Keeping students on track for graduation was at the root of yesterday’s conversation in the academic senate meeting. photo by Glenn Marshall
By Robert Rios, Co-News Editor
The Academic Senate Wednesday voted in favor of greatly modifying the grading system for the spring semester, allowing students the choice to convert any letter grade they receive for spring semester classes into credit/non-credit.
If approved by President Thomas A. Parham, the policy would allow undergraduates up to June 8, after grades are assigned, to keep an A, B or C in a class, which would be included in their GPA, or an NC for grades C- or below. Students who choose the latter option would not have their GPAs affected.
“We need to be more sympathetic, we need to be more flexible, and we need to provide flexibility for the students,” Dr. Katy Pinto told the Bulletin earlier this week about why the senate was considering changing the grading policy this semester.
The senate’s first meeting since the mid-March closure of the school was also a first in that it was done over Zoom Initially, the meeting echoed some of the problems students had in their online classes a couple of weeks ago, as audio problems hindered communication, but they were eventually smoothed out.
The credit/no credit option was one of several items on the agenda, but it was most pressing as it included Pinto’s summary of the results of a survey sent to all faculty members last week asking them their opinion about whether to change the grading structure this semester.
Many faculty members responded that they approved of the credit/no credit option, as it could help students who are having troubles making the transition to online instruction. The senate voted 38 in favor, 2 abstain, and 0 against.
In and of itself, the recommendation is not binding, but it will be passed onto President Thomas A. Parham. Two weeks ago, the California State University provosts met to discuss the issue and decided that instead of waiting for the Chancellor’s office to make an announcement, each campus would deal with this issue on its own.
A few changes were made to the original recommendation. One change suggested by Provost Micheal Spagna was to move the date of registration for students to petition for the change from May 8 to June 8, or after the time grades are posted. One thing emphasized in the meeting was doing everything possible to ensure students are fully informed of the grading option, such as all advising units and departments offering assistance on any questions.
“A lot of students are having concerns, is this gonna bite later on in my trajectory to go forward,” Spagna said, emphasizing that he didn’t want any unintended consequences to ensue for students who opt for NC. “From my standpoint if the chancellor’s office was to say we want maximum flexibility and students can change this option on their own volition, even past the semester, I’m good with it. But there is a lot of advising that needs to go with this. I just don’t want to miss any students with a net, to be able to say, you know what we told you it was okay because of COVID-19, and now I’m sorry you can’t go on to that next trajectory.”
The change, if approved, would affect graduate and undergraduate students differently. Undergraduates could keep an A, B or C minus letter grade and take NC for a D plus or below. Graduate students could keep an A, B or C grade and NC for C minus and below.
In light of COVID-19’s unprecedented impact on the educational process, the senate recommended that under these special circumstances, students would not have to provide evidence or pay any fees when petitioning at the Registrar’s Office for the NC option.
One issue some of the senators and faculty members in the survey expressed was that graduate programs require for their students to carry a grade no lower than a B to finish their semester.
“The way our graduate program is structured, B or higher is what we consider a passing grade in our program,” Terry McGlynn of the biology department said.” “So I think we can slide for a B minus, but i think I’m gonna have to vote no on the C. “
Senator Monique Willis of the Marital & Family Therapy program, also felt there would be consequences for the graduate programs down the line.
“This again would be problematic in that for one, we’ve designed our program and are moving our program in a way towards accreditation and moving towards competency basis,” Willis said. “Allowing a C grade to count as passing would be problematic.”
Academic Senate Chair, Charles E. Thomas explained that if a student were to earn a C, the consequences that came with a C, would still be there.
