Week 3 follow-up email Principles of Constitutional Law
Dear all,
I hope my email finds you well. Personally I am quite happy about how our debates are progressing and we find our way into the debates! I am sorry if it takes more time than expected, but I do want to give everybody the chance to pronounce herself/himself/x-self on the questions and readings. I am not sure if we will be faster in the coming week, so for all those having to leave earlier (particular those forming part of groups II or IV), do let me know at the beginning of the seminar, so I can ensure you are allocated to an earlier timeslot. I do appreciate everybody's presence as I think it will be valuable for you just to listen and reflect on the issues even if you did not get a chance to do the readings, it helps in terms of participation grade too (minimum participation grade). Do let me know if you encounter difficulties with the readings or anything related to the course of course.
1) Here's next week's doodle: please sign up only once and don't withdraw, it will facilitate your peers' preparation and planning for the seminar as well: https://doodle.com/poll/vxnbpu6cb7um69mh
2) I was asked to what extent you would need to be aware of the readings of other subgroups or how deep you'd need to go into them. I sincerely do not want to overload you and would appreciate a thorough reading for the subgroups you have been allocated to. The take-home exam won't ask for extremely detailed information, it will be rather up to you, i.e. you will be required to use the literature discussed, but can obviously choose what you want to use and the parts of the readings you find relevant. So again, please listen to your peers in the seminars to get an idea of what other readings are about. I will continue contributing to this by means of comments and in the lecture of course. I think you will be very well prepared.
3) Similarly, I was asked to provide a compulsory/recommended reading list. I am afraid I cannot distinguish: please consider your subgroups' reading as compulsory and anything else as recommended. I think the compulsory parts are doable, I actually carefully checked this before even putting the readings together, because I cannot expect you to do more than that given the workload for other courses.
4) Again, I was approached regarding the public holiday/liberation day issue. I think actually there are no other options apart from compressing it so to say, having lecture and seminars in one single day. Easter holidays take place until April 23, April 25 is a public holiday and 26 is a day that would prevent you from having a long weekend. Moving our lectures and seminars to a different week is absolutely impossible since you have your exams the preceding week and the week after you'd be overloaded in terms of readings/materials to be studies. April 24 is the only day in that week really.
5) Relatedly, you do not need to show up on April 24 if you are travelling provided that you do not miss more than 25% of the course in terms of seminars. If there are reasons of force majeure, we will look into the case of course and I urge you to let me know about special circumstances as soon as you can.
6) The recording of this week’s lecture has been uploaded (find it under course materials). Please find the lecture slides here:
https://prezi.com/view/4RGPT0XDOndc3J3f4Yyz/
Warm wishes,
Jessika
- Principles of Constitutional Law (A-L) (GIU0748)