Wellness days become an excused absence at Towson University starting Spring 2026

By Jaylen Beaner-Walker, Staff Writer

Towson University is implementing an excused student wellness day into its attendance policy starting in the Spring 2026 semester, two years after it was originally passed by the Student Government Association. 

According to an absence policy document provided by Joyce Garczynski, chair of the Academic Senate, students are allowed to take one excused wellness day per course during a semester. Students are not allowed to claim a wellness day during final exams, clinical placements, internships, fieldwork or placements at external sites. 

This excused wellness day has been in the works for years by Towson’s Student Government Association, known as SGA, being first introduced as a resolution in November of 2023. It was passed by the Academic Senate this past May. 

In this span of time, SGA worked to create a suitable proposal for the Academic Senate that respects Towson’s attendance policy while also keeping students’ well-being in mind, according to Melanie Perreault, provost and executive vice president for Academic Affairs.

Perreault said that during this process, research was done to see if there was a blueprint that could be drawn or followed from other universities’ policies on attendance and student wellness. 

“Some of the feedback I gave them is to do a little research on whether other universities were doing anything similar to that,” said Perreault. “I pushed back and said, I’m interested in doing what you’re talking about, but let’s make sure we craft this together to make sure it hits what we’re actually trying to achieve.” 

Perreault said that after several revisions as well as additional assistance from academic deans, the provost and SGA were able to come up with an appropriate proposal for the Academic Senate.

“There’s all kinds of things that people need to do besides just going to class every day, right?” Perreault said. “And so this is going to allow them to do that in a way that sort of protects that activity, but doesn’t make it expand so much as to say, class attendance doesn’t really matter, because it does.”

For SGA, the passing of this bill marks an impactful milestone as it signifies the importance of having students’ concerns be heard by those in leadership, Vice President Liam Brinton said.

“I know it can be hard sometimes for people to give us another excuse for a day off, but the fact that the staff at the university took a look at this bill and saw, okay, this is something we’re going to pass, says a lot about how they value our mental health and they value our students as people,” Brinton said.

Moving forward, Brinton hopes for SGA to continue its work recognizing the mental health struggles that students may face and the underlying factors to prevent them from becoming even bigger issues in the future.

First-year student Sanai Whittington sees this excused wellness day policy as a great opportunity to take a day to recuperate without having to worry about the consequences of missing one day of class.

“I mean [students] should be motivated to go to class and learn, but also not fear that if they miss one day because they physically can’t get out of bed, then it’s the end of the world,” Whittington said.

First-year student Feyi Amokomowo also thinks that the wellness day will make professors more aware of how students’ mental health may play a part in poor class performance.

“I definitely think that if it’s at least one day, I think it’ll allow professors to see who might need more attention,” Amokomowo said.