Academic Calendar

Policy UW-880

August 18, 2022

TO:         Deans, Directors, Faculty, and Instructional Academic Staff

CC:         Facilities and Administrative Unit Directors, Teaching Assistants

FROM:    John Karl Scholz, Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs

Lori Reesor, Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs

Heather Daniels, Secretary of the Faculty

RE:         Religious and Election Day Observances

We write to remind you of UW-Madison’s religious observances policy and to highlight faculty legislation regarding Election Day observances. State law mandates that any student with a conflict between an academic requirement and any religious observance must be given an alternative for meeting the academic requirement. A student’s claim of a religious conflict, which may include travel time, should be accepted at face value. There is no practical, dignified, or legal means to assess individual claims.

As you finalize your fall term syllabi, we encourage you whenever possible to avoid scheduling conflicts between examinations or other major course activities and religious observances that may be observed by a number of students in your class. Please indicate in your syllabus and announce to your students that when conflicts do arise, you and your teaching assistants will follow UW-Madison policy and provide accommodations.

The following guidelines are intended to provide clarity for both students and instructors:

1. Announce to students early in the semester that they must notify you within the first two weeks of class which dates they request relief due to a religious observation or election official responsibility. Include this information on your course syllabus by referring to the policy or using the recommended course syllabus template (provost.wisc.edu/course-syllabi/), where a link to the religious observances policy is included.
2. Make-ups may be scheduled before or after the regularly scheduled requirements.
3. Instructors may set reasonable limits on the total number of days claimed by any student. Occasionally, students may not fully understand the necessity for prior notice, and under these circumstances we urge you to be as flexible as possible. Our policy is meant to be sensitive to the needs of individual students.
4. Please refer to the following calendar for a listing, though not exhaustive, of religious observances, election days, and cultural observances. Note that some religions mark observances over multiple days, which may begin at sunset on the day preceding the posted date(s) of the holiday. The list does not include all possible religious observances and cultural observances that may be requested by students. It should be used as a guide for understanding potential scheduling conflicts for major religious observances that may be observed by a number of students in your class. As stated above, all requests from students should be taken at face value, whether or not the observance in question appears on this list.

This calendar is also available online at secfac.wisc.edu/academic-calendar and as a shared Outlook calendar named “SoF Academic Calendar & Religious Observances.”

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact:

Heather Daniels, Secretary of the Faculty, 608-262-3958, sof@secfac.wisc.edu

John Zumbrunnen, Vice Provost for Teaching and Learning, 608-262-5701, zumbrunnen@wisc.edu

Christina Olstad, Dean of Students, 608-262-1451, dean@studentlife.wisc.edu

CALENDAR FOR FALL SEMESTER 2022

The list does not include all possible religious observances and cultural observances that may be requested by students, but rather should be used as a guide for understanding potential scheduling conflicts for major religious observances that may be observed by a number of students in your class.

Fall 2022 Key Deadlines: registrar.wisc.edu/dates/

Please contact the Office of the Registrar for the Apply to Graduate deadline.

*        Observances of Jewish holidays begin at sunset on the day preceding that which is listed as the holiday.
**               The official date of degree conferral on the diploma will be 25 December 2022.

Calendar 2021-2026 (Fac doc 2795, Feb 2019) (PDF)

2021-2026 Academic Calendar TR-MWF

Print version, 2017-2021 Academic Calendar revised (PDF)

Academic calendar dates 1961-summer 2021 (PDF)

Gideon Elliott
Office of the Secretary of the Faculty
University of Wisconsin – Madison
129 Bascom Hall
500 Lincoln Drive
Madison, WI  53706-1380

gideon.elliott@wisc.edu
Phone: (608) 262-3956

For questions about commencement, see: commencement.wisc.edu/
or email your questions to: commence@chancellor.wisc.edu

Apply to graduate deadline for Fall 2021: Friday, November 5

Apply to graduate deadline for Spring 2022: Friday, April 1

Final grades are due to the Office of the Registrar 72 hours after the last final exam day, regardless of whether or not a two-hour summary block exam was held. This is the deadline approved by the Faculty Senate.. For questions about final exams or submitting grades, please see the Office of the Registrar’s pages.