An Update on Our Proposed Changes to Arts and Science CR/NCR Policies

Dear students, we’d like to thank you for supporting our CR/NCR policies by filling out our surveys and giving feedback. We have been working very closely with you and the Faculty over the past year to try and pass several policies with respect to CR/NCR. We value your questions and would like to provide some updates about our progress thus far.

Has the proposal to extend the CR/NCR deadlines until after final grades have been released gone through? Is this a permanent change?

Given the special circumstances of the Covid-19 pandemic and the added stress on students during this time, ASSU has worked with the Dean’s Office to extend CR/NCR deadlines until after final grades have been released for the Winter 2020, Fall 2020, and Winter 2021 semesters. As of right now, the extended deadlines are only applicable for courses which end up to April 2021.

Why have the CR/NCR deadlines not been extended permanently?

The extended CR/NCR deadlines have been a response to the added stress on students amidst the transition to online learning. After discussing with the Dean’s office, ASSU has learned that a permanent extension for CR/NCR choices until after grades have been released poses several issues:

For students in their final year of study, their departments and colleges must work to determine their eligibility for graduation (i.e. completion of program requirements, breadth requirements, degree requirements, etc.) upon their submission of the request to graduate. A late CR/NCR deadline will create a very short and practically unfeasible timeline for determining graduation eligibility.
For students applying to programs at the end of their first and second years, GPA requirements and grades for program prerequisites are important for program admission decisions. A late CR/NCR deadline puts departments at short timelines to determine student eligibility for the programs, potentially delaying admission decisions.
Early determination of GPAs is important for identifying changes in academic standing, for instance for students on academic probation or suspension. This is especially important as enrolment in courses is contingent on academic standing.
Even if a course has been CR/NCR’d, the underlying grade may still be used to determine eligibility for enrolment in upper-year courses, for instance 300+ courses which require minimum grades in 100-200 level courses. A late CR/NCR deadline may delay this process, causing students who may not have been eligible to enrol in certain courses to only be notified and removed from the courses well into the academic term.

Does this mean that CR/NCR deadlines will go back to the pre-Covid ones in Fall 2021?

ASSU is still committed to improving the benefits of the CR/NCR options for students. Though we are equally disappointed that a policy to extend the deadlines until after final grades are released will likely not pass, we are now working towards a permanent extension to CR/NCR options until the last day of classes. By this date, students will have received a larger portion of their final grades and will be able to make a better inference on whether they would like to CR/NCR the course. The Dean’s Office has also expressed their support for this change as well.

We still do not have a timeline for this policy, and cannot tell you whether it will be retroactive or not. However, we will provide updates to students as soon as progress is made.

We received an option for unlimited CR/NCR in Winter 2020, will this be offered again this semester?

No, the unlimited CR/NCR option will not be provided for the Winter 2021 semester. We have been told by the Dean’s Office that the option was added in Winter 2020 to accommodate an abrupt shift to online learning as the pandemic accelerated. Since students have been operating online for all of the 2020-21 school year, the unlimited CR/NCR option will unfortunately not be provided for this winter semester.

What about the proposal to allow up to 1.0 FCE of CR/NCR options for program requirements?

Unfortunately, after consultations with Faculty members and the Dean’s Office, we can tell you that our proposal to allow up to 1.0 FCE of CR/NCR options for program requirements will likely not go through. These are some of the main reasons provided to us from the Faculty and Dean’s Office:

Faculty members have expressed concern surrounding the necessity of program requirements for upper-year courses. The worry is that a CR/NCR option for program requirements may leave students with a less stable foundation for challenging 300+ courses.
Upon request, professional schools will still have access to CR/NCR grades, as has been the norm for CR/NCR options thus far. Concerns were raised surrounding the ambiguity that this may cause for students applying to Graduate programs; some may be unaware that the grades for their program requirements will still be released to the prospective schools, negatively impacting their chances of admission if these grades are lower than required.
Several professional schools have reached out to the Dean’s Office with concerns surrounding this policy. For some of these graduate schools, all program requirements are essential components for admission decisions. These schools might have to individually request that the grades are revealed for each program requirement that has been CR/NCR’d for each student, posing a large issue for graduate schools’ efficiency in admission decisions.

Though we are disappointed, we are still planning on working with the Dean’s office to look further into specific program requirements which large numbers of students have trouble with, in order to address the root causes which cause students to request a CR/NCR option for those courses. Additionally, we are brainstorming alternatives to the 1.0 FCE for program requirements proposal. Thank you for your continued support through this process.

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