Cleveland State University extends Pass/Fail option through the fall semester
Cleveland State University President Harlan Sands announced in a town hall meeting on Oct. 14 that the university will be extending the Pass/Fail option through the fall semester.
"I am really pleased to announce today that we will be offering all students a Pass/Fail option for this fall for undergraduate and graduate courses," Sands told the meeting.
"This is something that students spoke about. We listened, and we want to be as helpful as possible," Sands said. "Just because we have switched to Pass/Fail, doesn't mean we don't want you to stay engaged in all of your courses ... We don't want this to send any signal that we are anything but academically rigorous here at Cleveland State."
Sands's announcement followed a unanimous vote in favor of the policy by the Senate Faculty on Oct. 7. That vote was held in response to a petition that the CSU Student Government Association circulated calling for a Pass/Fail option in fall 2020.
Renee Betterson, the president of SGA, said an outcry from the student body on social media made her aware of the issue.
“What we were hearing from students was that they were overwhelmed,” Betterson said. “We feel that it is important that the University do everything in its power to help the student body.”
Members of Cleveland State’s Faculty Senate met with Betterson and her colleagues to discuss extending the Pass/Fail option.
The option revised the spring 2020 Pass/Fail benchmarks to allow undergraduate students who earn no lower than a C, or no lower than a B for graduate students, to automatically pass a class with no impact on their GPA.
Following SGA's discussion with Senate members, the CSU Faculty Senate recommended at its Oct. 7 meeting that the university move forward with reinstituting the Pass/Fail option. Along with raising the letter grade requirements, the motion also established a deadline of Dec. 18.
Sands's announcement on Oct. 14 followed the lead taken by the SGA and Senate on the issue.
Anup Kumar, Ph.D., professor of communications at Cleveland State, voted in favor of reinstating the policy.
“It is a policy based on compassion and empathy,” Kumar said. “The pandemic affects everyone differently and this policy doesn’t hurt those who want to do well.”
Kumar also said that there was a lot of emphasis placed on students, but the instructors need to be actively involved with the policy changes.
“It is the burden of the faculty to provide information to the students so they can make an informed decision.
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