On Sunday, April 5, the Student Government Association (SGA) passed a proclamation calling for a reconsideration of the Pass/Fail (P/F) optional grading policy which Stevens adopted on March 22. Provost Christophe Pierre responded with a letter on April 17, stating that Stevens will not be modifying the existing policy.
In the letter, the provost stressed that the benefits of the P/F optional grading policy and the Double A grading policy are inherently similar, as they both “intend to make the grading scale equitable during this semester’s disruption.” It was also detailed that students will have several options to receive extra assistance, including but not limited to a written disclaimer on transcripts, flexibility with incomplete grades, and expanded online advising by the Office of Undergraduate Academics. The full response from the provost is provided below.
The students who proposed the Proclamation, Diversity and Inclusion Committee Advocate Eli Trakhtenberg and Senators Nasir Montalvo and Matthew Cunningham, expressed the following in a joint statement: “This is not the outcome that we believe students need and that we worked so hard for, and we believe maintaining the optional pass/fail grading policy will have far-reaching consequences. We’re disappointed that administrators discounted the overwhelming number of student testimonials that expressed a significant need for a new grading policy, and we can only hope that, moving forward, administrators will include students at the table in crucial decisions.”
Samantha Molla, the President of the SGA, and Anthony Tesori, the Vice President of Academic Affairs, have additionally expressed their thoughts in a joint statement: “We were very impressed with how thorough the Provost’s response was to the proclamation. After students put weeks of preparation into writing the survey and proclamation, seeing that it was thoroughly reviewed and thoughtfully analyzed to this extent is something that we rarely get from SGA initiatives. They [the Office of the Provost] have been consistent and very responsive to recommendations that we have provided from both the cabinet and our CAR chair, such as creating the new email alias for academic concerns, increasing flexibility with incomplete grades, and adding a disclaimer to all transcripts regarding this semester.”
Molla and Tesori further noted that the goal of the proclamation was “never to implement the Double A policy specifically, but it was to present it along with several other recommendations to address the hardships students are facing. Although the outcome may not be what some students may have wanted, we believe that the university is taking the proper steps towards ensuring that we all receive the best learning experience we can during these uncertain times and are given all of the resources that we need.”
Be First to Comment