth on that front. Having two separate “measured” sections of the report card give much more information to the student and parent in terms of what areas need improvement. Maybe you are doing high quality work in Language Arts and deserve the “A” but you turn in every paper late (which authors do all the time – btw) which results in you getting a “C” in time management. That is more effective than blending the two together.

This doesn’t address the behavior. In fact, in some instances, it might increase it and negatively affect their self-esteem. Students that habitually turn in late work may give up because their grades are tanking. Address the behavior and come up with strategies to help fix it rather than just docking their grade across the board.

Schools should exist for learning, NOT just for preparing kids for employment or higher ed. In theory, schools shouldn’t exist just so we can make sure kids get good grades in college or that they turn in their work to their bosses on time. Using lack of time management to punish grades shifts the focus from academic growth to “playing the game of school.” This opens up a whole other discussion about grading, but I’ll save that for a future post.

The system rewards organization over knowledge and understanding. This creates a mis-interpretation of mastery. It rewards students who finish their home work on time, which assumes that they must have a better understanding of the academic concept. However, if you are disorganized, yet understand the concept well, it doesn’t matter in the grade book.

Punishing kids for late work via grades can cause lasting damage/anxiety to a student. In the thread, several adults shared stories about the anxiety this caused them during school and later in life. While some say “kids just need to suck it up and get the work done on time” that’s really a one-size-fits-all approach that doesn’t differentiate for students. Damaging self-esteem and raising unnecessary anxiety shouldn’t be the goal or outcome when it comes to learning (or late work).

This policy isn’t equitable or inclusive. It fails to take into account students’ home life, their own learning preferences, commute time, access to technology and parental support. Perhaps a student has to work extra hours at home to make ends meet or there is not where they can go to sit and focus. This assumes that all students have a great, supportive home life, when in reality, many of our underserved communities do not.

Possible alternatives to point deductions for late work

Instead of punishing for late work, give bonus points for turning work in early or on time. If it’s a big project and you get it done early, perhaps a little point bump is in order. This is a fine line as you don’t want students rushing through their work, but it shifts the focus from a negative (punishment) to a positive (reward). One issue with this option is it still means the grade doesn’t accurately reflect their learning.

Use this as an opportunity to teach them how to dialogue and communicate. When you are late with a bill or rent, do you just not pay it? No, you reach out to the company to ask for an extension or explain your situation. Life happens and it’s happening to these kids at home as well. Encourage them to have open communication when it appears they are going to miss their deadline. Many teachers on the thread mentioned they would often forgive some late work if the student talked to them about it first.

Teach the students to reflect on their own time management. When a student does turn in an assignment late, this is an opportunity to talk with them about time management. Have them reflect (written, video, audio recording) about why they turned the work in late and what they could do better next time. Sometimes, it might be extenuating circumstances, but usually it was just them getting distracting with something else that commanded their attention. Reflecting on the issue helps them notice their own behavior more so than just docking points off a grade.

Allot time during the week for students to finish up late work. In elementary school there is often a “Fun Friday” where students have time to work on passion projects or play games that teach intrapersonal skills. Taking this concrete experience away from a student in elementary can have more of an impact than a grade which is more abstract. One commenter mentioned her 3rd grade son missed his Fun Friday once and never turned in a late assignment again. However, now that he’s in 8th grade, which has a points penalty policy, he just gives up and doesn’t care about getting his work done.

In secondary schools, many students have a “home room” or “advisory” period to complete missing work and ask for support. Providing this additional time might be the thing a struggling student needs to focus on mastery of the skill rather than just rushing to turn something in on time.

Have a “late slip” for work not turned in on time. When a student misses a deadline, give them a late slip. The late slip has to be taken home and signed/acknowledged to encourage discussion around why the work was late. At that point, work must be turned in with the signed late slip, but no points are removed for academic mastery.

It’s clear to me that this is a hot-button issue in education with no “perfect solution.” I truly understand both sides of the argument here. After reading the (now) 228 responses on this thread I can tell people have severe emotional attachment to penalizing or not penalizing students for late work. To me, it really comes down to this question: What is best for kids and how can we teach them to be their best selves as adults?

Can we teach them time management and executive functioning skills without penalizing grades? YES.

Will it take more work, time and energy by the teacher and parent? YES. At least at the beginning as we front-load students with the skills to manage their time best.

We have to remember that sometimes, what is right isn’t always what is easiest. I think that’s the case here. I appreciate all that contributed to this important dialogue and hope that if nothing else, this sparks a conversation on your campus or district about late work policies. We can’t get better if we aren’t open to the idea of change.

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Carl- This is a great post, and I appreciate your outline of both sides of the issue. “Accountability” is a far more complex concept than many realize. Particularly, assuming that punishment is a motivator for better behavior really doesn’t address the root cause of procrastination, which is fear. I like the idea of the “late slip,” but would also consider some option for kids to announce ahead of time that an assignment will be late. That reinforces good planning habits, and respects the fact that kids are not entirely in control of their schedules.

Carl, I love the summary you provided- – it really captures the many nuances of this topic. I can understand why this is an issue that resulted in passionate responses from two camps on social media. Many districts have homework policies in place because teachers’ and parents’ have strong, often polarized, feelings about it. But, like most things in education, there needs to be a healthy shift in perspective about the role of homework. We love to tell kids that they should be well-rounded, involved in co-curriculars, volunteer in their community, mindful of their mental health, etc, yet some schools plow them with homework without really discussing why and this is a conflicting message.

I, Mrs. Hodgson, circa 2002, would have gleefully marked “-11” in red ink on the late assignments while Mrs. Hodgson, circa 2019 (on the off-chance that I did actually assign homework), would have accepted the late work without issuing the demerits, regardless of district policy (Mrs. Hodgson became a bit of a rebel in her last years of teaching).

The shift in my mindset came with the realization that kids are people who sometimes can’t get their work done on time, and the reasons for not doing their homework spans from apathy to confusion to crisis. I stopped assigning homework as part of my daily routine and started rearranging class time to make it more effective. The response from students when I told them on the first day of class that they will rarely have homework was relief- – and the relief was shared by me as well.

Thanks again for your summary and post because it prompts educators to ask “Why are we assigning homework in the first place?”

My #1 argument against deducting for late work has been that it grades executive functioning and compliance over content knowledge. I also think that as teachers we need to recognize that as we ask for woek/life balance, we need to support that for our students, too.

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• Create Compose Connect / Late Work

Homework, Grading, Late Work, Oh My…

by Jeremy Hyler · Published 01/01/2019 · Updated 11/24/2019

Homework, in particular, has always been a hot button topic in education. After decades of debate, you can still go on Twitter today and be part of chats around homework policy or engage in conversation with others about whether homework really makes much difference in learning.

These last few years, the teachers in our district adopted a set of policies for grades 5-8 that put us all on the same page. Our goal was to help students with their transition to middle school and “self management” – and to put an emphasis on the importance of studying for tests.

In addition, we hoped that students would also see that completing classwork and homework had importance too. Below is the late work policy that has been in place for the last two years, plus the grading categories we use.

In particular, I’ve begun to wonder whether our late work policy makes sense for young middle school writers. If an adolescent student works for two weeks on an informational essay and doesn’t turn it in on the day it is due, is it fair for that student to lose 50% of an assignment that may be worth 35-40 points? Also, if a student is two days late, is it fair for them to lose all the credit for that assignment?

In my opinion, no student should lose points for being a few days late on a major assignment. If that assignment is worth fifty percent of their grade for the marking period, that makes it nearly impossible for them to recover from a failing grade.

I think something needs to change for the students in my 8th grade classes and for the students transitioning into the new middle school structure. I don’t see this as a step away from “rigor” but a step toward fairness.

Policies Galore

After a few discussions at staff meetings this fall, it was evident that we needed to make a change of some kind. It was at this point that I looked toward my online PLN. After consulting with several other educators on Twitter, I came to one conclusion – there isn’t a magic solution out there for homework and late work policies. The variety is amazing – policies where students can turn in assignments whenever, all the way to the other extreme where one day late means a big fat zero.

While consulting with these other educators, I took notes and went back to my staff and shared what I found. Prior to leaving for Winter Break, we decided that at the conclusion of our semester we would need a new approach. Furthermore, each teacher would have to come up with their own policy because there were just too many differences among us to devise an umbrella policy for the whole school. Those differences included grades being taught, subjects being taught, and individual teaching philosophies.

Organizing Language Arts

Now comes the heart of what I am trying to get to in this post. What should a Language Arts homework/grading policy look like for a middle school classroom?

• Create their different classes
• Track their assignments with color coding and set reminders for due dates
• Use a calendar that can show due dates daily, weekly, and monthly
• Use it on their phone and on a computer.

The greatest thing about this application is that it is free for students to use (or ad-free for $5 a year). It can help students get and stay organized as long as they use it. I also offer paper planners and folders to help students if they prefer having something physical in their hands. Other available applications include My Study Life (with some “Brit speak”) or Pocket Schedule Planner .

What About a Policy?

These organization and scheduling tools are one way I get my students thinking about deadlines and time management. But I’m still left with the question of how to set up a homework policy specific to my Language Arts classroom. Do I accept late work for full credit? How do I weigh my tests, quizzes, and homework?

There is this struggle within me. I want to be a teacher who teaches my students responsibility, but then there’s this other side of me that wants to help students see the intrinsic value of education and to be lenient enough to keep the focus on learning and not just grades.

Education consultant Anthony Muhammad asked two very important questions when I saw him speak a few years ago. I leave you with his thoughts, and I am open to any suggestions and thoughts you might have, including any reading or viewing that might be helpful.

“What are we doing for our students instead of to our students?”

“Are we grading the students’ knowledge of the content or their behavior?”

Happy New Year, everyone!

___________________

PS: I’m already following up on one suggestion from my MiddleWeb editor – ordering Rick Wormeli’s Fair Isn’t Always Equal (2nd Edition) .

Share this:

Tags: Create Compose Connect grading homework Jeremy Hyler late work responsibility student time management

Jeremy Hyler

Jeremy Hyler left his position as an English and Science teacher at Fulton Middle School in Middleton, Michigan in the fall of 2021. He is now a Manager of Educational Partnerships at the Center for the Collaborative Classroom. Hyler has co-authored three professional books with Dr. Troy Hicks – Create, Compose, Connect! Reading, Writing, and Learning with Digital Tools (Routledge, 2014); From Texting to Teaching: Grammar Instruction in a Digital Age (Routledge, 2017) and, most recently, Ask, Explore, Write!: An Inquiry-Driven Approach to Science and Literacy Learning (Routledge, 2020). Follow him @Jeremybballer and check out his podcast Middle School Hallways on your favorite podcast platform.

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Excellent points and pointers here. There is a marked lack of teaching organizational skills and habits. Kids are given planners but not taught how to use them. Thank you for this article!

Thanks for leaving a comment Lauren. The most frustrating part to me with what you said is that there are then complaints about how students aren’t using them. We have to be diligent about showing them what that looks like and that includes parents too. It is a life skill after all. Again, thank you for your feedback.

Agreed, Lauren! I am going to propose a study skills course for next school year. Students (and adults) think they can remember to do all the things in their daily lives, but they don’t/can’t.

What strategies we use to build student confidence and success in the short term need to be progressively modified as students progress through the grades so we don’t create a crisis later.

Thanks for leaving a comment Lane. Yes, we are trying to prepare them for future grades and for life in general. Again, thank you for taking the time to leave a comment.

Your 2 quotes closing the article are spot on! I have developed my homework strategy as follows: Late homework is accepted for the entire grading period, with a 1-grade deduction for ANY late work. This seems fair to those who finish on time, as well as not crushing the grades of those who truly care.

Thank you Ray for your response. I will definitely take your feedback back to my colleagues for further discussion. I appreciate you reading my writing.

What if the majority of your students turn in their late assignments the day before grades are due? Is that fair to you? Recently I had a conversation with a 28 year old male who was trying very hard to convince me that it should be ok if people were late to work….10 to 15 minutes late. When I ask him why he thought this behavior was acceptable, he referred to not be held accountable arriving to class on time and the opportunity to turn in assignments late with no major consequences.

That is where I have internal battles. It amazes that there are people in our society that think it is okay to be late or not show up for work. That is why I still want to teach those life skills to my students such as responsibility.

A pebble in every teacher’s shoe for sure. Let me ask a simple question, what should grades measure?

If you say achievement, then you’re not measuring it by grading homework, you’re measuring compliance, and arguably effort.

If you say effort, student skills and achievement, how do you measure effort? What about the kid that has a 97 test average, and doesn’t do homework? Is he/she not doing what they need to, to learn?

What about the kids who copy their homework, or plagiarize, and earn the same grades as the kids who witness their dishonesty? How does that make them feel? What are your grades measuring now?

Should students see homework as an opportunity to learn more and deepen their understanding and recall? If so, the test scores are their homework grade, aren’t they? If not, don’t student then view homework as a meaningless endeavor and just more tedium?

I’ll bet that after the dust settles from these discussions, teachers will realize that grades should be based solely on valid and meaningful assessments. Homework, class work and study skills should be measured, monitored and coached, and reported to parents, but not a part of the grade. How else will we measure what our students know and teach them that the work they do before he assessments is all about the learning?

Thank you Frank for your thoughts here. At times, I too struggle with assigning letter grades. I often wonder what do they really mean?

I have had those students in the past who would get nothing but high marks on tests and quizzes, but never turned in one shred of homework. That student saw no value in it and they were a very smart individual. They have since gone on to be a successful individual in life.

Ultimately it is about finding a balance that can work for our students and for us as educators.

Thanks again for your thoughts here.

I wonder if the issue is that homework counts too much. I usually roll a few assignments into each “one” in the grade book program, so that missing or late on one isn’t a killer by itself. I am pushing more quizzes out that measure if they understand, whether by doing the homework or not…this seems better for assessing if they have learned what I am looking for them to have learned. I teach HS science just to clarify (this had also been part of my answer while trying to push a more flipped arrangement, as it reinforces the need to actually do the reading/activities prior to the next class).

Part of the issue is teaching the concept of time management and the sense of urgency to complete tasks…fought this battle for years in industry, too!

Hi George! Thanks for your response. I like your approach with homework. This is definitely something that I will bring up when we discuss homework policy again at our staff meetings.

I agree that time management and the sense of urgency is importance. I think we need to teach these things first before we expect students to be more diligent about getting work turned in.

Thanks again!

I should also mention that most homework is a continuation of work started in class…so that the “how” should be clear, now it is practice and reinforcement.

I have eliminated meaningless homework and only assign homework if the student could not complete the assignment in class. My penalty policy is -10% for each day it’s late, up to 4 days (40%) then it’s a zero. Less punitive and still teaching responsibility. It has worked so far and I’m reaching 23 years. Thanks for raising the issue.

Thank you Celestina for sharing your policy. This is an idea to definitely consider. Again, I appreciate your response to my post and reading my column.

Our school is K-8 and has struggled with this also. We went to standards based grading for the whole school a few years back for about three years, using a “behavior” grade for things like late work, being ready for class, managing time and materials. The high schools that our students move onto (mostly private) struggled with how to rank our students against traditionally graded students so last year, we returned to traditional grades along with standards for 7/8. In particular, we kept the idea of behavior grades for late work while not impacting the grade for the work produced. Students must also attend a mandatory study hall until the late work is completed (which may not work at every school model -our 7/8 still have a noon recess which is when this study hall takes place). We have found that the students still focus on the learning, and we can report that they are still working on the behavior skill without damaging the impact to the work they’ve put in. I’ve been teaching for 23 years and this is the best cross over I’ve been a part of for this struggle.

Thank you for your feedback. I like the idea of standards-based grading. We have actually had short conversations about it before in our meetings. I love the idea of a study hall. Thanks again for your timely input.

Homework policy is a big concern/issue for me as a (first year) math teacher! The middle school team established a homework policy this year, but I had to modify mine because of the “repeat offenders” and my sanity. So now, I give 0% if an assignment is late. I also started giving out 2 homework passes per quarter because things happen and sometimes students just need a break.

Honestly though, I don’t care if students complete homework, but if they don’t do the homework, their exam and quiz grades are going to be really bad (for the most part). Requiring homework is simply forcing them to practice skills so that they retain the information and are successful on the assessments. The great majority of my students do much better on assessments if they regularly complete homework.

Interesting article. I like the homework policy. However, it seems that in courses such English and History, which have long-term projects/writing assignments, that they would deserve their own category on the rubric, and their own policy. I completely agree that if it is a quarter-long project, it is ridiculous to give a 0% for being a day or two late. However, if the students are given class time to work on the project, and little deadlines throughout to keep students on track, then that work would be counted toward homework/classwork grade. BTW I separate classwork from homework grade.

If a course has long-term projects, a more appropriate syllabus might read:

Exams 50% Quizzes 15% Daily Homework 15% Classwork/Participation 10% Quarter Project 10%

I appreciate your input Heather. I really like your breakdown of the scale you had at the end of your response. I too think that giving students a “0” is not the greateast idea after a day or two. Thanks for responding!

First of all, planners are not effective unless there is a consistent policy across the grade level. In elementary teachers used to have the planners on the side of each desk and checked routinely by the teacher. There is another time grabber! I like the flexibility of the app, paper or notebook. Most projects have a rubric which can include checkpoints for progress with dates due incorporated. I would assign a final grade based on the amount completed on the due date. With all the technology available, parents should know to monitor progress. However, ultimately it is the student who is responsible. Some schools (especially middle and high) have “advisory” periods and this is one of the opportunities for students to put forth extra effort to complete work. Again with tech available the classroom teacher should inform the advisory teacher of the students in their advisory who have deadlines coming up, passed due etc. The biggest problem with advisories has been more of a lack of follow through on the part of the teachers. Use the time for what it is intended by offering period coaching tips on writing or test taking; meeting in small groups with students who have the same courses and asking for their updates or what they feel they need help with; coaching a student who seems to have been struggling socially. Far too often if the students appear to be working, quietly talking, maybe a few napping, teachers see this as time for them to catch up on emails, grading. If that is within school policy, then fine but it is not in the spirit of the advisory period. Even playing a game to give the students some free time but structured can be a good way to interact and help students open up to each other. The biggest complaint from employers is “workers who are habitually late, don’t show up at all, and expect a pass.” Not requiring punctual attendance and work is doing our students a disfavor in life.

Thank you for your thoughts. We do have a homebase/advisory class. Part of that class is students getting some homework time. We are also incorporating more time into their exploratory classes as well next semester.

Yes, I agree we do need to have students be on time to class and have students be responsible for their work, but at the middle school level the penalty should be less severe than a “0” the first day they are late. Again, thank-you for your thoughts.

I teach 6th grade math. I do not have any major projects, mostly homework, quizzes & tests. For late homework, I take off 10% per day for every day that the assignment is late. All assignments for that chapter must be turned in by the day of the test or the grade is a zero.

Thanks Chris for the response. I do like this approach. We are considering doing something similar to this next semester. Thanks again for your insight.

Here’s the thing you need to repeat as your mantra: *the point of grades is to communicate to parents, students, and other involved parties*

I suppose this is my question for you, based on that: Why can’t you break down grades *for parents*? Why can’t you have a report card that says, for each subject:

Tests/Quizzes: A/B/C/D (or N/A should be an option) Papers/Projects/Presentations: A/B/C/D or N/A Homework: A/B/C/D or N/A Organization: A/B/C/D ***THIS IS WHERE HOMEWORK TIMELINESS GOES! Behavior/Conduct: A/B/C/D

Then you wouldn’t have to have endless debates about how much each measure should weigh, and you’d be communicating MUCH more clearly with parents; they’d have a much better idea of where things are going right/wrong fro their kid, and would result in way fewer “where did this grade come from” emails.

It sounds like this is a problem for the whole school, and you need a solution that will (a) communicate better, (b) resolve debates, and (c) not create extra work for teachers. This would be *really* easy for teachers/computer programs to set up.

Thank you for your thoughts on the post. I really appreciate your forward thinking here. We are definitely looking to make a change as a whole middle school. Again, thank you for responding.

Just a note on how I did things:

I taught high school, earth science and biology, for years — just retired. Our school wide policy for science quarter grades (other depts. had similar policy) was: Tests 25%, Labs & Projects 25%, Quizzes 25%. Classwork 15%, Homework 10% (of total grade). Each teacher set his/ her own way of handling homework. For me, it was a reinforcement/ practice/ learning experience and students who actively participated always did better on tests/ quizzes/ labs/ projects (except perhaps those at the very top and very bottom). I walked around the room each day while students did a warm-up and put the daily stamp (I had many themed stamps and colors of ink) on any homework paper laid out for inspection and next to the stamp wrote the approximate amount completed (all, 3/4,1/2,1/3,1/4,few, none) after a quick glance. After discussing the warm-up, we’d discuss the homework and students would self-correct any mistakes (to me this was an important step) — anyone who hadn’t done the assignment was welcome to hastily do it then for 50% (at least they’d pay attention as we discussed the answers and they’d have the paper to use for study purposes). To get 100% on that day’s homework a student had to have an “all” by the stamp and all answers correct when it was passed in. Having a stamp with “all” but failing to make corrections earned a student whatever percent of the answers were corrected (anywhere from 99% to 0%). I used this scale for a student who’d made all corrections: a “3/4” stamp = 85%. “1/2” = 75%. “1/3” = 70%, “1/4” = 65%, “few” = 60%, “none”/ or papers that mysteriously turned up in the collection box without a stamp = 50%. I accepted late homework (and classwork) up until a few days before the end of the grading quarter for a maximum of 50% (one day late or 40 days late). Parents appreciated the fact that doing the work at any point still taught the lesson that it was important and gave a reward for the effort (even though I knew it was probably copied). Kids who’d hastily copied someone’s homework right before class realized that they had to pay attention to homework discussion and check & correct answers to get credit (the kids who readily let others copy their answers were usually the same ones with numerous guesses/ errors).

Thank you so much for your response. I am really interested in your scale and am seriously considering implementing some pieces of it. Your thoughts and insight have been very helpful and I appreciate your input on the topic.

Hi Sir Jeremy, Just want to share my strategies about Homework. I’m teaching Social Studies to grade 10 students. Homework is part of our Written Outputs which is 30%. We use point system. 10points for every complete assignment. As soon as we collected the homework, and checked it, 10points is automatically recorded. There’s no chance to submit late homework. Projects are included in Performance Task with 50% av. We use rubrics in giving points. Included in the rubrics is a deduction of 10points for late submission.

I apologize for my late response. Thank you for sharing your policy with me and the rest of the readers. Homework policy is an ongoing conversation every year. Good look on having a successful school year.

Great article, Mr. Hyler, so what are we doing? We expect they do both, turn in work, but doing on time! do your assignment, but don’t forget the deadline! I cannot imagine 6th graders who are just learning how to organize their ideas and work, now they need to learn how to manage their time. Thanks for the computer and phone applications. Very helpful article!

Thank you Mayra for your comment. I do expect them to do both, but can be flexible depending on the individual student. I am trying to mirror real life for them with deadlines. I appreciate your feedback and reading my article. Keep being a rock star!

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Rethink Your Late Work Policies

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Over the past few years, faculty have been working to be more flexible with students and to accommodate their needs as they balanced completing assignments with caregiving, work, and other responsibilities. One area that has come under focus is late policies. Late policies often cover how late students can turn something in, if they lose any points, and what the procedure is for asking for an extension.

Late penalties are often instituted for a few practical and philosophical reasons: sometimes, students need to complete work by a specific time to prepare for a lab section or to be ready to move into a new unit. Thus, late penalties are used to induce students to complete work in a timely way to ensure they are prepared for class. And sometimes, faculty need students to submit work in a timely manner to be able to manage their own grading loads, particularly if they are working with large-enrollment sections.

However, other reasons are more problematic. One is the idea that late penalties are fair to the students who turn in work on time and teach students responsibility. However, not all students work from the same conditions, so what is fair for one person may not be fair for others. This idea of fairness assumes students are starting from the same place, but we know that each student has varying levels of privilege, ability, and time: while one student may be able to focus full-time on schoolwork, another may be balancing work and caregiving alongside their academic load. In addition, “fairness” is a loaded term in that it assumes that giving flexibility to one student somehow penalizes or costs the other. The student who submits work on time still has an advantage over the one who needs flexibility because they can move on to the next task. Thus, instead of fairness, thinking about equity might be more beneficial in that providing flexibility is one way to lower barriers for student success. Students can benefit from flexibility in accepting late work and no penalties for late submissions, and it can add to the equitable classroom environment faculty seek to build.

The other argument is that late penalties teach responsibility, but that reasoning assumes that the classroom works like the workplace, instead of being a space where students can make mistakes and learn how to succeed—and, in any case, employees often have to renegotiate deadlines as problems emerge or unexpected events occur. Who among us hasn’t had to ask for an extension for a manuscript or change the deadline on a project?

While you may have good reasons for needing students to submit work on time, you might want to rethink penalizing students for submitting work late. Late work penalties may encourage some students to turn work in on time, but what is often overlooked is the ways late penalties might burden some students more than others. Neurodivergent students, for instance, might struggle to get work in on time and the late penalty may discourage them from submitting work altogether. Students who are struggling to master the content may be penalized more for needing more time with work, thus lowering their grade still more and creating more barriers to success.

Instead of late penalties, you might consider creating policies that encourage students to get work in time but make your reasoning clear and transparent and creating what Matthew Cheney calls a “cruelty-free syllabus.” For instance, some faculty think that they need to appear to be stricter in their policies but that they’ll be flexible if students ask. However, this creates a shadow policy where the students who are willing to ask for extensions get them and others do not because they don’t know to ask. Instead, faculty should outline a policy and explain the reasoning, such as explaining why work past a certain date cannot be accepted. For example, I tell students I can’t accept their last project of the semester past the deadline because I need time to evaluate them and submit final grades before the deadline imposed by the university. Other faculty might note that certain homework assignments are necessary for work that will be done in class and thus cannot be submitted late, such as the kind of work needed to be successful on a practical or a laboratory assignment.

If you typically allow extension requests, then clearly outline the process for doing so and communicate it in various places. In addition, you might also include a grace period for submitting work, such as a 24 or 48-hour “no questions asked” policy, where students can submit work in the grace period without letting you know why they need to do so—thus allowing them to make decisions and you to get fewer last-minute extension request emails! Again, the goal of these policies is to create some flexibility, let students understand your reasoning for accepting late work, and ensure that all students have access to flexibility and extensions as needed. Since I stopped penalizing late work, my own workload has not increased, but every semester, a few students and are able to come back from challenges they encountered to pass my courses, which means they encounter one fewer barrier to success.

References and additional resources

• Boucher, E. (2016, August 22). It’s time to ditch our deadlines. The Chronicle of Higher Education. https://www.chronicle.com/article/its-time-to-ditch-our-deadlines
• Cheney, M. (2019 February 16). Cruelty-free syllabi. Finite Eyes . Available https://finiteeyes.net/pedagogy/cruelty-free-syllabi/
• Cheney, M. (2020). (Against) the syllabus as instrument of abuse. Syllabus 9(1), 1-2. https://www.syllabusjournal.org/syllabus/article/view/301
• Ezarik, M. (2021 June 21). How COVID-19 damaged student success. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2021/06/21/what-worked-and-what-didn%E2%80%99t-college-students-learning-through-covid-19
• Kent State University Office of the Provost (2020). What it means to be reasonable, flexible, and equitable when students are required to quarantine or isolate due to the COVID-19 pandemic . https://www.kent.edu/provost/what-it-means-be-reasonable-flexible-and-equitable-when-students-are-required-quarantine-or
• McMurtrie, B. (2021 March 17). Good grades, stressed students. The Chronicle of Higher Education . https://www.chronicle.com/article/good-grades-stressed-students
• Santelli, B., Robertson, S.N., Larson, E.K., & Humphrey, S. (2020). Procrastination and delayed assignment submissions: Student and faculty perceptions of late point policy and grace within an online learning environment. Online Learning Journal 24(3), 35-49. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1271877.pdf
• Schacter, H.L., Brown, S.G., Daugherty, A.M., Brummelte, S. & Grekin, E. (2021 December 1). Creating a compassionate classroom. Inside Higher Ed , https://www.insidehighered.com/advice/2021/12/01/compassionate-teaching-yields-most-benefits-opinion

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What's a good policy for accepting late homework?

There are a lot of ways of handling late homework submissions, of which I've only tried a few. The general policy I've settled on is something like the following.

• Homework must be submitted at the beginning of class on the day it's due.
• Late homework is not accepted.

This is pretty harsh, I think. But with this policy in place, I make unofficial exceptions on a case-by-case basis (it's easier to start with an overly harsh policy and make exceptions in the students' favour than the other way around), for example, if a student happens to be late to class on a day that homework is due.

I want students to be motivated to hand in their work on time. Highly motivated. That's why I make the official policy so strict. But I feel bad about actually adhering to such draconian measures (they should get zero for missing the bus?), which is why I make exceptions. But overall, I'm dissatisfied with the ad hoc nature of this approach. How can I motivate students to submit homework by the deadline without being "overly harsh"?

• student-motivation

• 2 $\begingroup$ Are there aspects of the question particular to maths homework? $\endgroup$ –  Roland Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 14:28
• 7 $\begingroup$ @Roland There don't seem to be, but it's not clear that all questions are required to be math-specific. I certainly think this question is of interest to the community here. $\endgroup$ –  Jim Belk Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 14:49
• 3 $\begingroup$ @Roland the style of homework assignment in a math class is quite different from most humanities classes, and late policies might be correspondingly different. But I agree that this question might be equally applicable to, e.g., CS or physics homework policies. Nonetheless, this is an issue I face every time I teach a class with weekly or biweekly problem sets, and I think the math-ed communitiy will have a lot of specific insight to offer. $\endgroup$ –  Adam Bjorndahl Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 14:54
• $\begingroup$ @JimBelk: I'm not saying it's required, and I think that this question is fitting well as it is now. I wouldn't vote for closing it. I was just wondering if there are aspects which are specific to maths. $\endgroup$ –  Roland Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 15:16
• 1 $\begingroup$ I'm wary of "case by case exceptions", it is too easy to be unfair. Worse, this tends to favour the ones that are cutting corners and teaches them they can get away with it, not those who deserve help. $\endgroup$ –  vonbrand Commented Jan 27, 2016 at 10:58

8 Answers 8

My policy is that late work is not accepted, but I also give students multiple ways to turn in work, most of which revolve around electronic submissions.

The vast majority of work that I assign students is done electronically -- computer programs, Geogebra constructions, LaTeX-ed up proofs, etc. and so all they have to do is attach the file to an email and send it. Having electronic submissions cuts down on physical stuff happening, like missing the bus, that would prevent timely submission.

Last semester I experimented with having students use Dropbox folders to hold all their work and then sharing the folder with me. As they worked, they kept their works-in-progress in the Dropbox folder. Once they were done, they just added the word FINAL to the file name so I would know what to grade. This way they never "turned in" homework -- all the versions of the work were in the Dropbox folder at all times, and they didn't have to "remember" to turn something in. I've been doing the same thing with SageMath Cloud this semester with my discrete structures students.

If you use paper submissions, then tell students that if they are prevented from being physically present to submit their work on paper, they can (and should) scan it with their phones and send it to you. Not every student has a smart phone, but most do.

TL;DR -- "Late homework gets a 0" is a perfectly fine policy to have as long as you give students multiple avenues of submitting work.

• 2 $\begingroup$ I spent this morning working on code for automating submission of homework in SageMathCloud, making all the students' projects visible (as subfolders) of the instructor's project, and automating peer-grading so one can assign deeper problems. Course workflow will be the next big feature of SMC. Stay tuned. Also, of course SMC has snapshots every 2 minutes, so you can tell exactly when students did what. $\endgroup$ –  William Stein Commented Apr 21, 2014 at 18:15
• $\begingroup$ SageMath Cloud is amazing and getting...amazinger. $\endgroup$ –  Robert Talbert Commented Apr 23, 2014 at 0:11

My policy is that homework has to be turned in by the due time, for each day late 20 points (of 100) are discounted, after the third day no more submissions are allowed and the solution is posted.

As OP says, there is a bit of leeway for exceptional cases, i.e., if somebody was sick or otherwise unavailable they might be allowed to turn it in late with no penalty, or get a replacement homework.

In my experience, a (somewhat) harsh policy, with fixed dates for homework turn in and exams, dates that are only changed in case of extreme circumstances, is best, it isn't really hard and lightens work by not having it pile up at the end of the term.

The comments that follow pertain mainly to classes at or below the level of the beginning calculus sequence, elementary linear algebra, and a first course in differential equations.

To minimize the effect of situations where someone couldn't make it to class for some reason or had legitimate questions about one or more of the problems, over the years I gradually began to take up the homework in class when it was due, but still accept homework delivered to my mailbox or slid under my office door. I established a absolute due time , which typically was that it should be there before I get to my office and check mail the next morning. I warned them that I sometimes got to work very early (5:00 a.m. or earlier), and sometimes not until after 7:00 a.m., so to not take any chances, they should essentially regard the absolute deadline as the night before.

However, as much as possible (these being departmental or course supervisor constraints), I tried to avoid actually taking up and grading homework as much as possible. Instead, I found it much simpler to have frequent short (5 to 15 minutes) quizzes, averaging at least one quiz per week for the semester, and sometimes averaging nearly two quizzes, these averages being for classes that meet 2 or 3 times a week. Sometimes the quizzes were what others call "homework quizzes" (students get to use their homework on the quiz), but I would instead just make it an open notes quiz. I did this because I did not want to go around to every desk and police whether they were really using their homework (and not class notes), especially when a lot of students did their homework in the same spiral bound notebook they took class notes in. And yes, I realize that some students used photocopies of other students' notes and homework, but I didn't police that either. The only thing I did try to police in these situations was to make sure that they didn't pass notes to each other. You have to watch carefully for this, because once a note is passed and received, you have no way of telling (without careful scrutiny of all the papers on a student's desk) whether a certain student may have gotten worked quiz solutions from a nearby student.

• 1 $\begingroup$ After long consideration of (somewhat related) "cheating in homework" I came to the conclusion that I should be interested in what the know/can do , not in what they turn in . What you describe is perfectly in line with that. $\endgroup$ –  vonbrand Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 15:36
• $\begingroup$ I am very sympathetic to using quizzes to supplant homework assignments. Some of the same issues persist, however. How do you handle it when students miss a quiz? $\endgroup$ –  Adam Bjorndahl Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 16:48
• 1 $\begingroup$ Almost always I made each quiz $10$ points and at the end of the semester the total of their top $10$ quiz grades became an additional major test grade (almost always their best test grade). The number of quizzes they got to drop varied, depending on how many I gave (almost always at least $4$ or $5$ were dropped, so I also didn't worry much if sometimes a "quiz experiment" didn't work and grades on it were low), and the nice thing about this method is that you never have students groaning about having to take yet another quiz! $\endgroup$ –  Dave L Renfro Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 17:38
• 1 $\begingroup$ Speaking as the student... I had a calc prof who never collected homework, though he assigned a lot. It was a good idea to do it. He had office hours, which were always crowded, but I at least was motivated enough to go, and having other students there to chew on assignments over helped a lot. The quiz system @DaveLRenfro describes is also one I like because it helps me figure out if I missed the plot somewhere, and it cuts down the anxiety over exams, as well as telling me what I should study. But YMMV. $\endgroup$ –  Jesse Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 0:33
• $\begingroup$ @Jesse: Other reasons besides those you stated are that quizzes are easier to grade (the uniformity makes grading easier), tests are easier to write and type (several questions arise by simply copying and pasting quiz questions, making appropriate alterations), and tests are easier to tell students how to prepare for (30% to 60% of the test typically consists of things just like former quiz questions). Also, see these Math Forum posts of mine: 16 December 2009 and 2 March 2010 $\endgroup$ –  Dave L Renfro Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 14:25

Since I'm not exactly timely in grading homework, my policy is: You have until I grade the stack to hand it in. If you do so, I just put it into the middle of the stack and no big deal. But if I'm done grading the stack (or took the stack home before you slid yours under my door), you're out of luck. This means that there's sort of a probabilistic decay in the chances that a late homework will be accepted. Students realize the risk of waiting too long, but appreciate the ability to sometimes hand things in just a tad late.

Disclaimer: If I'm publishing solutions to be studied from for an exam, then the deadline is firm on being in before solutions are posted.

To a degree I think it depends on the age of the students. I would not have the same policy for high school and college.

For high school I had a longstanding policy of on time for full credit, 1 day late half credit and none after that. The only exceptions were excused absences, and for students that missed significant time I would usually work out a plan for catching up that contained modified homework assignments and due dates for groups of assignments.

I wouldn't say that this helped with student motivation. I chose this because I couldn't manage the homework load when it was being turned in at odd times. I needed to reduce variability in order to effectively check the assignments quickly. Also, students can become overwhelmed if they're trying to complete too many assignments. I wanted to limit the number of items that could be on a students plate at any time. When a student missed assignments I tried to talk to them about "what are we going to do differently?" and move them away from mistakes that they may have made previously. I don't have any proof that this helped, but I think it did.

For more advanced classes this was more problematic, students were less likely to be able to catch up on their own. I still kept the same policy, but it felt like I was less successful at getting students to change their behavior and had to make exceptions more often to offer credit for late assignments if a student was willing to make the effort to catch up.

Last, homework does not count for much in my classes. My homework assignments were not busywork, but they tended to be short reviews of work we did together. When I have tried more significant home assignments I have used different criteria for lateness. I have given a few application problems as take home quizzes, and most often those have had a generous but firm deadline for full credit and no late assignments accepted.

I'm with VonBrand, mostly. My way of dealing with it is to say that if you turn in your homework on time you can resubmit before the end of the semester to raise your grade for half credit. So if I give out a ten problem set, and a student turns in five problems that are 100% correct that's still 50%, F. Three weeks later the student can come in with the remaining five problems. Assuming they're 100% correct, minus 50% late penalty = 75% or C, but still better than an F. Of course if the student turns in nothing at the due date then the student gets zero.

Imparts a sense of understanding the importance of meeting deadlines while allowing for some flexibility. I know that some students save up for the week of Spring Break to catch up.

I'm also flexible on before-the-fact excuses. Come to me two days before the homework is due and say Fluffy had an accident and needs to go to the vet, fine, I'll grant an appropriate extension. Come to me on the day the assignment is due or after the assignment is due, sorry, no extension.

• $\begingroup$ Agree with the "ask before" extension policy. $\endgroup$ –  vonbrand Commented Jan 27, 2016 at 2:57
• $\begingroup$ Using the example you gave in the first paragraph, would a student that completed all 10 problems, but with only 50% accuracy have the same opportunity to resubmit for 75% credit? $\endgroup$ –  BBS Commented Jan 27, 2016 at 23:21
• $\begingroup$ Yep. Or turn in 100% wrong answers and resubmit for 50% credit. Still better than 0. Not saying this is the right approach for every academic situation, but it works in the types of classes I teach (computer programming) where some students get everything on the first try and some take longer. I try not to penalize students for being in the latter category as long as they're making an honest effort. $\endgroup$ –  Raydot Commented Jan 27, 2016 at 23:38

Students should be graded on the quality of their work (their ability to meet the desired learning targets) rather than how punctual the assignment is. Late Penalties lead to inaccuracy, which leads to deflated grades, which distorts the students’ achievement; their true ability to meet the intended learning outcomes. Some students predictably struggle with deadlines. Quality work should trump timeliness. By the way: The flood of assignments at the end of the year that you think you are going to get; it won’t happen, at least that wasn’t my experience. In fact, in every school I’ve worked in where teachers eliminated their late penalties they did not experience the flood.

• 3 $\begingroup$ This supposes that you only want the grade to reflect understanding of material, or ability to produce quality work. Sometimes we might really want the grade to reflect time management ability. $\endgroup$ –  Steven Gubkin Commented Jan 27, 2016 at 2:22
• 7 $\begingroup$ It might be true that quality of the work itself is the goal of teaching, but teaching is next to impossible if the students are unable to accept any definite schedule. $\endgroup$ –  Joonas Ilmavirta Commented Jan 27, 2016 at 7:33
• 2 $\begingroup$ Another point: Homework is not only used to grade students but also to get insight into the progress the students make. $\endgroup$ –  Dirk Commented Jan 27, 2016 at 12:23

Regarding the question in the title on how to deal with late submissions : First some background. I collect hand written homework and no electronic submissions. Usually the the submission is before class (in the lecture room) or via some mailbox. I do not accept late submissions after class and empty the mailbox at the time I announced (give or take some minutes). So my policy with late submissions is

Late submissions without warning are not accepted.

Most students have phones and can call, text or write emails from anywhere. If I get an email saying "I stuck in a traffic jam due to some accident and my submission will be late." I am going to accept the submission (unless there is evidence that the student lies, e.g. seeing him on campus at the same time). One important thing is:

This is not an official rule.

If it were, people could easily abuse it. So I handle all exceptional late submissions individually. By not making this a rule, the students need be proactive.

But there is another guideline that I find helpful here:

Once does not count but twice is a general phenomenon.

This is not meant per individual but in the following sense. If some reason for a late submission pops up once, I treat it individually. But if the same reason pops up twice (with a different student), I think about a general procedure how to handle these cases and make a rule with an announcement. This has the advantage that I do not have to make too many rules since many exception just occur once. (Finally: There are exceptions to this rule - sometimes even twice or thrice does not count…)

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Peter DeWitt's

Finding common ground.

A former K-5 public school principal turned author, presenter, and leadership coach, DeWitt provides insights and advice for education leaders. He can be found at www.petermdewitt.com . Read more from this blog .

Homework: High-Quality Learning, or Act of Compliance?

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Today’s guest post is written by Kris Fox, senior field specialist for the Quaglia Institute for Student Aspirations ( QISA ).

Challenge yourself to rethink the purpose of homework. Although the general usefulness of homework is debatable, let’s assume all homework assignments have a learning goal. One frequently espoused goal of homework is to teach students responsibility by making them independently responsible for completing and turning in homework on time. This “lesson” is often reinforced with zero-tolerance policies for late assignments.

I can’t grasp the thinking behind a blanket policy of no late homework assignments. Sure, repeat offenders require some type of intervention: But not as a punishment, rather as a support to help them succeed in learning. Right?

A common argument for zero-tolerance late policies is: “ In the real world, if a student is late for work, or misses a deadline, he or she will be fired .” Personally, I have never known an adult who was fired if she showed up once or twice late or missed one deadline. No doubt someone who is habitually late for a job will find her employment in jeopardy.

However, even if a 15 year old has a job, it is uncertain whether receiving a zero on a late assignment has any correlation to that job or any future employment in a teen’s brain. Presumably, the teenager would learn the consequence of being late to work at work. In the absence of that correlation at school, we have to question whether anything meaningful is being taught about responsibility when a student receives a non-negotiable zero for a late assignment.

So, let’s not deceive our students by saying no tolerance policies help them learn responsibility and teach them about “ the real world .” Students live in the real world everyday. They work, volunteer, take care of siblings, cook meals, study for exams, and, all too often, take on many adult responsibilities. Many teenagers are just trying to survive. A policy based on the thinking that by accepting no late assignments students learn to be responsible simply ignores who each individual student is.

Some questions: Do all students need homework to teach them about responsibility? If student responsibility is a goal, then why not involve students in developing meaningful homework assignments? In determining due dates and grace periods? In assessing their own and peers’ homework? In thinking about learning and what they do and don’t understand and why?

Pedagogy that includes students as decision-makers teaches responsibility far more than a hard and fast deadline. Strict homework deadlines also thwart the real purpose of homework, which is to extend learning, rehearse developing skills, deepen understanding, and broaden concepts. If a student fails to meet a deadline and receives an automatic zero, then typically the assignment is never completed. As a result, the student misses a genuine learning opportunity. One must wonder whether the goal in such a case was authentic learning or mere obedience.

This does not mean I am not advocating a flood of procrastinated or ignored assignments streaming in the day before the end of the semester. What I am advocating is a common sense approach to late assignments - one based on learning, not behavioral compliance, as the goal of homework. One that considers individual students and their realities. An approach that realizes a day or even two late on the occasional meaningful assignment might earn partial credit, but certainly not a zero. Grace-periods, second-chances, and flex time are, after all, parts of the real world, too.

In the real world of school, the fact is that grades count (for far too much I might add, as grades do not always reflect actual learning). Both struggling and high achieving students are penalized by no late assignment policies. A missed homework assignment that garners zero points can drop a struggling learner from passing a course to failing. Such a student, inclined to hang on as long as they are passing, might give up on all work if they find they are failing.

Likewise, a missing assignment in a competitive A.P. class may mean a difference of a half-letter grade even though the student has mastered the content. On a GPA in front of a college admissions officer, up against students of exactly the same caliber but in a school without a zero tolerance policy, a tenth of a point may matter. In a system driven by grades, every grading policy should be carefully weighed for all its consequences.

Before requiring students to sign a beginning of the year agreement to a policy of no late homework (a policy that students have no choice, but to sign), consider trying the following practices.

Focus on Relationships Get to know your students and have them get to know you. You may discover that some students learn best with a week’s notice in order to balance their lives with lengthy projects. Or, you may learn that homework assignments need to be differentiated depending on the needs of your students. Once students discover you care about them and know them as individuals, they will do their best to complete assignments in a timely manner.

Develop Assignments with Students Take the time to design homework with your students - not for them. Students know what will help them learn, what they don’t understand, and ultimately, what assignments they are willing to put forth their best effort to complete.

Create Engaging and Meaningful Assignments When homework is merely about compliance and deadlines, many students simply share and copy answers. However, when exciting, interesting and meaningful assignments are co-developed, student interest in completing assignments increases. Consider homework assignments as a precious opportunity to hook a student who appears bored in class or uninspired by the content matter. Realize that students who are engaged at school are 16x more likely to be academically motivated (QISA, 2014).

Establish Networks To help and to support students as learners, introduce them to a network of support outside school. This includes guiding students towards free supplemental, online material and encouraging students to attend after school tutoring sessions as well as connecting students to peers. Students who are new, shy, or simply afraid to ask for help may not have peers readily accessible to support their learning outside of class.

Consider Alternatives Encourage students to submit alternative assignments that demonstrate the equivalent learning goals. One student may learn best through a Khan Academy video while another may demonstrate the necessary understanding by building a 3D model with a peer.

If you still hold onto the idea that a no late policy works in your class, then at minimum be fair. Be transparent that the purpose of homework is first and foremost to teach responsibility and not to reinforce or extend content knowledge. Let your students know that the former lesson will always trump the latter. Provide students one-week notice on all assignments so they can accommodate homework to their other responsibilities. Respond in a timely manner to inquiries about homework. In addition, make a specific time commitment to when assignments will be graded and posted - no exceptions. Like your students, sign your name to that agreement. If nothing else, then at least you and your students will be operating in the same “ real world .”

Creative Commons photo courtesy of Woerterhexe.

The opinions expressed in Peter DeWitt’s Finding Common Ground are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in Education, or any of its publications.

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Is "no late work" a common policy?

When I wrote my syllabus for this term, I added the line "Late work will not be accepted." In the past, I just took off a large percentage of the grade per day, but I became tired of the added work of managing papers that students handed to me at random times and places.

The students, naturally, complain this policy too harsh, especially when some larger projects are worth 25% of their grade. I searched the Internet to try to establish what the norm is. I found many syllabi from famous universities, but found very few even list any policies at all.

Is "no late work" a typical rule?

• 13 As a student, I had a number of courses which did not accept late submissions at all . I also had courses which had similar rules to what you've done previously, deducting points for late work, and other courses with other different policies besides. I see nothing wrong with a "no late work" policy that is clearly stated in the syllabus. (I was an undergraduate in Texas.) –  Brian S Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 17:57
• 12 Yes, it is very common. For examples you can try Google queries like "no late work will be accepted" site:harvard.edu . –  Nate Eldredge Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 20:00
• 13 @Joshua I have a hard time seeing what would qualify as "insane" in what the OP proposed. –  xLeitix Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 22:36
• 6 In industry, late work could cause serious consequences such as huge financial loss. You are doing your students a big favor by imposing no late work policy so that they learn this precious lesson as early as possible if they are going to work in industry after graduation. –  Nobody Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 2:28
• 10 Is “no late work” a common policy? It should be. –  Marc Claesen Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 7:10

21 Answers 21

One issue not covered by the many good answers is proportionality .

There's nothing wrong with having firm deadlines and sticking to them, or allowing a grace period with corresponding deductions, and so on. But it's your job as lecturer to make sure the 'punishment fits the crime'. If you have a zero-tolerance late policy and a short time window for a hard assignment that counts for a lot of points, then the policy is disproportionately harsh even if it's fair and clearly stated. I bring this up because you mentioned assignments/projects that carry upto 25% of the grade.

This is partly why I use a sliding scale late policy, where students can turn in things late, but lose a percentage of their score for each day they're late, upto a week for a 2-week assignment at which point they earn nothing. If you wish to have firm deadlines for a project that accounts for a large portion of the grade, then you might consider creating intermediate deadlines to break up the penalty. This way, students can learn the consequences of missing deadlines without facing huge penalties. It is also more robust to unforeseen events that no one can control.

• 7 Codified rules are good. They don't preclude you from being accomodating of special situations. Say a student approaches you well before the deadline and has valid reason to be late (illness, tragedy, ...). This might be obvious to many, but maybe it needs to be said. (Also, I challenge that university attendees should be forced to do anything. Give them material, give them offers for support, and then the exam. Those who can not motivate and organise themselves should fail. Unfortunately, that point of view is not economically (US et al) and/or politically (EU et al) opportune.) –  Raphael Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 18:52
• 2 True. What I meant to say was that the OP mentioned zero tolerance AND lots of points. Then a short time window is the last piece that turns this into an unfair policy. –  Suresh Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 20:18
• 9 One percentage point per day is not enough IMO. I like multiplier = 0.90 ^ (days late) , which is 100%, 90%, ~81%, ~73%, ~66%, ~59%, ~53%, ~48%... but never quite gets to zero. –  Mooing Duck Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 23:21
• 3 @Joshua And those rules apply in special circumstances.... There is a huge difference IMO between allowing a repeat due special circumstances and allowing late work...Note that students complaining that late work is not accepted is not the same as "in special circumstances" late work is not accepted...... –  Nick S Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 1:13
• 4 I've never taken a class where we were directly punished for showing up for an exam late. The punishment was always implicit and proportional (if you show up late, you have less time to finish; the later you are, the less time you get). –  Brendan Long Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 15:23

Disclaimer: I am a student in Central Europe (Computer Science), but an enthusiastic one ;)

"No late work" rules are common for both courses with many (>100) and with few participants. Usually, there will still be a couple of students trying to get a deadline-extension, but in my experience this number is far smaller if you make the "no late work" rule clear to everyone.

Just keep in mind that students have other work besides your course and make sure that there's enough time to do the assignment. I don't really see the point to give less than two weeks - if a student falls ill for a couple of days or is otherwise occupied, a second week will give him or her the chance to nevertheless produce a good solution.

Even for regular homework assignments, I think that giving the students two weeks time will result in far better hand-ins: they can ask questions/request clarifications one week after the assignment was published in the lecture.

• 18 +1 for "make sure there's enough time." Even for a short assignment, don't assume that I can find an hour in the next two days to complete it. –  ff524 Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 16:17
• 6 "I don't really see the point to give less than two weeks." One possible point is that students retain much more from a lecture if they do a follow-up assignment as soon as possible after the lecture -- two weeks later is almost as bad as two months later. –  Mark Meckes Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 16:41
• 7 @MarkMeckes If you want the follow-up assignment to immediately follow the lecture, make it an in-class assignment. Otherwise, don't assume that students should be able to rearrange their schedules to accommodate your tight deadline, however well-intentioned. –  ff524 Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 16:51
• 7 @ff524: I don't expect my students to rearrange their schedules, I expect them to arrange their schedules around the classes they're taking. –  Mark Meckes Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 17:25
• 5 @Raphael We were often forced into those two days due to projects for other classes. In my experience, professors seem to like to assume that they're the only ones that give homework, and assign due dates accordingly, not taking into account we have stuff to do for other classes as well. –  Izkata Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 19:40

I am sure this varies between lecturers/courses; some universities may have more or less stringent policies but none that I have seen. In my own surroundings, a deadline used to be a deadline. This has softened over time due to many circumstances. Lecturers/teachers are more stressed and enforcing deadlines inevitably involves more work; students seem to find more and more excuses for not being on time. It is hard to point the finger in one or the other direction.

It is, however, interesting to think about the fact that deadlines are still deadlines in society. If you do not send in your tax report in time you are fined; if yo do not pay your bills you are "fined" etc. More critically, if you cannot finish a work task on time you may lose out on salary increases promotion or even lose a job, the latter particularly if you run your own business. So learning to cope with deadlines is important yet it seems to not be prioritized.

So what can be done? Key is to be very clear on what will happen from the start. If you make assessment criteria you can state that a late task means fail/zero points or whatever the perspective is. At the same time you can say that for a larger task, points will be deducted or grade lowered a step at a time after each time period the work is late. My former advisor gave all of us the option of being late but told us that points will be deducted. It was up to us to judge if we would benefit from being late (Better answer gave more points than was deducted for being late). This fostered some form of responsibility where you as a student had the power to decide.

So I do not think that it is difficult to impose rules for lateness that allows students to assess the effects of being late. Learning is of course about learning a subject but it is also about learning to function in society (in the work place) and that involves developing work standards that are good. So when imposing rules that involve lateness, it is also important to make the rules very clear and also to provide suggestions for what you perceive as a good work ethic/schedule to pass the tasks well, i.e. provide the students with enough information to also see what will not work. If you fail to do so the lateness effects may only seem as punishment.

• 4 +1 for So learning to cope with deadlines is important yet it seems to not be prioritized. –  Marc Claesen Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 16:28
• 13 True, though if you don't pay your bills, you're fined, you aren't generally immediately sent to collections or thrown in jail. If you don't send in your tax report on time, you have to deal with bureaucracy, fill out a bunch of papers, and probably won't get your refund very quickly, but you will still generally get it eventually. Learning to deal with deadlines is definitely good, but still, the real world isn't usually "turn it in on time or you're just completely screwed with no recourse", either. –  neminem Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 18:44
• 2 @neminem ... but losing a significant amount of points isn't exactly "being screwed with no recourse" either. It's exactly what you mentioned for the other examples - it's quite bad, and you would generally want to avoid it, but it's not the end of the world if it happens. –  xLeitix Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 22:39
• 1 As I understand it, there are a lot of career paths (e.g. medical school) where having a single 'C' on a college transcript is an automatic and irrevocable disqualification. And if you have a 'no late work' policy and individual assignments worth 25% of the grade, you're talking about giving an otherwise perfect student a 'C'. –  Daniel McLaury Commented Mar 27, 2014 at 8:11
• 1 @DanielMcLaury And if the students shows up late for the exam, you are also giving an otherwise perfect student a "C"... If the assignments for a class are worth 25%, then they should be a higher priority for that student than a 10% assignment... And we are speaking about probably multiple assignments worth 25%, being late once is not the end of the world... Being late always would be an issue, but then would you really want to accommodate that student?... And since you brought up medical school, would you want the student which is always late to be your heart surgeon? –  Nick S Commented Mar 27, 2014 at 14:01

I would say that in general it depends. If assignments are going to be happening regularly or are kind of a hard mathematics course (think calculus, differential equations...) then I think the no late work policy is valuable. This is particularly true if you plan to post a solution to the assigned problems shortly afterwards.

On the other hand in a class that I teach most of the assignments are more project oriented. As a result they will take longer than a normal assignment, and they are also far more open-ended (a solution from student A may look nothing like solution from student B, but they may both be completely valid). As a result the approach that some students use may lead them to take longer on an assignment than others. I use a sliding scale as discussed above; Typically I allow 1 week grace where each day costs a few percentage points, and after that the assignment is not accepted.

as for pros and cons,

• students seem to like the flexibility, sometimes many of their assignments are due in one or two days and this allows some buffering (at a cost)
• with a digital submission like blackboard the late grading is very easy to do
• assignments appear to have more work put into them, instead of students doing the bare minimum they tend to explore their solutions more
• since introducing the policy some students tend to turn in homework later (typically 1-3 days)
• some students treat the final deadline (1 week late) as the deadline, so a limited number of students will turn in their homework late consistently

Overall I am happy with the solution though, and I would suggest offering a slight grace period where it doesn't make your life too difficult. The main approaches that I've seen being either % off per day, or x number of free late days for the class.

• 4 +1 for "if you plan to post a solution to the assigned problems shortly afterwards," which seems to be an issue not addressed by the other answers. –  Mark Meckes Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 10:35

As an undergrad computer science/philosophy major at a top 10 school in the United States, I would say that 90% of the classes I have taken have had a no late work policy. Particularly after the end of freshman year, it's understood that you need to get your work in on time.

However, it's usually understood in these classes that there is still the option to ask the professor for an extension, which will almost certainly be granted in cases of illness, etc, unless the class is just too large/has an automated grading system (checkouts of code on a particular date from SVN, for example) that prevents this. The late policy covers the case where a student just doesn't hand in his or her work when it's due and says nothing to his or her professor, and there is really no excuse for that.

I think it depends a lot on the culture and the institution. In America, er, a decade or two ago, I remember there was usually some penalty for late work at the Universities I and my friends attended, but "no credit for late work" was rare. However when I was at university in England, there were no penalties for late work in any of my classes. Even very late work was not considered a problem. Personally, I found that having all the time I needed to do the work, resulted in me being far more productive (if not as timely, but no one cared about that), and doing much more interesting and better writing, as well as not abusing my sleep by staying up all night.

• 1 I find the last part interesting, as typically when one is late on an assignment it results in less time for the following assignments... And then you get no better writing and more abusing sleep.. –  Nick S Commented Mar 27, 2014 at 12:32
• 1 Ah but if no assignments have punitive deadlines, that doesn't need to happen. My overall amount of work done went up by a lot, actually, as I would actually spend several productive days working on a paper, revising it, turning it in when I was happy with it. So it didn't create a backlog - it just had me feeling no deadline pressure or resentment, and doing the work when I was ready and had thought of something interesting to write about, instead of stressing and resenting the deadline and doing something at the last minute, losing sleep, etc. –  Dronz Commented Mar 28, 2014 at 20:47
• I highly doubt that any instructor would accept assignments long after the final examination. Typically the final exam is a hard punitive deadline for all the assignments... Which means that the total time you can spend on all the assignments is the same, no matter how deadlines are set... It is an illusion that with no strict deadline, you get more time for all assignments, but this is a very popular thought among the students... The reality is that you only get extra time if you start the assignments late... If you have 2 weeks for an assignment but you only start it a day or two before .. –  Nick S Commented Mar 28, 2014 at 22:28
• ... the deadline, yes by extensions one actually gets more time and less abusing sleep. But exactly the same result can easily be accomplished by starting the assignment 2-3 days earlier... Or, and some of my students are shocked when I tell them this, one should simply start the assignment 2 weeks before the deadline as one is expected. –  Nick S Commented Mar 28, 2014 at 22:29
• Have you heard the expression, "what we resist, persists?" Do you think the shock of a student hearing that they could start assignments early is about not having heard it before, or about having to be punished into learning the truth of that obvious statement? I think the suffering and head-butting around deadlines comes from the power conflict in the situation. It's not about learning the obvious truth of when things could be done, and it doesn't have to be a stressful power struggle, and when it's not about that, it can be about much more interesting things. –  Dronz Commented Mar 29, 2014 at 20:23

I have never seen a no late work policy; on the contrary, most of the classes I have taken/TAed accepted late work and took off no credit when the amount of time late was reasonable (1 or 2 days if you were asking questions / professor knew you were working on it.) This is probably due to the fact that most of my classes have had 5-10 students in them; the classes that I have taken with 20+ students have all accepted late work with a similar penalty as the one you described.

The question follows: Do you want every students best work, or do you want every students best work within a very strict time frame? If an assignment is difficult, and not just time heavy, it might be worth relaxing a no late work policy in my opinion.

It is entirely possible to have a hybrid, in which weekly assignments are not accepted late but larger assignments can be late with penalty.

• 4 "Do you want every students best work, or do you want every students best work within a very strict time frame?" I want students to learn as much as possible from the course. Research on learning has shown that students retain more from a lecture if they do follow-up work as soon as possible after the lecture, regardless of how well they do on that work. –  Mark Meckes Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 16:46
• 1 @Mark Meckes: and is that difference large enough to offset learning less from the work itself because it has to be done at a more likely unsuitable time? –  Mark Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 15:27
• 1 @Mark: Based on studies I've seen, yes. –  Mark Meckes Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 15:51

I specify a due date, but have a 48 hr, no questions asked, grace period. If a student gets an assignment in by the due date, I give a small amount of extra credit (typically 0.25 pts added to his or her final percentage*). I do not accept assignments after the grace period. I never get complaints about this policy.

* I don't round final percentages. Students are in charge of their own rounding by getting the extra credit for turning in assignments by the due date

I've always been a student that turned in HW late, and it varies widely depending on the professor. In general, I have found the humanities departments the most harsh about deadlines. The natural science classes are more lenient, with some professors clearly stating that they will accept late HW with a deduced grade. Others will accept late HW unofficially before they return graded HWs to students, and yet others will work with you more flexibly. There hasn't been a single professor of mine that hasn't accepted at least some late HW from me.

As a TA, I fully accept late HW, with no deadlines, and likewise return the HWs to students late (you can call it a "suggested deadline"). My teaching principles are fairly libertarian, and my students tend to learn a lot during the semester. That's what I care about. The only time I care about HWs and examinations is to see whether I'm doing an effective job at what the students' pay me to do, which is teach them. It's only fair to examine the students to see if I'm failing them.

It's appalling to see professors demand of their students, who, just in case anyone forgot, pay the professors' salaries, demand of their students to learn a certain way within a definite deadline. Nothing in my experience has been more detrimental to my learning. I've gained the most out of classes that allowed me to turn in HW late.

Just in case anyone thinks that students who fail to "respect" deadlines are intrinsically procrastinators, I declare that it was quite the contrary in my case. The reason I submitted HWs late was to ensure I read the whole relevant text before attempting the HW. I wanted to know exactly what I was doing when I solved a problem, rather than use "ad hoc" methods to get something that resembles the correct answer. Moreover, I would often find a passage in a text that interested me, so I would pursue the topic and do some research. Sometimes this "research" would take a week out of my time, but I learned more from the self-driven pursuits than all the professor-imposed, who was paid by me to teach me, HW combined.

It's time we do away with harsh grading policies and strict deadlines, because I don't know a single person who has ever learned that way.

On the other hand, I do know a lot of wage-slaves, also known as employees at major companies, who rent their bodies to their masters; and the masters certainly will demand of their subjects to have work done on time and subject themselves to meaningless evaluations by authoritarian figures. That isn't the environment in which people can learn and discover; that sounds more like mines, sweat-shops, and assembly line to me. Unless one wants to impose an assembly-line education, which is what's common in USA universities these days, I'd advise against serious deadlines.

• 14 their students, who, just in case anyone forgot, pay the professors' salaries — Incorrect. My salary is paid by the state, not from tuition income. (I do not accept late homework, even for illness or injury. I do, however, forgive homework under extenuating circumstances, so that the student's grade is unaffected. And I'm happy to give feedback on anything.) –  JeffE Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 22:40
• 6 Yes, but so do I. And so do their future employers. –  JeffE Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 22:44
• 8 @TheLateGreat you don't purchase learning. you pay for the time and expertise of people who've spent a long time studying the topic you're learning. If you want to buy your education, you can always buy a degree. But then it won't have much value. –  Suresh Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 22:46
• 9 Sometimes, "staggering consistency" = "correct". I should add though that I've seen courses (often, mathematically oriented ones) dole out homework that has no deadlines and merely needs to be turned in by the end of the semester. The problem is then that the homework fails as a diagnostic tool to identify student weakness and misconceptions that could have been rectified if detected early. –  Suresh Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 22:47
• 13 This is what worked best for you . Other students may find (in the long run) that a lack of firm deadlines would be a detriment to their learning; for instance, it gives them the option of putting off work until they've forgotten how to do it. I understand your point of view, but I don't think you can claim that it's the one right way to do things. –  Nate Eldredge Commented Mar 25, 2014 at 23:17

My problem with a "no late work" policy is that it disincentivizes learning. If a student forgets an assignment or can't quite finish it in time, they no longer have any reason to learn the material; they get no credit for learning it because they cannot turn it in late. Because of this, I favor a 10% or even 20% per day penalty as oppose to a no late work policy.

I also think the "prepare students for the real world" argument is invalid. In the real world, if you miss a deadline for something (work deadline, tax filing, etc.) you will get punished somehow, but you likely still have to complete the work; it doesn't just disappear. Also, preparing the students for the real world is a secondary goal at best. Helping students learn the material should always come before preparing them for the real world. Internships and first jobs are much more suited for preparing for the real world.

• 2 Aren't doing better on the final exam, doing better in followup courses, doing better in job interviews, doing better on the job, and "gee my mom and dad paid all this tuition money so I'd better get something out of it" reasons to learn the material? –  JeffE Commented Mar 28, 2014 at 5:41
• 1 So, college students are known for being great planners with lots of well thought out long term goals who rarely make poor decisions...? Don't pretend like rewards months/years down the road are of the same value to students as instant rewards. Also, for gen-ed courses, almost none of what you mentioned applies. How can you motivate a CS major to learn more about chemistry? Well, you can start by not disincentivizing them with a silly grading system. –  MikeS Commented Mar 28, 2014 at 17:31
• 2 College students are adults. –  JeffE Commented Mar 29, 2014 at 3:48
• 1 That's exceedingly dismissive and I'd say flip to sweep this and so much else under the rug with "he's/she's an adult". Are you going to hold me to your arbitrary standards even though I'm not even considered legally competent among other things? And even if I were, what you said is inappropriate for a great many people, probably a quarter, for any number of other reasons. –  Vandermonde Commented Aug 9, 2015 at 6:16

I remember an answer I once got for a piece of work handed in a few minutes late (and rejected):

How can you have nothing ready for 30 days and then suddenly have something in the last few hours?

In fact, I had been working on it the whole time, trying to constantly improve it, despite the fact that I had a working solution early on. Waiting was a mistake and helped me learn to prioritise.

So welcome be hard deadlines, they teach planning and prioritisation , and save examiner time.

As an undergraduate, I have had a few classes like this, but if it's a class with lots of HW assignments, usually the professor will grant extensions if you ask; sometimes there are also a set number of "late days" that students can use, so maybe you can do that so that the volume of late submissions is reduced, or just take 50% off for one day and 100% off for more than one (that way I doubt many people would ever submit late).

I just want to make it clear that any professor should, of course, always grant extensions in the event of an emergency (family emergency / illness); to do otherwise is, well, barbaric.

Edit: I don't think you're obliged to give full credit if there was no extenuating emergency circumstance (e.g. illness) and the student didn't ask you beforehand. If they thought they might not finish in time, it's definitely their responsibility to tell you that. That said, giving 0% for such a case is also pretty harsh.

I think the focus of teaching should be students' learning, and all policies including late assignment policies should be designed with the goal of improving student learning and experience. A good fair policy would encourage learning and good behavior, a bad unfair one would do the opposite.

I think students generally care too much about grades, it is important to refocus them as much as possible on learning. Assignments, tests, and grades are tools for teachings not goals of teaching.

The hard deadline policy is common but I think it is also a common experience of instructors that it doesn't work well. It is important to think about why it is so, if we understand why hard deadlines do not work well then we can design better policies.

In my experience, the followings are the main reasons for missing deadlines in most cases (roughly based on the justifications my students gave me when asking for extensions in my previous courses):

Technical difficulties: small unexpected submission difficulties, i.e. they have finished assignments but they were unable to submit it before deadline, e.g. they lost power just before deadline.

Procrastination: Considerable number of students leave working on assignments to the last minute. They are also not good with estimating the time they need to finish assignments. So they go over deadline.

Special cases: events beyond students' reasonable control prevented them from finishing assignments, e.g. serious illness.

Of course we would not want to penalized students for the 3rd reason. But we should also try to help those in the first two groups.

One common alternative to hard deadlines is having grace days, but it has a too high administrative overhead in my opinion, and it doesn't really work much better. They will use up their grace days and then go over deadline. If we give them a grace day for all assignments then we are essentially shifting deadlines in their minds.

After discussions with a few more experienced instructors I switched to something similar to Suresh's policy for my last course and it worked quite well. There was almost no serious complaint. Here is the policy I used:

1% penalty for every 30min after the deadline.

First, it is easy to implement. I use an online submission system so it is quite easy to compute and apply these penalties using time-stamps for latest submissions, it is a simple script.

Second, it is effective way of helping the first two groups. This policy gives them two extra days after the deadline if they really need. Most late submissions miss the deadline by a small amount of time. Being essentially a continuous linear penalty function it makes sure the penalty is proportional: a student who goes over the deadline a few minutes doesn't loose too much points. I give students typically 2 weeks for submitting assignments. I don't think it makes sense to give more that 2 extra days. Too many days and too soft penalty will essentially shift assignment deadlines in their minds and cause further procrastination. The hourly lateness penalty creates a sense of urgency that daily penalty would not. I had around 100 students and they seldom went over a few hours. I also put deadlines on Friday evenings. Students who don't like doing assignments hate to spend their weekend on them. Student who submit their assignments on time do not have to worry and spend their weekend working on assignments, this adds an extra incentive for them to finish it by deadline, or if not possible with as little lateness as possible. In addition, it also makes sure that the following week we can focus on our topic without them worrying about assignments.

To deal with the 3rd group I don't use my late assignment policy, I use an special consideration policy. If a student misses an assignment deadline with a good reason, e.g. serious illness supported by medial documents, I apply my special consideration policy to accommodate them e.g. I may move the points for the assignment to other assignments.

I think the appropriateness of such a policy depends on the class and the students within it, and even when it exists, I'd consider flexing it for extraordinary circumstances.

For example, I once had a student who turned in late work because they were called up to respond to a national emergency. Is that really something I should have savaged their grade for, even if generally the class had a pretty strict deadline policy (because I was trying to turn grades around fast)?

As an undergrad engineering/computer science alum, I will say that I am biased towards having a late policy. Scale the assignment difficulty appropriately to account for "extra" time at a penalty and codify the policy to be clear and non-negotiable, ie 10% off per day. The other option is to tell students late assignments are not accepted, but extend deadlines appropriately based on student feedback. The goal remains the same: maximize participation.

The reason I support this is pedagogical. It is not to account for students being irresponsible. It is to attract more students to complete an assignment, allowing them to be methodical and calculating with their learning experience while ultimately maximizing the value they receive from a course.

The goal with college classes, from a pedagogical view, is to maximize turnout and participation. These are solid measures indicating that students are learning and that the college experience is economically valuable. If there is a no late assignment policy and 25% of students received a zero or extremely low mark for being unable to "complete" on time, we have an issue that could potentially be fixed with a course policy change. So I argue that it is better to have a late penalty while scaling content difficulty appropriately.

I was exceptionally busy during my senior year, taking the max amount of credits where all classes were advanced level/difficult. I recall one class where the policy was no late assignments. This was a very difficult programming class. I was on the wire for time, and pulled repeated all-nighters to complete an assignment for this course- right past the due date. I was very stubborn and I refused to just give up, although in the back of my mind I considered the high likelihood I would receive a zero. It ended up being accepted with no penalty and I received a high grade where the average grade was significantly lower.

Many would say this is not fair. But from my perspective, I learned more actually doing the assignment rather than being defeated - the alternative fate would have been to cease all work and receive a zero had the policy been uncompromising. As someone who is a perfectionist- I prefer not to stop until I know I have produced something that is robust and meets all requirements- this hits home even more for me. I believe that from a learning standpoint, accepting late assignments is far more likely to result in higher quality education. If a late penalty makes a course "easier", scale the content appropriately. Or surprise the students on a case by case basis at the instructor's discretion.

The goal is to get as many students as possible in a course to give a best effort attempt on an assignment given a variety of schedules, circumstances and uncertainty in the assignment itself. If after some date they receive a zero you will always chop off a number of students who can do the assignment with more time, and would with the opportunity, even with dramatic penalty.

• 1 And if the policy had been "no late work", then instead of just handing in what you had, you would have done nothing ? Be realistic. You wouldn't have been "defeated", you would simply have handed in something that wasn't as good as it could have been if you'd had more time. Which is kind of a common situation to be in throughout your life. –  jalf Commented Mar 29, 2014 at 11:40
• That is sometimes true and sometimes not. In that particular case I would have failed the assignment completely. I consider that defeat. It is actually not as common a situation as you may think. Very rarely in life do you need to complete something, once, before a certain date or face failure. Things we do at work don't just disappear once a certain day passes; it just gets deferred until a later date. The point is that handing in something that isn't as good as it could have been is bad . The goal is to get as many students to hand in their best work as possible. Is that so far-fetched? –  trueshot Commented Mar 30, 2014 at 7:48
• no, if that was the goal, you wouldn't have deadlines at all. It is up to the student how much work they want to put in before the deadline. Universities are not obligated to coddle you. And you're still hung up on the (wrong) mindset that "if it is not perfect, then it might as well not exist". In real life, people do not just "defer" the task you've been working on if you exceed the deadline. Instead, you just have to make do with what you've got. You , not I, are the one pretending that things just disappear if you can't perfect them before the deadline. They don't. –  jalf Commented Mar 30, 2014 at 10:32
• But please enlighten me as to how it is "fair" that you get a full grade for breaking the rules. You were supposed to do X before date Y. By your own admission you were unable to do that, and would have failed the course if they hadn't been lenient. Why did you deserve that leniency? You were unable to do what the course required. –  jalf Commented Mar 30, 2014 at 10:35
• I'm not going to tell you I deserved anything. I am going to tell you that I have personally experienced the benefit of a late policy in courses. Those policies have allowed me to absorb more from a course than what would have been possible without one. The goal for me was always to learn. Forgive my selfish desire to maximize learning. You imply that the goal of a university is to sink as many students as possible, ie no student deserves "leniency". I argue that the goal is to maximize participation. Target any average for a course, but get as many students to try their best as possible. –  trueshot Commented Mar 30, 2014 at 20:01

An important role for a college professor is to prepare the students for the real world. And in the real world, deadlines are firm. You think a customer or an employer cares that you have a "good excuse" for being late? That you "tried"?

Trust me, you'll be doing all your students a favor by accustoming them now to the reality that schedules are unforgiving.

When I was a student, one of the first things we were told was "No late work is accepted. Not even if it is only a matter of seconds. Not even if the printer catches fire or you're snowed in".

My university had previously just subtracted from the grade, and had been warned by the authorities that this was against the rules. So they stopped doing that, and instead enforced a zero-tolerance rule of "respect the deadlines".

And honestly, it worked well. The only requirement is that you make absolutely totally sure that all of your students are aware of these rules! Like I said, it was drilled into our heads on day 1 (and repeated regularly ever since). And it was enforced for the entire Computer Science department, not just for individual courses.

Of course, students can always ask (preferably in advance) to have an agreed-upon extension in special cases (perhaps in case of extended sickness, or whatever else it might be), but if it's just a matter of "I didn't finish in time", then tough luck. You either hand in what you have, even if it is incomplete, or you don't hand it in at all.

Honestly, I kind of think it is the only fair policy. Lowering a student's grade for handing his work in late strikes me as much weirder. Their work should be graded on its quality, and nothing else. "your ability to manage time" should not be part of the curriculum. If two students hand in equally good work, they deserve the same grade.

I think the important point is that being late doesn't mean that you can't hand in your work. It just means that instead of handing it in late, but complete, you hand it in on time, but incomplete. And you get graded on what you handed in.

I don't know about "typical," but I have definitely seen it used. I've taught mostly in design schools where understanding the importance of hitting deadlines is a core part of the training.

Having said that, most instructors are a little more moderate. Some will say students are allowed one late assignment per semester, some will accept any assignment late for half-credit.

My own personal policy was this: As long as you made a reasonable effort to turn an assignment in on time you could always improve your grade on that assignment by resubmitting any time before the end of the semester. If you missed that first deadline, no deal. But if you turned in a project at, say, 25% completion on the day of the deadline and then before the end of the semester managed to get in the remaining 75% you could have full points. But that's just me.

One other thing I go out of my way to say on day 1 is that communication is important. I had a student who didn't show up for class all semester only to tell me two weeks before the end that he'd been caring for an ailing relative. I could have made an accommodation in week one, but what am I supposed to do in week 13?!

The university I attended had a no late work policy, however, some of the modules did allow a 24-hour late work window, but work submitted in this 24 hours was capped at 40% (Minimum pass grade).

I work at a middle-ranking UK university and we have a rule of 5% per day for 5 days then zero. I think it becomes counted as a cost by some students. "No late work without a doctor's cert", providing everyone knows well in advance, seems as fair as any other, what with the deadline being part of the test.

Your students have the reasonable right to expect you to operate the policies decided by your department. Whilst I have every sympathy with the notion of 'a minute late = no marks' providing exceptional circumstances are accounted for, it's really not your decision but rather a decision that should be made by your department and uniformly applied across different courses.

It is unfair on students for your course to operate a different policy to the other courses they are taking because it (a) unfairly requires them to prioritise the work for your course over other courses and (b) it requires them to notice that you've set different regulations. So, whether or not your method has merit, you should adopt the same system as other courses they are taking.

I'm kind of surprised that your university/department does not already have a formally stated and agreed policy on this.

• 4 My department leaves this decision to the individual instructors. As it should. And no, students don't need to notice ; instructors just need to tell them. –  JeffE Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 23:29
• The comment on noticing was based on the assumption that was a general ruling. If every course does things differently then that alters expectations. –  Jack Aidley Commented Mar 27, 2014 at 7:01

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What's your school's late policy?

About three years ago, our slacker principal changed a 10% off per day late policy, which was working just fine for students who had some exigence about them, to a student now has 2 weeks after the due date to turn in an assignment without a late penalty. This is crazy, and in my judgement, simply reflects the way in which she approaches most things, but now the students are using this as a way to kick the preverbal can down the road. Oftentimes though, it backfires on them. I've also noticed that if there's an assignment that you gave a week ago, and as you're grading, you notice that students are making the same mistake, so you go and tell them about it, but there are another half of the class who hasn't turned it in yet, they can now preemptively correct the mistake, and have an advantage that the other students didn't have. Personally, I'm not going to let the students who've already turned in the assignment un-submit and correct it to then turn it in again...I'd be doing nothing but grading like a revolving door.

Anyway, so what's your school's late policy? I have half a mind to bring up the nonsensicalness of her policy, but I'm also pretty sure it helps her daughters out, who are also slackers. Help me prove my point!