College May End Fines For Dropping Courses

The College may scrap its system of fining students who drop a fifth course--but it may also make it impossible to drop a fifth course late in the term.

Under a proposal now being considered, a student could drop his fifth course up until a specified date without being charged for it. But, after the deadline, a student who decided he couldn't do the work in his fifth course wouldn't be allowed to drop it. He would simply have to fail.

The changes would go into effect next fall, when, if the Faculty approves, all upperclassmen will be allowed to take a free fifth course on a "pass-fail" basis.

Students who take five courses can now drop one any time before its last meeting. But they are fined for it, unless it is a tutorial, and the later they drop the course the more they pay -- up to $220 for a half course and $440 for a full course.

The fining system has been under attack by Faculty members for some time. Since the pass-fail plan could encourage several hundred more students to start taking a fifth course, there may be considerable support for getting rid of the fines and establishing the earlier deadline.

There is still no agreement, though, on how late in the term the deadline for dropping the fifth course ought to be. This, and other details of the pass-fail plan, will be discussed by the Administrative Board and the Committee on Educational Policy (CEP) during the next few weeks.

The CEP agreed last month that a free, pass-fail fifth course for all upperclassmen was a good idea "in principle."

It would extend to everyone the privilege of a free fifth course -- now reserved to juniors and seniors taking honors tutorial. And it would supposedly attract students who want to experiment with a course they wouldn't ordinarily take, and who want some recognition of it on their transcript, but don't want to risk a bad grade.

These students should be able to drop the course after a few weeks without being fined for it, Edward T. Wilcox, CEP secretary, said yesterday. On the other hand, preventing students from dropping a pass-fail course late in the term will ensure that they take it seriously, he said.

Before the fines were introduced, students could drop a fifth course before the last meeting of classes without any penalty. Faculty members don't want to return to that, Wilcox said, but they feel that the financial sanctions are unfair and would like to find something to replace them.