<p>[Academic</a> Forgiveness: the Price of Pardon - Commentary - The Chronicle of Higher Education - June 10, 2013 - By Jonathan Marx and David Meeler](<a href=“http://chronicle.com/article/Academic-Forgiveness-the/139691/]Academic”>http://chronicle.com/article/Academic-Forgiveness-the/139691/)</p>
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<p>I think this is worthy of its own thread. Perhaps a counter-observation will encourage that.</p>
<p>Among other attributes, college is a time for young people to explore. Do we really want to discourage that exploration? “Don’t take Dr. Meld’s class on String Theory. Fascinating stuff, but he rarely gives out an A.”</p>
<p>Lenient institutional withdrawal policies go hand in hand with grade inflation because students can wait, in some cases, until more than half the semester is through before quitting. The lower half of the class grade distribution then essentially takes itself out of the equation. I personally don’t think students should be allowed to withdraw after 3 weeks (exceptions for medical withdrawals). </p>
<p>For students applying to graduate schools which really scrutinize the undergraduate transcript, a pattern of withdrawals, incompletes and retakes looks bad. I don’t imagine a pre-med or a PhD applicant could get away with this kind of GPA management strategy. But I suppose there are many employers who don’t care and only glance at the major and the GPA. That hurts applicants who don’t game the system.</p>
<p>One thing to remember as a student is that not all colleges have the same policy. I have a BS from a college in Michigan (1984). I withdrew from a couple of classes during my time there. I can’t remember what the cut off was. Anyway when I decide to go back to school the colleges in Georgia recalculated my GPA with the “W”'s being an “F”.:eek:</p>
<p>If they can figure out what the first grade was, law schools include it in the gpa calculation. There have been some posters on the law board who have been surprised that the 3.5 they thought they had turns into a 3.3 when the LSDAS (law school data assembly service) processed their transcripts.</p>
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<p>That is an issue today for students intending to go to medical school or law school, or who have merit scholarships with high keeper GPAs.</p>
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I don’t think you would have much agreement on what constitutes “a pattern”. In my undergrad years (of which there were many) I had at least 7 withdrawals, 2 incompletes, and 1 retake. The incompletes do not show on my transcripts BTW. Students can have reasons for doing these things besides “GPA management strategy”.</p>
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I totally disagree. 3 weeks is not enough time to judge in many cases.</p>
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<p>I agree with this. It’s possible to go 3 weeks without even a test or graded assignment to let you know (1) how the prof grades and (2) how you’re doing in the class. I think late withdrawal dates are fine. But I am biased: I’m going to be attending MIT and I know they have a very late drop date. Personally, I think it’s great, considering the difficulty of the classes – but that is not the case everywhere.</p>
<p>EDIT: To respond to the OP, I think dropping low grades from GPAs is ridiculous. I think that’s why drop-dates exist – if you have no way of doing well in a class, you should withdraw. But if you stick it out and do poorly, that should be reflected in your GPA.</p>
<p>I don’t care that much about Ws. I am concerned about what classes the student took and how he or she did in them.</p>
<p>I don’t care for academic forgiveness either, but it may be because I was never given that option (nor was it an option in my children’s schools).</p>
<p>Students who have federal loans need to maintain full-time student status, which prevents them from withdrawing, if it would drop them below the required number of credits. I think that students who are parent-financed have no required lower limit on credits. They might have to live in an off-campus apartment, rather than a dorm, but many students do that after the first year or two, anyway.</p>
<p>If the implications of the withdrawal policy are unequal by socio-economic status, then I am not in favor of W’s.</p>
<p>I’m eternally grateful for retakes. S2 began his freshman year just three weeks after probably most horrific thing he will ever witness in his life. He failed four of six classes that first semester(the other two were D’s) that got him a .80 gpa. He was depressed but did a good job of hiding it. He slept through most of the sem. By the end of the semester he started to get himself together but it was too late. </p>
<p>He did three retakes (the most his univ. allowed) and worked diligently to bring up his gpa over the next three years. His final sem. he made the Dean’s List (3.75) He graduated with a little over 3.0. gpa. We could not have been more proud.</p>
<p>At his school the failing grades will always appear on his transcript but the retake grades are the ones used for calculation of gpa. Also retakes are only available for 100or 200 level courses and only if the original grade was a D or F.</p>
<p>Good point, QM. Hadn’t thought of that. I still feel that the W’s serve an academic purpose (getting out when it’s clear you can’t pass or if you’ve overloaded), but I can’t support it as a general rule when it gives more privilege to some than to others.</p>
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<p>It’s not that uncommon for people to take off some time from undergrad, work a little bit, and then come back. Even people of modest financial status can take advantage of the withdrawals. It’s better for them (and everybody) then failing a bunch of classes, being stuck with a bad GPA, and then not being able to find a job after graduation.</p>
<p>^Yeah, I really don’t think socio-economic status is a significant issue here. Certainly not enough to say that NO ONE can therefore take a W.</p>
<p>It might not be a really common thing, but I have advised undergrads who cannot withdraw from a course, because that would put them below the required number of credit hours. The refund policy is not very generous–after a certain point in the semester, there are no refunds. The student has already received financial aid for the semester. If the student takes a complete break from higher ed, the student has an extra semester’s worth of loans to pay off. There was also a change that took effect at the beginning of the 2012-13 academic year, that new incoming federal funds cannot be applied to the new semester if there is money still owed to the university from a previous semester.</p>