Rushing to get final grades completed but, again, it’s SOS no matter how much or how little of class assignments: The A’s get A, the B’s get B, the C’s get C and the F’s get F. D is rare.
Posts Tagged ‘grades’
A Flurry of Posts in the Waiting While I Finish Off Final Grades for This Semester – Part II
Wednesday, December 30th, 2009How I Learned to Bite the Bullet and Let Them Eat the “F” Without So Much As a Blink of an Eye – Sort Of
Tuesday, December 15th, 2009Several years in the making.
If institutions of higher learning desire academic honesty, they must be institutions of obvious integrity, places where students, faculty, and administrators seek truth and wisdom and technical expertise in an environment marked by trust, honesty, respect, fairness, responsibility, and courage. — Peg Hogan, Former President, The Center for Academic Integrity
Spring 2009 Grades – Whoa!
Monday, June 8th, 2009I want to preface this semester wrap-up with an anecdote that I believe provides an insightful, behind-the-scenes look of inner workings and thinking as well as speaks to important matters, such as student learning, undergraduate journalism, Academic Freedom and the kind of baleful malaise that corrupts academic values and principles.
The D:F/M chair informed me a while back that he and the D:F/M Policy & Budget Committee wanted me to take a leave from teaching Basic Reporting, MEDP 292. I was suspected of being the culprit responsible for the drop in enrollment of department majors. There was this concern that a lot of students were flunking my classes (which have high standards and expectations for students, high – I’m being kind – in light of this department’s standards).
The result, if one was to believe the chair and the P&B, was a cosmic resonance so strong that what occurred in my classroom emanated beyond its boundaries and was discouraging students (who didn’t take classes with me, who weren’t even planning to enroll in my courses) from taking the major or were being encouraged to drop it.Â
Whew!
Lame courses, lame instructors were not being considered. Not to mention lame policy decisions.
I refused, of course.
D:F/M – Ethnic News Reporting: 399.31
Wednesday, May 13th, 2009Because Blackboard at City University of New York is down* (“Blackboard Down” makes me think of Ridley Scott’s and Mark Bowden’s Black Hawk Down, about a crash-and-burn crisis ever there was one), some  D:f/M instructors are hawking their “wares” to students on fm-l and, of course, a teeny-weeny few like me hawk on Hunter-L as well:
Students:
This experimental class uses multimedia via the WORD, Youtube, podcasting, blogging, twitter, facebook, myspace, et. al – to teach students how to tell and disseminate stories about issues in immigrant and ethnic communities.
Final Grades, Fall Semester – Basic Reporting (So-called)
Monday, January 5th, 2009This was one of the most talented classes I’ve had in a few years. However, two students who could have achieved at least a B flunked because they seemed to believe they could bluff their way through the course and get a C  without completing the assignments (that’s my impression), and one was very late-late several times and in one conversation conveyed that she was hoping to bluff – again, my impression – her way to a passing grade that she could get without doing the homework.
The other attended class regularly but … refused to turn in assignments or refused to turn in assignments on time.
Because of the internecine war with my department about my classes and how I want to teach, final grades is always serious manner. The usual attrition rate – F’s, D’s, W’s and WU’s – is one-third.
I’m expecting that the two INCs eventually become passing grades.
Â
A — 2
B+ — 3
B — 3
B- — 1
INC — 2
W — 1
WU — 1
F — 2
MEDP 292 (AKA Basic Reporting), Spring, 2008
Saturday, June 14th, 2008Final Grades
A+ (1)Â
A Â (1)Â
B+ (3)
B Â (4)
B- (2)
C+ (1)
C Â (3)
Again, another semester showing a paltry number of A students. I’m not sure why, though there were B+ students who could have earned higher grades.