The University of Rhode Island faculty senate proposed to change the manual’s second grade option provisions, allowing students the ability to retake a course at any time during their undergraduate careers.
Changes to the second grade option provision concern chapter eight of the university manual.
The idea of negating the transcript GPA is something that has upset students in the past, according to the faculty senate’s vice president, Travis Williams. Ignoring the GPA found on students’ transcripts has made graduation honors calculations much more difficult.
This semester, the senate plans to reconsider circumstances under which a student would be able to have a third and fourth option, allowing students to retake a course three to four times and have the opportunity to factor only their most recent grade into their transcript GPA, according to Williams.
“There’s plenty of evidence, especially with honors in graduation, that people are upset and rightly so when they graduate,” Williams said. “The university gets a lot of letters about this.”
The GPA on student transcripts will no longer be ignored in calculating which students will receive honors, according to Williams. This will ensure students are aware of what to expect on graduation day in regards to receiving awards.
“There are some changes to the General Education Program that are likely to come through this semester,” Williams said, “What are the conditions under which someone could repeat a course, a second or third time?”
A few other peer institutions, such as the other public institutions in New England, North Dakota and the midwest have already incorporated these changes to their own second grade option provisions and URI has followed suit, according to Williams.
“In as much as URI is an ambitious university and we want to continue to improve ourselves and the experience that everyone has, we have to at least be at par with our peer institutions, both those that are like us and those that are aspirational peers,” said Williams.
