March 30, 2020

McGovern College students:

After a few days off from my regular updates, find below updates for Monday, March 30:

Interim college policy on C- minimum grades

In light of the interim undergraduate grade policy and the unprecedented challenges the current situation poses for students, the McGovern College of the Arts has decided to temporarily suspend enforcement of the C- minimum grade policy for sequential courses in majors in which this policy currently applies. The college will instead enforce a policy that is consistent with the interim undergraduate grade policy: for grades earned in spring 2020, students will be considered as having met the minimum grade requirements for sequential courses in their major if they earn either (1) an appropriate letter grade, or (2) a grade of "S" in cases in which the student opts into the S/NCR grade scheme.

The college's Office of Academic Affairs and Student Success will be in touch this week with more information about the college's interim minimum grade policy.

Interim graduate grade policy

On Friday last week, the Provost announced an interim graduate grade policy. The policy is here.

The policy is similar to the interim undergraduate grade policy, in that graduate students will have until May 18 to decide on whether to opt into the Satisfactory/No Credit Reported COVID-19 (S/NCR). Decisions on whether to opt into the S/NCR scheme will be made after you view your traditional letter grades for the semester. This means that your professors will still compute and assign letter grades in your courses, as usual. You may then, after seeing the letter grade, opt to adopt the S/NCR scheme in lieu of that letter grade. This is intended to allow you maximum flexibility and to allow you to seek guidance from your professors and from your academic advisors before making a decision.

Note as well the extension of the deadline for completed submission and final approval of theses or dissertations to May 22. (It is helpful for graduate students to contnue to consult the spring term calendar that appears in the Graduate Catalog, here.)

As always, you should consult your academic advisor for guidance on the implications of choosing one grading scheme or another or for all other questions regarding academic policies and deadlines.

Academic advising update

Be sure you have seen the update on academic advising, sent Sunday afternoon, from the college's Office of Academic Affairs and Student Success. You'll find information on applications for graduation, summer and fall enrollment, and more. If you have not received this email, please let me know.

Continued updates on remote library services

We continue to keep students and faculty informed on remote library services. Please continue to monitor the library's COVID-19 website for up-to-date information.

Please continue to let me know what questions you have and I will continue to provide answers. Many of you have written me with questions that i believe have been answered in my daily updates. If that is not the case, and your question is still unanswered, please ask me again and I will answer you. 

I appreciate all of you who have been in touch with me over the last few days. Have a good week.

Andrew Davis
Dean