At the Spring University Meeting on January 7, Linda Bennet thanked faculty for participating in the university’s new Early Alert program.
The university’s website states, “Early Alert grades are required for all full-semester courses at the 200-level and below.” However, there are professors of courses higher than 200-level that are submitting Early Alert grades as well.
The concept of the Early Alert program is definitely a righteous one that possesses the potential to reap numerous benefits and possibly save some student’s grades.
It’s implemented blanket formula, however, does not fit the mold of every class and becomes somewhat of a wasted tool for students and a nuisance for professors.
Requiring every class to report grades at the three week benchmark doesn’t work.
Last semester, I only had two professors – to my knowledge – report Early Alert grades: my POLS 271 and my JRN 381 professors, one core and one non-core.
But who benefitted from that?
Certainly not the student in this case.
At the time of the Early Alert, we only had one grade in the grade book for each of those classes.
What am I being alerted early about – the fact that I got three questions wrong on my International Politics worksheet?
This semester, one of my professors brought up the Early Alert program while going over the syllabus and advised our class not to freak out when we see the grades since they “are not reflective of (our) final grades whatsoever,” as the only grade that will be in the grade book at that point will be a quiz worth roughly four percent of our final grade.
Granted, that class only meets twice a week and there’s a lot of reading involved outside of the classroom, so it doesn’t have very many assignments.
In this case, the argument in favor of the program then shifts to classes with a substantial amount of assignments.
With the majority of Math 111 sections taking place four days a week, there are bound to be numerous assignments turned in before the Early Alert grades are reported, yet the percentage of Ds, Fs and Ws in the class rose from 43 to 57 last fall during the first semester the program was implemented.
Math 111 may be an isolated example, seeing as how the rate of Ds, Fs and Ws for Math 114 during the same timeframe sat below 30 percent, but the Early Alert program does not appear to have been affective in this case.
In another one of my classes this semester, we won’t have any grades in the grade book by the time Early Alert grades are reported.
What does my professor do in that case since it’s a 200-level class and the grades are required to be reported?
While there is an “N/A” option, what, then, becomes the point of the program?
One of my colleagues had a professor last semester who told his class not to freak out when they saw their grades because they were made up since the professor was required to report grades.
The Early Alert program is a good idea. However, by requiring all classes to report grades after three weeks, the idea is being wasted.
It serves no purpose to students.
It wastes professors’ time.
The only clear benefit is assuming that three weeks is too early for students to be failing a class. Therefore the grades that are reported are expected to be good and can then be boasted by the university.
As opposed to the current way of operating the program, the university should get rid of the three week report and have the six week report be the initial early alert.
Six weeks would not only give a more accurate reading on ‘early’ grades, it would give students who are contemplating dropping a class ample time to set their schedules in stone.
What’s the point of enforcing a program that’s meant to help students if the current operation of that program isn’t actually helping students?
