Withdrawal policy now offers more options

A new withdrawal procedure has been proposed by the JMU Faculty Senate that would allow instructors the option of assigning a grade other than F to students who withdraw after the course adjustment period.

The new policy will allow professors to assign a regular letter grade A through F, an incomplete, a WP — withdrawal while passing — or WF — withdrawal while failing — acccording to Douglas Brown, provost and vice president for academic affairs.

A W only will be given if a student withdraws before the course adjustment date, which occurs about 60 percent of the way through a semester.

Current policies state that any student withdrawing after the course adjustment date will be given an F unless the grade is appealed and changed. Medical withdrawal after the course adjustment date still is possible with the new procedure.

Brown said the proposed changes would be more beneficial to students.

"I think that students interpreted that there are fewer options in the proposal, but there are more,"

Brown said. "In the proposal, the discretion will be given back to the individual faculty member, whereas now students are given an F unless the grade is appealed.

"What students may not know is that the majority of appeals were denied, so at least this gives the students more opportunity," Brown said.

However, students still can appeal their grades if they so choose.

"The standard grade can still be appealed, but what disappears is the special committee set up to deal with the appeals," Brown said. "Appeals will go through the department head."

Brown said he feels the change will help students.

"In my view, this provides additional flexibility that wasn't there before," Brown said. "This should be beneficial to students."

Junior Ricardo Pineres, SGA committee chairperson for academic affairs, said, "When [the Faculty Senate] approved the procedure it was done by an 18 to 13 vote, which indicates even within the faculty there was a lot of debate and discussion on this issue.

"This indicates to the administration that this procedure needs to be revised. This [new withdrawal procedure] is detrimental to JMU students and faculty," he said.

Prior to this decision, the Student Government Association took a stance against it. The SGA disapproved of the changes with a two-thirds vote in the Student Senate and a unanimous vote of the Executive Council.

"An overwhelming majority of SGA did not agree that the process should be changed, mainly because there is nothing wrong with the current procedure — if it's not broke, don't fix it," Student Body President Levar Stoney said.

"The new procedure gives faculty members too much discretion," Stoney said. "SGA is going to be proactive in this issue; we will make sure students know what is going on behind the scenes. We are here to serve, inform, educate."

Pineres agreed that there was no reason to change the current withdrawal procedure.

"We, the SGA, do not think the changes benefit the students," Pineres said.

He added that he thought there is already too much ambiguity in the grading scale, and the new policy would add more even subjectivity.

"Currently, some professors use pluses and minuses, while others choose not to; some say that 90 to 100 percent is an A and others say that 93 to 100 percent is an A," he said.