Dear Students:
As many of you are now living at home or are in a location away from the UMass Amherst campus, your current residence may be in a different time zone from the Eastern Time Zone. Depending upon where you are located in the world, this difference in time zones may impact your final exam experience.
Exams start one hour later: To accommodate the majority of students currently living in different time zones, the Final Exam day/time matrix will be moved one hour later. As a reminder, final exams start on Friday, May 1st with the last exam day scheduled for Thursday, May 7th.
Original Start Time of Final Exam NEW Start Time of Final Exam
8:00 am - 10:00 am 9:00 am - 11:00 am
10:30 am - 12:30 pm 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
1:00 pm - 3:00 pm 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
3:30 pm - 5:30 pm 4:30 pm - 6:30 pm
6:00 pm - 8:00 pm 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Adjustments for students in different time zones: If you are currently living in a time zone where you are beyond a three hour time difference from the Eastern Time Zone (EDT) and the time the exam is scheduled to start falls outside a 6:00 am – 10:00 pm time block within your respective time zone , you should contact your faculty or course instructor to make accommodations to take the exam at a different time. Faculty members and course instructors are required to provide a make-up exam time for you.
For example, a student who is currently residing in Hawaii is experiencing a 6 hour time difference from the Eastern Time Zone. If this student has a scheduled 9:00 am final exam this would convert to 3:00 am local time for that student and therefore fall into an allowable request for a make-up exam scheduled at a different time. However, a final exam scheduled for the 4:30 pm EDT time block would not qualify for a request for an alternative time as the 4:30 pm EDT time would equate to 10:30 am Hawaii time (within the 6:00 am – 10:00 pm allowable time block).
Request Process: If your time zone falls outside the 6:00 am – 10:00 pm time block for allowable start time of a final exam, you may either decide to take the final exam anyway as originally scheduled, or request an alternative make-up time to take the final exam. This request must go to the faculty member or course instructor by Wednesday, April 29th, 5:00 pm (EDT) and the faculty member is required to provide a make-up exam time that falls within the allowable 6:00 am – 10:00 pm time block in the time zone where you are currently living.
Please visit your SPIRE account to confirm your final exam schedule for each of your courses. Please remember that SPIRE lists the final exam time according to Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). You should calculate your local time zone difference from this Eastern Time Zone to determine whether you qualify for a make-up exam request (the start time of the exam falls outside of the 6:00 am – 10:00 pm time block within your local time zone). If you have questions regarding your time zone and whether your scheduled final exam falls within or outside the allowable time block please feel free to reach out to the Student Success office at studentsuccess@umass.edu.
Students who are enrolled in courses with conflicting scheduled exams or who have three or more exams scheduled in one calendar day should use this web form - www.umass.edu/registrar/final-exam-conflicts. When you submit the form it will automatically be sent to the Registrar’s Office staff who will review the exam information. Once the information is verified, emails will be sent to the student and the instructor of the course that needs to make adjustments and arrange for a make-up exam for the student.
Thank you and best wishes with the remainder of the Spring 2020 semester, a semester none of us will ever forget!
Carol A. Barr, Ph.D.
Senior Vice Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Education