In a matter of days, Emory administrators responded to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic with a decisive transition to an online learning system. The University’s subsequent decision to offer optional pass-fail grading and an extended course withdrawal window for students unable to complete coursework due to the virus was well-intentioned but fell short. To ensure academic equity and mitigate socioeconomic disadvantages among students during this unprecedented time, the University should supplement optional pass-fail grading with a GPA floor for the remainder of the current semester.
A GPA floor would prevent any and all students’ GPAs from decreasing this semester. Each student’s cumulative GPAs would become “floors”; therefore, if a student’s grades at the end of the semester would otherwise decrease their cumulative GPA, their final course grades would be raised to ensure that they would maintain their previous GPA. A GPA floor would allow students to earn letter grades on their transcripts without risking fallout from COVID-19-induced hardships.
Administrators must look toward the future and ensure that students’ academic prospects remain intact by recognizing the crisis’s disproportionate impact on low-income, international and otherwise disadvantaged students, including those with ill family members. Donors have graciously contributed $42,397 to a student hardship fund to support students struggling financially during this period. This fund, however, has primarily relieved students’ immediate burdens — travel, housing and food expenses. Administrators have augmented this fund with the optional pass-fail grading system. In their view, this approach will sufficiently mitigate the asymmetrical harm that the sudden online transition inflicted on students’ grades.
Many students may find it necessary to take classes pass-fail due to financial or mental hardships from this pandemic. Such a decision however, may prove undesirable as students who choose to take a class pass-fail cannot use it to raise their GPAs and their transcripts will show an “S” or “U,” indicating a satisfactory or unsatisfactory performance in their course. Unlike the optional pass-fail system, a GPA floor system would not academically injure students who cannot devote adequate effort to their classes but who still need letter grades for scholarship eligibility, graduate school applications and professional opportunities.
An email sent by the Office for Undergraduate Education to the student body on March 19 reinforces this possible disadvantage: “some graduate and professional schools will not accept or will require additional details on courses taken on a satisfactory/unsatisfactory basis.” A universal pass system, in which all students are graded in all courses on a pass-fail basis, poses problems because students could be penalized by graduate and professional programs for taking courses as pass-fail, even if it was required by their university.
Emory’s current pass-fail option is admirable but insufficient in promoting academic equity amid this unprecedented crisis. Students who lack the basic resources necessary for academic success, such as stable housing, food or Wi-Fi, may be forced to opt for pass-fail grading out of fear that they would otherwise perform poorly enough to hurt their cumulative GPAs. This could disadvantage them in the long term, as students with higher GPAs gain access to more selective graduate schools and internships; differences as small as a few tenths of a point can be critical. In this way, socioeconomically privileged students will more often choose traditional grading, thereby allowing them to increase their cumulative GPAs where others cannot. A GPA floor would resolve that inequity.
Yale University (Conn.), Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Columbia University (N.Y.) have all implemented universal pass systems. The universal pass system was designed to ensure equality between at-risk students and their classmates by “passing” all students for the Spring. However, a universal pass system prohibits students from improving their academic standing through letter grades. A GPA floor would permit all students to raise their GPAs while protecting them from any negative academic consequences.
A GPA floor system does lack precedent, but so does the more widespread concept of universal pass grading; it’s only now gaining significant traction. The University’s efforts to protect and support us from COVID-19 in many other respects have been admirable, and a GPA floor would allow administrators to apply that commitment to an academic context. We acknowledge that this idea is without empirical justification and requires further study. But Emory, as an academic community, prides itself on tackling problems with exceptional solutions. This particular solution is an opportunity to help the entire student body.
We urge the Emory administration to consider augmenting its optional pass-fail system with a GPA floor. The lack of precedent behind the idea should not inhibit its implementation; adding a floor would combine the universal pass system’s equity with the utility of traditional grading. The COVID-19 pandemic should neither become an excuse to slack off nor erect barriers to academic success, and Emory has a duty to prevent both. By implementing a GPA floor, administrators would give students the support they so desperately need.
The above editorial represents the majority opinion of the Wheel’s Editorial Board.
The Editorial Board is composed of Sean Anderson, Brammhi Balarajan, Zach Ball, Devin Bog, Jake Busch, Andrew Kliewer, Meredith McKelvey, Boris Niyonzima, Nick Pernas and Ben Thomas.
