RC students fight against new course grade policy

By Jacquelyn Nixon

Daily Staff Reporter

With the Residential College planning to use letter grades for courses in addition to narrative evaluations, many RC students who gathered in East Quad's Madrigal Lounge last night said they had not been given a chance to voice their opposition to the changes.

"There wasn't much interaction between the administration and the RC students and we weren't allowed to react. We haven't been given the opportunity to voice our views. We've just been given the grandfather clause," RC sophomore Sanjay P Hukku said.

The new grading policy was announced to students this week through an e-mail from RC Director Tom Weisskopf.

"It is standard practice within the LSA College to hold external reviews of departments and units at intervals of approximately every 10 years. The LSA College takes these reviews very seriously because they include recommendations for improving the unit and that serve as the basis for long range planning," LSA Dean Shirley Neuman and Associate LSA Dean Robert Owen said in the e-mail.

"An important consideration in this decision involves the way narrative evaluations are weighed by admissions committees of graduate and professional schools," the statement said.

Another one of the changes that will be made concerns the number of pass/fail credits allotted to RC students. "Currently RC students have more than 30 pass/fail credits, and the new plan with only given them 30 credits like all other LSA students," Hukku said.

"The college has decided to accept the recommendation of the external reviewers, and has requested that the RC convert its grading practices to conform to these of the rest of the College. Present RC students will not be affected by this change," the statement said.

Owen attended an LSA Student Government meeting Tuesday. LSA-SG passed a resolution during their meeting urging "RC faculty students and LSA faculty, students and administration to keep an open mind in all demands." The resolution also called "for further consideration by the dean's office for the concerns of RC faculty."

"The dean's main concern was to give RC students an opportunity for getting into grad school," RC sophomore Rachel Razgunas said.

Hukku, who attended yesterday's meeting with Owen, said "he ended the meeting saying that this change is a part of many changes to come."

A few members of the RC faculty were present to hear student's opinions and discuss the relationship with RC and LSA faculty.

"There are those at the RC who are not on the tenure track and they aren't respected. We have a higher percentage of them than LSA. It's kind of a class war," RC lecturer Katherine Mendeloff said.

The new plan is scheduled to be implemented in Fall 2001. Some students said they fear those who have already been accepted into the RC will arrive in a program that has become too similar to LSA. "We want to maintain diversity. We're not better or worse than LSA students, we're just different," Hukku said.