The OU Faculty Senate is “exploring” the implementation of pass/no pass grading for the Fall 2020 semester, according to an email from Vice Provost for Instruction and Student Success Mark Morvant.
In an Oct. 12 email to OU Registrar Kellie Dyer, Morvant asked Dyer to provide data on the Spring 2020 semester’s pass/no pass grading usage. The alternate grading scheme was offered to students last semester after OU elected to transition to fully online classes amid the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. This semester, classes will be virtual following Thanksgiving break.
According to an Oct. 13 response email from Dyer, 9,883 students opted into pass/no pass grading for the Spring 2020 semester and 17,898 courses were impacted. Of the total courses impacted by alternate grading, 5,175 Bs, 7,724 Cs and 3,218 Ds were changed to a ‘pass’ grade. Most students opted only to change one course grade to a ‘pass,’ with 4,183 changing one course, 2,480 changing two and 1,552 changing three.
In Dyer’s email, she provided a list of concerns regarding pass/no pass grading and its impact on OU students academically.
“We are already receiving requests from students to provide a verification letter of their original grade for professional and graduate schools,” Dyer wrote. “Some students may have earned a ‘B’ in a course and still opted for a Pass to maintain a 4.0 GPA. I worry this will haunt us for years to come.”
Dyer wrote that additional complications are created for veteran students when reporting to the Department of Veterans Affairs after using the pass/no pass grading scheme and that OU would “need to establish consistency” with “all areas of Extended Campus” if pass/no pass grading was used again.
“We definitely have some bugs to work out if the decision is made to do this again,” Dyer wrote.
In a Sept. 25 email, OU Director of Media Relations Kesha Keith told The Daily OU has no plans to "implement any changes to the Norman campus grading policy." On Oct. 19, Keith wrote that the provost and registrar's offices were gathering data to "aid in varying discussions related to Faculty Senate."
As of Oct. 19, the student-led petition for OU to provide a pass/no pass grading option for the Fall 2020 semester has over 3,100 signatures.
