Word: pass-fail
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...least for the present, the HUC can't escape comparison with the more effective HPC. Dean Ford has set up a committee of House Masters and HUC members to study parietals, and hopefully come up with "the same kind of advice the HPC was able to give on pass-fail." And Dean Glimp would like to see the HUC do an HPC-style audit of the Office of Graduate and Career Plans...
Graduate school admission may, in fact, induce students, especially upperclassmen, to reject the pass-fail option on the supposition that, all other things equal, four courses with fine grades is a better showing than three (and many admissions committees will face large numbers of applicants where, indeed, all other things do appear equal...
That such a concentration in education which would result from the present pass-fail proposal is not intended is evidenced by the rejection in the December faculty meeting of Professor Handlin's proposal of a simple three graded course system. To the extend that the incentive structure implicit in the present pass-fail proposal has been appropriately represented above, this vote on Handlin's amendment is essentially a rejection of the present pass-fail proposal. What is at issue is not the objective, but the means; the pass-fail option as presently proposed is clearly unsatisfactory...
...alternative proposal consistent with objectives underlying the current discussion and the retention of a grade system which would appear to be a much superior means of achieving the desired objectives would be the option for students to take a fifth course pass-fail. This is different in one important respect from the right to audit, namely, that a record is available of a student's choice of direction of these efforts (a difference which students may value considerably). Students will argue that this implies the right to diversify their education only "after hours," and the administration will suggest that these...
...fifth course proposal comes the closest, and is consistent with the premise that the allocation of effort implicit in a four course graded system is preferred to three, a premise substantialted by the faculty's action on the Handlin Amendment. The faculty and student body need reconsider the present pass-fail vote in light of that vote. Mahlon Straszheim Assistant Professor Department of Economics