By Anna Hansen
Edgewood College is providing students with the option to choose pass/fail grades for the Spring 2020 semester.
Margaret Noreuil, Edgewood College vice president for academic affairs, sent the announcement in an email on Wednesday morning.
Students — both graduate and undergraduate — who wish to keep their letter grades may do so. “You will have the option to choose which courses you want changed to pass/fail – after you know what that letter grade will be,” Noreuil wrote.
“We are making these modifications understanding the extraordinary circumstances COVID-19 has created for us all,” she said, “and in the spirit of academic equity.”
This decision was voted on by faculty in a survey sent Monday morning.
Two questions were on the survey, said Lauren Lacey, chair of the English department. The first asked faculty to select yes, no or maybe for pass/fail grading; the second was a place for faculty to leave comments.
The possibility of a pass/fail grading system follows a petition created by Edgewood sophomore Marie Ruth Treleven in response to the college’s decision to suspend face-to-face courses and operate solely online due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We must think of the students’ personal life and mental health during this pandemic and how it will affect their grades,” the petition says.
Trevelen said she is pleased the college has made pass/fail grading an option. “Our administration listened to the needs that our students expressed,” she said, “and I am very happy with the results.”
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