When Mr Donald Koh, then president of NUS Students’ Union, was negotiating for change in the satisfactory/unsatisfactory option with the administration last September, the issue of fairness was a recurring one.
Last August the NUS registrar’s office changed its policy to allow students to exercise the option only after their examination results are known.
But because only freshmen and future NUS students were given this new deal initially, Mr Koh led the union to negotiate successfully for all existing students to use the option in a similar fashion.
“We wanted to allow all students to experience the new S/U,” said the 28-year-old.
But this one-year-old policy has made an impact beyond the confines of NUS.
Calls for change at NTU
Following its implementation in NUS, students from NTU have called for a similar system to be implemented, according to a poll by the NTU Students’ Union in April this year.
The S/U option lets students declare a small number of courses to be excluded from the computation of their grade point average (GPA).
Both universities had introduced the option as a way to encourage students to explore areas outside their major without adversely affecting their GPA, but this guiding principle has led to different policies enacted in the two universities.
Although the NTU union had proposed to the administration to adopt a system similar to NUS after some 70% of students voted to exercise their S/U option after knowing their results, the administration has decided otherwise.
This is because the purpose of the option was to encourage students to broaden the kind of courses they take; it was never meant for pulling up the Grade Point Average (GPA), said the divisional director of NTU’s office of academic services (OAS), Mr Lau Kim Yang.
The office wrote on its website on September 24: “Allowing students to change their grading option after the results were known would distort the students’ GPA.
“This would be against the overall education philosophy.”
Same concerns, different approach
But the same consideration of exploring modules beyond a student’s specialisation was also the driving force for NUS to allow its students to exercise the S/U option after the release of examination results.
The NUS union explained in an email to all students the rationale of having S/U after the release of examination results.
“The objective of the S/U options is to encourage you to pursue courses of your interest, which may not be your forte, without the worry that it may adversely affect your CAP (Cumulative Average Point) score,” the email read.
“The new policy of allowing you to S/U after viewing of results is aimed at further reducing your risk and reassuring you that pursuing your interests will not compromise your results.”
With fairness being the central theme of negotiations between the NUS administration and its students’ union, the university decided to allow a one-off chance for all senior students to view the grades of subjects they had previously declared S/U.
They were then allowed to retract the S/U decision if they wished to do so, in the hope to “level the playing field for everyone”, the email announcement of the new S/U option read.
But NUS stopped short of allowing these students to declare a subject S/U that they had previously not, explaining that “the S/U option is designed for an educational purpose and not as a way to erase a poor grade”.
An issue of motivation
At NTU, Mr Lau added that his office had taken student feedback into account and pushed back the deadline for declaring a subject S/U by three weeks—from week eight to week 11.
Although the extension was supported by students such as final-year business student Lim Weijian, Mr Lim still believes that allowing students to exercise the option after knowing their results would motivate them to “give it their best shot till the very last minute.”
“If a student exercises his S/U option before exams, he won’t be as motivated to study as the grade doesn’t count to his GPA,” he said.
With the revised option at NUS, declaring a subject S/U no longer means effectively giving up on the subject halfway through the semester, the former NUS union president Mr Koh said.
This is because only a grade of “C” is required to obtain the “Satisfactory” grade, which earns students the academic units for the course.
But Mr Lau of NTU said the amount of effort put into a subject should not be affected by the use of the S/U option.
His view was shared by Associate Professor Ho Khai Leong from the NTU School of Humanities and Social Sciences.
Professor Ho said although there is an S/U option as a “safety net”, students should choose electives that they are interested in and “put their whole heart to it”.
Citing how he used to sit in for lectures outside his syllabus for pure interest, he said: “What I learnt from these classes still stay with me. It is this kind of learning spirit the university should encourage.”
An issue of credibility
Officials at NTU are also concerned about protecting the credibility of the degrees issued by the university.
The NTU office of academic service wrote on their website: “Top universities around the world with an S/U or similar arrangement also required their students to declare their options before the examinations.”
Allowing students to declare their options after their results are known “might affect the credibility of the degrees issued by the University.”
A check by the Enquirer on similar systems implemented in the top 15 universities on the World University Rankings 2008 revealed that the new S/U policy in NUS is unique and the most liberal among top universities in the world, followed closely by Columbia University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
At the same time when NUS had changed it S/U policy last year, the 10th ranked Columbia University started allowing students from its school of general studies to “uncover” a grade of Pass, or turn it back into a letter grade if they choose to do so after viewing their results.
At Columbia, the equivalent of the Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory option is the Pass/D/Fail option.
But unlike the S/U option in NUS and NTU, there is no “Unsatisfactory” grade. A grade of “D” or “Failure” is recorded onto students’ transcript and computed in the GPA, while a grade of “Pass” is recorded as it is and does not affect the GPA.
Seven out of 11 of the top universities that uses the GPA system has a similar system that penalises students for scoring a “D” or “F” even in courses where the equivalent of the S/U option has been exercised.
However, Columbia is the first to allow its students to uncover the grade of “Pass” in the following semester after the results are known.
But compared with NUS, Columbia students must still exercise the Pass/D/Fail option by the 10th week of the semester to be able to benefit from the option.
In contrast, students from NUS can choose which subjects they want to exercise their S/U option on after all their results for the semester are known.
In MIT, sophomores may opt to take one subject, even a requirement, per semester as “Exploratory”. Doing so allows them to drop the subject, thereby forfeiting the credits earned, in the next semester after knowing their grade.
The option, only made permanent by the faculty in 2008, was meant to ease the transition into the sophomore year by creating a flexible grading option and to encourage sophomores to consider unconventional majors at the start of their second year.
When asked if the credibility of NUS’s degree would be affected because their students can now exercise the S/U option after knowing their examination results, Mr Lau declined to comment.
“I wouldn’t want to speak on their behalf. It’s up to future employers and graduate schools to decide.”
Additional reporting by Cheong Kah Shin and Lin Junjie
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pang
says:October 28th, 2008 at 11.04pm
Another outstanding piece of journalism. Thumbs up Enquirer! This brings once again to the issue of the Student’s Union being relevant to represent the student body and “being our voices”. I am trying to understand why The Enquirer, with a team of less than 5 people, could manage to put up such a comprehensive investigation into the S/U system – not only in Singapore but around the world. The team of writers are doing this out of their free time, not for fame, money, nor CCA points. Yet, the Student Union representatives we have elected after hearing their election speeches and who pledged to be the “voice of the student body”, who get CCA points for what they do to represent us, and what’s more – a few paragraphs into their resumes for them playing an active role in school, which will more likely boost their employment opportunities when they graduate.
Are we merely electing mere figureheads in the Union who call themselves the “representatives of the student body”? Are we merely electing people who are there to get points for a room to stay in hall? Or are we electing a group of people truly passionate to serve the student body, being their voices, as they always say in their election rallies, when all they could do were to wholeheartedly agree with the administration that “Yes, it’s true that changes in the S/U system will compromise the quality of the degree” without further evidence to elaborate on the reason for so. (Yes, the Enquirer has done it for them.)
I guess it’s really time for the Student’s Union to get their act together in order to remain relevant to the student body. It’s no wonder why 93% of students polled didn’t know who the people in the Union are.
bizzkit0102
says:October 31st, 2008 at 1.54pm
Actually in some ways I feel we do not have a clue who the student union people are is because they were elected/chosen by earlier student union people, who we also have no idea who they are as well. Therefore, we do not feel their presence.
Anshuman
says:November 11th, 2008 at 4.09pm
A very comprehensive and informative article…
Just for information more insight could be derived by interviewing higher authorities than OAS for this matter as it was NTU Education Policy that was in question and such directives come down from much higher administration offices. As for matter of fact during the negotiations between Students’ Union and Administration it was Prof Er Meng Hwa who presented the education philosophy argument so for everyones benefit getting some inputs from him for article would be good.
As per where Students’ Union stands i have nothing much to say as something its hard to convince people who have a mindset fixed. All i can try to assure is that it took over 4 months of good work (including survey, talks with NUS SU, and some talks with friends and students from top Universities in the world) to reach the negotiation table with administration.
Not denying that Enquirer did a good job with the article but i think more was done in part of Students’ Union to have even the MINOR change in system.
Daniel
says:November 12th, 2008 at 11.45pm
The S/U system is in place to provide academic and interest exploration and as a risk management control from jeopardising overall grades.
Since this is the notion behind the S/U system, does it really make our degree not credible even if we exercised the S/U option only after the results are released?
I mean, just think about the following: “A = B + C + D” Does adding C to D first of B to D first affect the notion of this equation?
But anyway, making such a statement about credibility of a degree is stupid and ridiculous in my opinion.
Anyway to that staff who made the ‘credibility’ comment, talk about credibility again when our ranking doesn’t drop by 7 places in a year. Talk about credibility again when we can catch up with NUS first.
suge
says:November 12th, 2008 at 11.53pm
Why must we always learn from ‘top universities’ overseas?
I thought Singapore always promote herself as having a world-class education system?
Can’t we just stand on our two feet and come up with our own policies instead of importing in so-called talents to make decisions and point directions for us?
Shame on us.
Sad to say, very few Singapore institutions learn the ‘right things’ and culture from the top institutions overseas.
Even if we can import in the ‘top systems’, do we have the culture to support it in the 1st place?
Shame on us once again.
Unless mindsets change, we can forget all about becoming a real world-class top institution. Let’s hope that the current young generation of people do not grow old and follow the mindset-tracks as that of the current old fogeys up there.
Nicole Loy
says:November 23rd, 2008 at 6.20pm
I completely agree, the current Students’ Union is not putting in enough effort to be recognised by the student population, hence alot of what they enact is based on their internal opinions. More should be done to find out the true view of ALL NTU students
benny
says:November 24th, 2008 at 2.09am
great article! very insightful!
Adrian Koh (CBC\1.5)
says:November 24th, 2008 at 11.28am
I can understand why NTU is emulating other universities rather than to follow in suit of NUS. The very idea of a “standard” comes from many people accepting and using it.
NUS having (daringly, or foolishly?) allowed S/U after exams is simply taking a step into the unknown. We cannot simply assume that such a move will be helpful to the students in the long run. As clearly outlined by the article, this method of S/U can give students a better sense of security. But is that really helpful to NUS students? Maybe not. As NTU students, such a move may seem to disadvantage us. However, we should realise that NUS’s move has not only made them unique, it has also made us unique. We should cherish such an opportunity to differentiate US from THEM, rather than to keep looking for ways to further “safeguard” our grades (as typical Singaporeans…). This is so as people will soon realise that NUS students are but playing the statisitcal system to bring up their grades . Is that the image you want to be burdened with when you compete with other people for jobs after you graduate?
Our current system encourages us to build up our foresight and planning skills. We think ahead, to SU or not to SU. We plan, we ask our seniors, we learn. These are all valuable skills. Why hide behind a “hindsight is 20/20″ system? Grades are but a human construct to measure our RELATIVE success, it is not the first and last thing to bring out of university. We should go through university to be unique thinking individuals who understand and acknowledge our strengths and weakness; rather than continuously hiding and running away from them one way or the other.
People who claim to want to change the system for the sake of changing it just so as to be different should really think about the implications of such a move. The best way to win a war is to stay immobile while your enemy destroys it self from within (due to excessive fidgeting). The talk about catching up with NUS in terms of university ranking doesn’t cut cake either because university rankings rarely (if ever) take quality teaching as a major component of their assessments.
All in all a fantastic article. It has given me far more insight into the issue of SU rather than relying on our SU. Haha.
Jian
says:December 2nd, 2008 at 6.19pm
The S/U option doesn’t really make an NUS Social Science degree any less credible to a large extent. It could pull a 3.98 up to a 4.00, clinching a second upper from a second lower, or at any other grade band transition point. However, first class honours students, at least for Political Science requirements, always require an A- for a honours thesis. So the fake-grade effect is not really strong. Note that NUS students can only exercise the S/U option only thrice.
Anyway, if the system wants to actually protect the credibility at all, just retract the S/U option and keep “outside” modules mandatory. Obviously, students will then tend to flock to “easy” modules to a greater degree, thus again diluting the credibility of an NUS or NTU degree as a whole.
TwoFace
says:May 21st, 2009 at 11.12pm
Why so serious? Why the debate over to S/U before or after results? Why not just leave the S/U option open right from the beginning, throughout the course period AND even after results are out? Kill tow birds with one stone. Why so serious? Let the students decide!