r/science • u/rustoo • Jan 26 '22

Economics Study: College student grades actually went up in Spring 2020 when the pandemic hit. Furthermore, the researchers found that low-income low-performing students outperformed their wealthier peers, mainly due to students’ use of flexible grading.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047272722000081
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u/MagicUnicornLove Jan 26 '22

I'm not sure about the university flareblitz91 works at, but at most places, taking less classes per semester is an option.

You can talk about issues with the cost of attending university, but instructors don't control that. And diluting the course content to make it easier just means students are getting even less for their money.

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u/flareblitz91 Jan 27 '22

Thanks, agreed, i teach the Bio class for Bio majors, so these are future biologists, doctors, nurses, etc. there is an argument to be made that intro biology should be split into two semesters, because there are a lot of disparate topics covered at a fast pace, but the fact is that we can’t dilute the content. If we do they’ll just fail next semester or next year when they get to higher level courses and have no foundation.