ADA STATEMENT

NCTC will adhere to all applicable federal, state, and local laws, regulations and guidelines with respect to providing reasonable accommodations to afford equal educational opportunity. It is the student’s responsibility to contact the Office for Students with Disabilities to arrange appropriate accommodation.  See the OSD Syllabus Addendum.

AI STATEMENT

Absent a clear statement from a course instructor, use of or consultation with generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) or other similar technologies shall be treated analogously to assistance from another person, agency, or entity. In particular, using generative AI tools to substantially complete an assignment or exam is not permitted. Students should acknowledge the use of generative AI (other than incidental use) and default to disclosing such assistance when in doubt.

When students use generative AI to replace the rigorous demands of personal engagement with their coursework, it runs counter to the educational mission of the college and undermines the heart of education itself. Artificial Intelligence, large language models, and other such technologies hold promise for deploying knowledge in service to others and accelerating the discovery of new knowledge. However, such technology poses new challenges to pedagogy and to integrity. Within the context of the teaching mission of the college and consistent with the Student Code of Conduct, the authority defines the appropriate use, study, and deployment of these technologies’ rests with the faculty.

Individual course instructors, in coordination with their divisions, set policies regulating the use of generative AI tools in their courses, including allowing or disallowing some or all uses of such tools. Course instructors will set such policies in their course syllabi and clearly communicate such policies to students. Students who are unsure of policies regarding generative AI tools are encouraged to ask their instructors for clarification.

STUDENT HANDBOOK

Students are expected to follow all the rules and regulations found in the Student Handbook.

STUDENT SERVICES

NCTC provides a multitude of services and resources to support students.  See the Student Services Syllabus Addendum for a listing of those departments and links to their sites.

QUESTIONS, CONCERNS, or COMPLAINTS

The student should contact the instructor to deal with any questions, concerns, or complaints specific to the class.  If the student and faculty are not able to resolve the issue, the student may contact the chair or coordinator of the division.  If the student remains unsatisfied, the student may proceed to contact the instructional dean.

Name of Chair/Coordinator: Charles Adams           

Office location: Flower Mound Campus, room 107B

Telephone number: 972-899-8361

E-mail address: cadams@nctc.edu

Name of Instructional Dean: Mary D. Martinson

Office location: Gainesville Campus, Room 1409

Telephone number: 940-668-4209 ext. 4377

E-mail address:  mmartinson@nctc.edu

Your final grade will be determined through quizzes, discussions, and four exams.  Part of your grade will be determined by weekly discussions over, in particular, the course readings.  These will give you an opportunity to exchange ideas and thoughts with your classmates.  The exchanges will be between yourselves.  I will monitor the proceedings, participating in them if they get off topic or the tone of the conversation gets out of hand. To receive full points in the weekly discussions, you need to make an initial response of at least 250 words.  That will count for 50% of the grade.  The other 50% will be earned by responding to two of your classmates (25% for each classmate response).  Those responses will be at least 150 words.  When responding to your classmates, it must go beyond “I agree” or “I disagree.”  You can certainly say that you do so, of course, but you should state why, i.e. give an informed response.  Another great way to respond to a classmate’s post is to ask questions that would further the conversation. 

You will have online assignments over the chapters you read each week. I will make the quizzes available for you to take on Canvas on Sunday at midnight. They will be open throughout the week and will close at 11:59 PM on the following Sunday. You can take them any time between those days. PLEASE NOTE THAT YOU MUST HAVE THE ASSIGNMENTS COMPLETED BY THE DEADLINE. Unless you have an extreme emergency (such as a death in the family, a serious personal or family illness, or things of this nature), you will not be able to make up a missed quiz. This work will be worth 25% of your final grade.

There will also be FOUR major exams throughout the course of the semester. Each exam will cover a “fourth” of the course. The exams will consist of multiple choice and short ID/SIGNIFICANCE questions, and one long essay. A week before the exam you will receive a review with a list of key terms, which will be the basis of those questions. It is my intention to return the graded exams within a week. The exams will count for 75% of your course grade.

Because you have numerous grades for this course, I will not assign nor accept any

extra credit.

Exam Dates (This is a tentative schedule. I may change it should I see the need to do so.)

Exam 1: Sunday, 1/25

Exam 2: Sunday, 2/8

Exam 3: Sunday, 2/22

Final Exam: Sunday 3/9

Grade Breakdown:

Exams:            75%

Online Work: 25%

Total:               100%

Contacting Me and Meeting with Me:

Email is the best way to contact me. I check my mail multiple times a day. I have a 24 hour policy when it comes to responding to your email. The only exception will be if you email me over the weekend. I may not respond as quickly as I would in the week. This is not to discourage you from emailing me over the weekend, however. Please do so to document issues that may arise over the weekend.

I also have a 24 hour policy when it comes to responding to phone calls. If I do not pick up, simply leave me a message and I will get in contact with you as soon as I can.

Plagiarism and Cheating:

Plagiarism and cheating will not be tolerated in this class. If you are caught cheating or plagiarizing, you will flunk this course and I will report the incident. If this is not the first reported instance of this, you may be expelled from the college. Plagiarism is defined, but not limited to, the use of another person’s ideas as your own without citations. This also includes

essays generated through AI.

A Little About Me and Some Final Thoughts:

My name is Adrien D. Ivan and I am a full time instructor at Vernon College. I have a bachelor’s degree in history from Texas A&M University, a master’s degree in history from Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and a doctorate at the University of North Texas. My research specialty is in the American Civil War and Reconstruction, particularly Texas and the effects of the abolition of slavery on the Texas elite. I am also interested in American and European military history and in ancient Greece and Rome. I was born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, the son of an Air Force officer. My wife and I live in the Wichita Falls area, along with our two sons and two crazy dogs.

I would like to take the last space of this syllabus to talk about how to succeed in this course and in all your other courses across the disciplines. When it comes to academic success, intelligence is not what divides the successful from the less-successful. Although intelligence certainly does help, what makes a student successful is good time management. Undergraduate students, especially newly admitted freshmen, have a hard time transitioning between high school and college because they think they can approach college like they did high school. Trust me, for most people, it does not work. When you were in high school, at least when I was, you would have exams on one, maybe two, chapters of whatever you were studying. You would then study them one or two nights before the exam. If you look at the class schedule for this class, each exam covers a minimum of four chapters, and those chapters can be long. Studying all the material for college the night before an exam can be disastrous. You simply do not have the time to do that and you will most likely be unable to retain the material for the exam. The key, therefore, is to break down whatever you need to study in more manageable parts. For example, you should begin studying for your exam a week before it. To make your studying less traumatic, total up the pages that you need to read and divide by six. Whatever the number you come up with is a more controllable amount to study per day. Your seventh day, test day, should be for review and taking the exam. Always remember the adage: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. You can apply this method to any course you take throughout the remainder of your academic career. A final note about studying: when studying for the exam, it should not be the first time you study the material. You should be reading the material during the week it is due, or else how can you take the quiz and do well on it? Rather, studying for the exam should be at the very least the second time you have encountered the material that you will be tested over.

Success in your courses is kind of like winning a championship in sports, it is a long process. You cannot earn the grade you desire at the beginning of the course, but you certainly can lose your opportunity to achieve it. From the first day, therefore, you must do everything possible to get the grade you want. Here are some more tips that I can provide that you can certainly take advantage of. Use a two spiral approach to your notes. Take one spiral and label it “Class.” This is the one you will take to class and write your notes. You can be as messy as you want, as long as you can understand what you are writing. When you get home, though, take your second spiral, label it “Home.” In it, nicely and neatly re-write your notes. This does a couple of things. First, it exposes you to the material a second time, and if you are keeping up with your reading, that’s a third time. Second, it lets you know what questions that you may have to ask during class. I would recommend that you ask the questions publicly so that everyone can

benefit. Knowledge breeds confidence, and the more you know, the more confident you will be, and the better you can perform in this course.

My final tip is simple: use all the resources you have available. This college is here for one thing: YOU. Everyone, from the most junior staff member to the president of the college, work here for your betterment. You have many resources at your disposal. The most important one is me. Come and see me at my office, call me on my phone, or email me. I am here to ensure that you have ample opportunities to succeed. If you think that your tuition is to allow you to just attend class, think again. Imagine your tuition as a bill for a bundle (cable, internet, phone) from Time Warner Cable. If you are just attending class, you are paying for all three services but just using the cable.  After all, you are paying for it, even if you don’t use it.

Always remember that I am not the enemy, boogeyman, nor do I want you to fail. I remember when I was going through high school, my teachers put a fear of professors in us, saying we relish failing students and serve as a way to weed out students. That cannot be farther from the truth. This course is scary enough and I don’t want to add to your worries about it and any other course you have. I WANT YOU TO PASS THIS COURSE. I promise you that I will do everything in my power to ensure your success. If you need my help, all you need to do is ask for it. Here’s what I won’t do: take your quizzes and exams for you. When you want my help, or any other instructor’s help for that matter, it makes things a lot easier for the both of us if you do some things BEFORE you come to me. Here are the most important ones. First, attend class. Now sitting there and nodding off is NOT attending class. You will notice that unless the majority of the class is asleep, I will not wake you up. You are the one who chose the time to

attend class. Please plan your personal sleep schedule accordingly. Attending class, paying attention, taking notes, and asking questions can help solve problems before they begin. Second, read the textbook both before and after class. This makes lectures more understandable as you listen and when you review your notes. Third, know where you are struggling. Please don’t come

to me and say “I need help on everything.” The first question I will ask you is “do you have your lecture notes?” If you don’t have good notes, it is much harder for me to help you. If you do these things, you will less problems and I can help you to a greater extent.

Finally, for those of you that are “bad at history” or just do not like it, I can certainly relate. There are things that I do not enjoy reading about as they simply do not interest me. How do I get through it? I just read the material with an open mind and think of it as a story. Think of your favorite novel or movie, are there tedious parts in it despite the overall work being really good? That’s how history is, it has peaks and valleys of interest for everyone. Read the material for this course for what it is, a story that helps us define what we mean when we say “American.”  When you place your readings within that context, it should help you be more engaged within the material.