Recognizing the extraordinary impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the lives of students, faculty and staff, the following alternative grading plan will be instituted for the Graduate School and Graduate School of Management for spring 2020. This new policy is a result of listening to student feedback, Marquette’s institutional commitment to cura personalis and the recognition that the abrupt transition to remote instruction may prevent some students from achieving the grades they would otherwise have earned.
The new grading policy will be in place for graduate programs in the following colleges:
- Klingler College of Arts and Sciences
- College of Education
- Diederich College of Communication
- Opus College of Engineering
- College of Nursing
- Graduate School of Management
- Graduate School-based programs in the College of Health Sciences and the School of Dentistry
The Law School and non-Graduate School programs in the College of Health Sciences and the School of Dentistry are exempt from this policy. Read about the Law School’s new temporary policy.
Here’s how it will work:
- The Graduate School and Graduate School of Management will retain the current grading system of letter grades as articulated in the Graduate School bulletin or Graduate School of Management bulletin as the default. At the end of the semester, faculty will enter the earned grade for the course into CheckMarq, using the current grading system.
- If a student wants to keep the letter grades earned in the spring 2020 semester, nothing further needs to be done.
- On a course-by-course basis, students in the Graduate School and Graduate School of Management will have the option of replacing the letter grade they received for each course completed during the spring 2020 semester with the associated options (applicable only to this semester): High Pass, Pass, Not Pass (HP/P/NP).
- Definition of High Pass, Pass, Not Pass:
- High Pass (HP): credit; a permanent grade indicating equivalent work of B or better in the course
- Pass (P): credit; a permanent grade indicating equivalent work of B-, C+ or C in the course
- Definition of High Pass, Pass, Not Pass:
- Not Pass (NP): no credit; a permanent grade indicating equivalent work of F or FW in the course
- For any program-specific requirements for which students need a specific letter grade in a course, students who earn a “High Pass” will be determined to have met program-specific grade equivalents for that course. Students who earn a grade of “Pass” in a course will fulfill requirements as determined by individual academic programs. For purposes of meeting program-specific requirements, a grade of NP shall be considered equivalent to an F.
- Students will have the choice of replacing letter grades with the HP/P/NP option until two weeks after grades are filed. After May 26, 2020, the choice made by the student (i.e., letter grade or HP/P/NP) for a course will become permanent.
The entire policy can be found in the Graduate School bulletin. For questions, please refer to the list of Frequently Asked Questions on Marquette’s coronavirus website.
All students are urged to work with their academic advisers prior to making any decision regarding replacing letter grades. This is particularly important for students required to meet criteria for certification or licensure, and those students seeking tuition reimbursement from an employer.
Students choosing to retain the traditional letter grades they were assigned will have those letter grades included in the calculation of their GPA. In contrast, HP/P/NP grades will not be used in computing GPA.
For spring 2020, undergraduate students taking graduate-level courses in the Graduate School will be subject to this policy, as will graduate students taking undergraduate-level courses.
Transcripts will have notation indicating COVID-19 pandemic to record the unique grading system employed in spring 2020.