Incomplete Grades

The policy's key features:

  1. The Incomplete (INC) form -- available on mySwarthmore eforms -- is REQUIRED.
  2. The form MUST be submitted by or BEFORE THE END of the Final Examination period.
  3. Having "too much work to do" is not considered a valid reason for an Incomplete.

Note: The Incomplete policy does not apply to courses in which the IP (In Progress) grade will be given. IP is given by the professor normally to all students in the class; INC is requested by individual students.

The full Faculty regulation on Incompletes is as follows:

Incomplete (INC) means that a student’s work is incomplete with respect to specific assignments or examinations. The faculty has voted that a student’s final grade in a course should incorporate a zero for any part of the course not completed by the date of the final examination or the end of the examination period. However, if circumstances beyond the student’s control (e.g., illness, family emergency) preclude the completion of the work by this date, a grade of INC may be assigned with the permission of the faculty instructor and the registrar. Note that “having too much work to do” is not, in fairness to other students, considered a circumstance beyond the student’s control. A form for the purpose of requesting an incomplete is available from the Registrar’s Office and must be filled out by the student and approved by the faculty instructor and returned to the registrar no later than the last day of final examinations. In such cases, incomplete work must normally be made up and graded, and the final grade recorded within 5 weeks after the start of the following term. Except by special permission of the registrar and the faculty instructor, all grades of INC still outstanding after that date will be replaced on the student’s permanent record by NC (no credit). Waiver of this provision by special permission shall in no case extend beyond 1 year from the time the INC grade was incurred. Finally, any remaining INC grades must be resolved with a final grade or NC by the Tuesday prior to a student’s graduation.