Awareness of the “dead week” policy at Sacramento State gets the professors talking about the institution and its relevance towards teaching.

“Dead week” is the week prior to finals which is generally used for student finals review and prohibits professors from adding new material to their syllabi.

According to Ethnic Studies Professor Ricky Green, dead week is not widely recognized by professors on Sac State’s campus.

“Professors who don’t introduce new assignments are following the policy without realizing it,” Green said. “It is not a good idea to surprise students with new assignments so close to the end of the semester.”

“There are a lot of faculty and students who are not aware of the dead week policy,” said Child Development Professor Susan Gomez.

No introduction of new material and review for the final is being fair to the students, said Development of Art Professor Lita Sue Whitesel.

“They don’t need that extra pressure,” Whitesel said. “Although I don’t have a final for my class, students need to know in advance what to expect from me for the whole semester.”

Faculty receive mailed paperwork describing the significance of dead week, said Professor Jessie Mulira.

“Dead week is the week where no major exams or assignments are to be issued, unless it is stated on the syllabus,” Mulira said.

“Professors are sticking to the policy more than they used to,” Mulira said. “Sac State is the only school that I have worked at that has the dead week policy.”

Whether or not the policy is useful depends on the professor, said Gomez.

“I have mixed feelings about the usefulness of the policy,” Gomez said. “For classes where there are papers and presentations, the students need the extra time to prepare. It is not useful otherwise.”

The term “dead week” does not describe what actually happens during this time, Mulira said.

“Why do they call it dead week when things don’t stop?” Mulira asked. “They shouldn’t label it ‘dead week’, it should be a regular week.”

To the older crowd, dead week was referred to as a week to catch up on your studying for the classes that you had finals in, said Green.

“There was no activity,” Green said.

Mulira believes that because the semester is sixteen weeks long, there is no reason not to use all of them.”

Students need to be in school the whole sixteen weeks,” Mulira said. “Having the dead week policy is a good idea.”