Thank You for Choosing BrightMinds Online School as Part of Your Studies. 

We are delighted to have you as a member of our growing global community of e-learners  The following are our school’s academic and administrative policies and expectations. Please take the time to carefully review them.
1. Course Fee: 

	Non-credit	Grade 1-8	Grade 9	Grade 10	Grade 11	Grade 12
Local Students	$199	$499	$449	$499	$549	$599
International Students with Study Permit	$199	$1,000	$1,000	$1,000	$1,000	$1,000
International Students Without Study Permit	$199	$1,250	$1,250	$1,250	$1,250	$1,250

2. Refund Policy: BrightMinds Online School does not issue a refund. All payments are final.
3. Transfer Policy: You have the option of transferring from one course to another within the first two weeks of each semester’s start date. If you request a transfer, an administrative fee of $50 will be required as the preliminary work of registration will have to be repeated by our staff. 
4. Extension Policy:  All our semesters have a clear start and end date as indicated under our school semesters. You have the opportunity to extend a course within the last two weeks of each semester if you are unable to complete the course by its original end date. Request for an extension and payment can be done online and through our website:

• Two Weeks Extension
• Four Weeks Extension

Please be informed that

• a course can only be extended from its original end date for a maximum of 4 weeks;
• extensions do not apply to Spring (April to June) and Summer (July-August) courses;
• extensions are non-refundable. 

5. Prerequisite Policy: Certain courses require you to have completed a prerequisite course. This is especially the case for grade 10, 11 and 12 courses. We do require that you submit evidence of the successful completion of the prerequisite course in the form of:

• an Ontario Student Transcript (OST) OR
• a Credit Counselling Summary OR
• an Ontario Provincial Report Card OR
• An equivalent document in English 

Please be informed that the prerequisite course must have been successfully completed prior to your enrollment at BrightMinds. BrightMinds Online School will not issue a letter of enrollment, a midterm or a final report card until you provide proper evidence that the prerequisite course has indeed been completed. If you fail to submit such evidence within the first two weeks of the Semester’s start date, then your enrolment in the course will be considered not for credit. All documents can be emailed to Info@BrightMindsOnlineSchool.ca.
6. Attendance Policy: Attendance plays an important role in your success in the course and as such you are encouraged to maintain an ongoing presence in the e-learning portal. You are required to log in to your student account at least once a week (Monday to Sunday) to be considered Present in the course.

• Students who are enrolled in the Fall, Winter, and Spring courses are required to be present at least 7 out of the 11 weeks of instruction. 
• Students who are enrolled in the Summer credit courses are required to be present at least 4 out of the 6 weeks of instruction.

Once a student is withdrawn, they will not be re-enrolled unless they request and pay to repeat the course. 7. Late Submission and Re-Submission Policy: At BrightMinds, academic and administrative staff work closely to monitor and support your progress in the course. We believe that the “lateness” of work is not a reflection of your academic competence, but rather a manifestation of your work habits, such as time management and planning. We also understand that even the best of students can fall behind every now and then. As such, assigned evaluation activities (AOLs) can be submitted within 4 weeks of the indicated due date. Works that are submitted after this extended deadline will receive a mark 0. Please be informed that we do not allow for re-submission of assigned evaluation activities (AOLs). The re-submit button that is available on our Learning Management System (LMS) is a default setting and we are unable to remove it. Its presence on the platform does not mean that we accept resubmission.
8. Plagiarism Plagiarism occurs when you present another person’s work as your own. To ensure the integrity of the course and the credit, your online instructors will use a variety of software and commercial search engines to detect material that has been plagiarized. Any case of academic dishonesty will be reported to the administration and one or more of the following actions will be taken:

• You will be required to redo the work; 
• You will be given an opportunity to demonstrate expectations on an alternative assignment; 
• Your parent/guardian will be informed if plagiarism becomes a reoccurring issue (two or more incidents); 
• You will be assigned a task related to the ethics and morals of cheating and/or plagiarism; 
• You may be suspended/expelled from the course if more than five incident occurs. 

9. Email, and Marking Response Time: While the course content is available to you 24/7, our administrative staff and our e-learning instructors have the following office hours and are only able to respond to your administrative and academic inquiries during these hours:

***Monday to Friday 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. ***

• Email Response Time: Your e-learning instructor will reply back to your academic inquiry within 2 business days and admin staff will respond back to your administrative questions within 1 business day of the receipt time. 
• Feedback Response Time: Where applicable, your e-learning instructor will provide descriptive feedback to you on the work submitted within 5 business days of the receipt time. 
• Marking Response Time: Your e-learning instructor will mark your work within 5 business days of the receipt time. 
• Final Report Cards are issued 5 business days after the exam is written. 

Please be informed that BrightMinds Online School observes all national and regional statutory holidays.
10. Understanding AFL/AAL/AOL  Please take the time to familiarize yourself with the three types of assessment.

	Assessment For Learning (AFL)	Assessment As Learning (AAL)	Assessment Of Learning (AOL)
Conducted by	Teacher	Student	Teacher
Purpose	To provide descriptive feedback to you: What you did well; What needs improvement; How to improve.	1. To provide descriptive feedback to myself (self-assessment) or to my peers (peer assessment) 2. To become a reflective, self-monitoring learner	1. To assign a grade 2. To determine your achievement level

As you may notice, only the Assessment Of Learning is used for grades. Do not, however, let this restrict your engagement with the course. All assessments are an opportunity to participate in learning activities and receive feedback to encourage your learning.
11. Final Exam Policy:  At BrightMinds, final exams are closed book and must be written under the supervision of a designated proctor during the exam week. Final exam information is shared with you ahead of time and under the course announcement. At BrightMinds, final exam is the last evaluation activity (AOL) collected. Once final exam is written, no missing evaluation activity (AOLs) will be accepted. You have the following exam options:

• In Person Examination: You can write the exam, free of charge in our Markham office with a prior appointment. We are located at: Unit 103-8312 McCowan Rd. Unionville ON L3P 8E1. Appointments can be made by email: Info@BrightMindsOnlineSchool.ca 
• Online Examination: You can write the exam online, for a fee, paid directly to Proctor U.

In order to use ProctorU you will need the following:

• • • Proctor U Account; 

    • high-speed internet connection; 

    • webcam (internal or external); 

    • Windows or Mac Operating System; 

    • Government-issued photo ID.

***Please be informed that we do not work with independent proctors.***
12. Code of Conduct: By taking an online course, you have joined a community of virtual learners. From administrative to academic staff, to you as a student and to your fellow classmates, we are all required to adhere to certain policies and expectations. Examples of inappropriate behavior include but are not limited to:

• Harassment; 
• Using inappropriate and/or abusive language or conduct;
• Posting racially, culturally or religiously offensive language, images, and files; 
• Posting defamatory, abusive, obscene, profane, pornographic or sexually explicit texts, files, and images;
• Sending messages of sexual harassment or which contains inappropriate romantic overtones;
• Attempting to hide, disguise or misrepresent the identity of the sender.