The Faculty Council should vote to pass the Educational Policy Committee’s initiative to rectify confusion about undergraduates taking graduate-level courses.
The current problems are twofold. First, because of a different grading scale, undergraduates’ GPAs do not accurately reflect their performance in graduate-level courses.
Secondly, undergraduates are able to enroll in graduate-level courses for which they are sometimes not qualified. This glitch is a result of the University’s change in its course numbering system in 2006, according to which many graduate classes are listed as 700-level courses.
The solution is simple, and it consists of ensuring that undergraduates obtain departmental or teacher permission before registering. This will ensure that no students find themselves enrolled in a course for which they are not qualified.
It is important that these kinks get worked out sooner rather than later. Due to the increasingly advanced coursework many students now complete before even coming to UNC, more undergraduates will likely enroll in graduate courses in coming years.
Furthermore, the increasing number of students following the “3 1” plan will contribute to the popularity of undergraduates taking such high-level courses. This plan enables students to obtain their undergraduate degree and their master’s degree in four years.
This is especially appealing to students who want to minimize the number of years they have to pay tuition. In this economic climate, it seems likely that this approach will gain more popularity in the next several years. So there needs to be a clear way to give grades.
