Throughout winter quarter, an ad-hoc committee was created
within the Faculty Executive Committee of the College to draft an
amended late drop policy for the College. After this proposal was
drafted, the faculty members of the committee were scheduled to
vote on it, but instead decided to table the item until their May 6
meeting so they could give students sufficient time to review the
policy.
The current policy allows students to drop a class up until the
last day of instruction during 10th week with a “W”
noted on their transcript. The proposed amendment would change the
late drop policy from 10th week to fourth week.
There are several issues that need to be addressed before going
any further with this policy.
No students were involved in the process of drafting this new
proposal. The FEC’s decision to create an ad-hoc subcommittee
cited faculty concerns as the only reason that this revision was
necessary. Students were not informed that this policy change was
being proposed until the agenda for the meeting was released three
days prior to the meeting. The decision to create a subcommittee to
develop this policy was made behind closed doors, leaving students
uninformed. Why is it that students were not given a choice to
participate in the decisions that affect their education? The
simple fact that students were initially given only 72 hours to
respond to this policy shows certain faculty’s lack of
accountability to those affected by their policy, which brings up
the question as to the real intentions behind this policy.
Faculty members cite reasons, such as UCLA’s drop policy
being too lenient, and compare UCLA to other institutions like
Harvard and UC Berkeley, stating that their drop regulations are
much earlier than UCLA’s. However, these same people fail to
mention that Stanford, Cornell and Yale have similar drop policies
as UCLA.
Over the years, academic policies have been based on arguments
by administrators and faculty supported by statistics and concrete
data. The late drop policy is being proposed because some faculty
members have concerns, but there is no evidence that
students’ dropping of courses is a growing problem. Two years
ago, the FEC of the then-College of Letters and Sciences decided to
table a similar proposal to a later date, feeling that the proposal
was not necessary at the time. Now this policy is being brought up
at a time when the number of students that drop courses during 10th
week is decreasing. Over the past four years, the number of
students who drop courses has decreased steadily.
In a time of budget cuts, it is important for students to
advocate and assert their power by making sure that the few
resources that are allocated to us are being used properly. We are
spending an excessive amount of money to track academic policies
““ money that could instead be spent helping students develop
academic plans and ensuring that they maximize their undergraduate
experience.
Rather than trying to implement more policies, the College
leadership needs to examine current policies, such as Expected
Cumulative Progress requirements, and how they are affecting the
lives of students. They should not keep adding to the burdens
students have to face.
Before the College FEC votes on this amendment, it is necessary
to further analyze the effects of the current policy and the
possible unintended consequences, and even backlash, that might
result from such a change. More student input is necessary, not
only in the form of feedback, but also in the drafting of any new
academic policy.
Ines is the USAC undergraduate representative to the College
Faculty Executive Committee, Martinez is the USAC Academic Affairs
commissioner and Tseng is a USAC general representative.