After considering implementing a religious holiday policy for class attendance, the Government of the Student Body recently found there was already a policy in affect, but is perhaps not as well-known to students as it should be.

On Feb. 28, GSB senator Ian Guffy, senior in computer science and chairmen of the Religious Holiday Committee, received a link from Associate Counsel Keith Bystrom to the Equal Opportunity and Diversity office’s Web site.

According to the site, “Students and employees may request reasonable accommodation of their religious practices if those practices conflict with academic or employment requirements. In all cases, you must put your request in writing.”

Students should first discuss the conflict and requested accommodation from a professor. Assistance is also available from the Dean of Students Office or the Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity.

Employees should inform supervisors of the conflict and the requested accommodation. Assistance is available from Human Resource Services or the Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity.

Guffy said many people, including administrators, knew about his committee and had not mentioned anything to him about the policy that was already in effect.

“That policy statement was obviously not very well known,” he said.

The Faculty Senate currently has a resolution that would raise awareness about the policy by putting a reference to it in the faculty handbook and including it in the course catalog. A suggestion has also been made to refer to the policy in course syllabi. Guffy said the resolution would be voted on at the next meeting, which he will be attending, and hopes the resolution passes.

Guffy said all the work GSB has done on the issue will be compiled in a report for anyone who will take up the issue next, along with suggestions of what should be included as guidelines for the policy. Guffy said there has been a discussion on the possibility of putting together a committee of faculty, administrators and students to discuss implementing guidelines to the current policy.

The current policy may be located in the Iowa State Policy Library because it is easier for people to access, Bystrom said.

Through the university counsel office, the idea of a policy library was initiated a few years ago to collect all of the universitywide policies and put them in one place, so students would always have the most current and accurate policies, Bystrom said. In the past, policies were located in different areas and would not always match up.

“Inconsistencies were starting to creep into it,” he said.

Bystrom said if GSB were to implement part of its draft as guidelines to the current policy, they would be guidelines and procedures in how to implement the accommodation of the policy.

“Guidelines and procedures can be changed more easily than the actual policy,” he said.

Guffy said the reason the policy was so unknown was possibly because of where the statement was located.

“I think [it was unknown] because the place it existed doesn’t really make sense for the policy,” he said.

If a student has something that conflicts with class, looking at policies that involve employees is not going to be the first place he or she will look, Guffy said.

The Religious Holiday Committee was formed last fall because Guffy was told there was no attendance policy concerning religious holidays.

Guffy, president of the Jewish student campus group ISU Hillel, said individuals have shared their concerns with him about how instructors are not always understanding of religious holidays as an excuse.

He feels the main reason for this confusion was that no one really knows how to handle these things or how to approach any accommodations, from either the instructor’s or student’s viewpoint.

“I hear all these horror stories from people,” Guffy said.