Skip to Content, Navigation, or Footer.
The Tufts Daily
Where you read it first | Friday, March 29, 2024

Faculty, students discuss pass/fail deadline extension, other academic policy changes

1000-2-1
Class of 2021 Senator Sharif Hamidi poses for a portrait in Sophia Gordon Hall on Feb. 27.

Beginning this fall, the deadline for selecting the pass/fail option on classes has been extended from five to 10 weeks into the semester for sophomores, juniors and seniors, matching the 10-week period allotted to first-years. This extension was proposed by Class of 2021 Senator Sharif Hamidi, whose resolution was passed unanimously by the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate on Jan. 29 and approved by the faculty-student Educational Policy Committee (EPC) on Feb. 7, according to a March 8 Daily article.

Through the resolution, Hamidi wanted to address the inequality between first-years and undergraduates of other class years within the pass/fail policy.

“Previously, if you were a first-year, you had up to ten weeks to declare pass or fail in your classes. The rest [of undergraduates] only had five weeks to decide. Reviewing academic policies at our peer institutions and gauging Tufts students’ thoughts on the policy, I found it necessary to have a uniform pass/fail deadlines for all undergraduate students,” Hamidi said.

Hamidi explained how this extension will allow students to be more curious and experimental in their course selections and academic experiences.

“Last year, I had conversations with many upperclassmen who wanted to take more elective courses outside of their majors -- for instance, a classics major having an interest in an elective chemistry course -- but were discouraged to explore, often due to the concerns about its impact on their GPA,” Hamidi said. “What’s really great about the extension is that the benefit of academic exploration that was limited to the first-years is now available to the entire student body. If you are a junior and you want to take a brand new course, you don’t have to worry about your GPA as much.”

Similarly, Anne Mahoney, chair of the EPC and senior lecturer in the classics department, explained the significance of the pass/fail policy in an email to the Daily.

Sometimes students are timid about taking a course in an area they don't already think they know well. If they can take the course without worrying about the grade, they're often more willing to branch out. We very much want students exploring the whole breadth of human knowledge and the entire spectrum of human cultures, and if pass/fail grading helps with that, then it's a good thing,” Mahoney said.

Recognizing the significance of the pass/fail option to Tufts students, the EPC had discussed the extension of its deadline for a while, Mahoney noted. By extending the pass/fail deadline, the committee wanted to address the rise in the number of students withdrawing from classes when they could complete the course.

“The deadline for changing to pass/fail used to be the same as the deadline for dropping a course [without record] ... at the end of the [fifth] week of term. The [Advising] Deans felt that some students were deciding too quickly to drop a course, when in fact if they stuck around until midterms they might find that they were doing better than they thought. Sometimes it takes more than [five] weeks to get the hang of a new subject,” Mahoney said.

With this new change to the policy, however, there were some concerns from the faculty as well.

“We know there are students who opt for pass/fail rather than settling for a bad grade," Mahoney said. "We decided that, on balance, it was more important to help out the students who would use this to keep on track to graduation than to make it more difficult for other students to raise their GPAs artificially."

Regarding the faculty’s concerns, Hamidi responded with a clarification of how the pass/fail option is being used by students.

“I think the faculty’s concern was largely rested on a misconception that students would somehow use the extension to inflate their GPAs. However, as it stands now, [the] pass/fail option cannot be used to fulfill credits for our foundation requirements, distribution requirements or major requirements. So the policy almost exclusively fits into the elective courses," Hamidi said. 

Hamidi reflected that he was glad to have been able to address some of the faculty’s concerns through his TCU Senate resolution and presentations to faculty, ultimately contributing to the faculty's final decision to extend the pass/fail deadline.

Changes to course withdrawal policies

The Arts, Sciences and Engineering (AS&E) faculty also voted on similar policies, which will take effect in the coming spring semester, at a Sept. 12 faculty meeting, according to Mahoney.

“We moved the last date to withdraw with a W grade earlier. [The previous deadline] has been the last day of classes; the faculty voted to move it to the end of week 10. This is to encourage students not to wait too long if they must drop a class. Often, if a student is struggling too much in one class, this can take time away from other classes, and dropping the one may help the student succeed in the others," Mahoney said.

The AS&E faculty also voted to change the "grace period" for first-year students to drop a course without any record of enrollment.

“Right now, first-year students have until week 10 to drop without record. We're leaving that in place for students in the first semester, but starting in the second semester all students will have the same deadlines: week [five] to drop without record, week 10 to choose pass/fail or to withdraw with a W grade. These two changes were proposed by the task force on student mental health [co-chaired] by [Senior Associate Dean of Undergraduate Advising for the School of Engineering] Jennifer Stephan,” Mahoney said.

Many first-year students noted that they were largely unaware of the pass/fail policy at Tufts.

“Coming into Tufts this fall, I wouldn’t say I knew too much about the pass/fail option, or that I even do now," Rabiya Ismail, Class of 2022 Senator, told the Daily in an electronic message.

“Emails should be sent out explaining the advantages [and] disadvantages of the pass/fail option, or even videos that we are required to watch, like the ones for pre-major advising versus individual advising. I learned about the pass/fail option mainly through upperclassmen and my professors just these past few weeks, but it still doesn't seem like people know all the specifics,” Ismail added.

As a newly-elected member of TCU Senate, Ismail hopes to make the university administration more transparent and communicative in its academic policies and changes with the student body. Hamidi similarly noted that the more transparent and understandable academic policies are, the better it is for the student body.

“Perhaps having an hour-long crash course on various academic policies during Orientation week might help,” Hamidi said.

Moving forward, Hamidi noted that he will continue to reflect the voices of the student body in advocating for changes to policies at Tufts.

“[A] constant growth mindset is important for institutions like Tufts to evolve and grow. We will continue to seek out what the student demand is and craft practical policies that would best serve our community,” Hamidi said.