University of Toronto France Summer Abroad 2016 FSL*** Grading Petition

its really discouraging to see my gpa drop because of this sudden change. why are we being treated differently than previous years?

needs to be fixed asap

it makes no sense that we get penalized compared to other programs when we worked just as hard. fix this.

THE GRADING SCALE IS TOTALLY UNFAIR. PLEASE CHANGE IT BACK TO A 5.

In addition to all of the aforementioned and extremely pertinent concerns with regards to the new grading system to be implemented for the first time this year, I would like to also voice my strong and personal objection to this system: As a student who consistently achieves grades above 90%, this system does not favour exceptional students such as myself (as the highest possible grade with such a system is a 90% which can only be obtained by receiving a perfect grade on all evaluations (20/20 x 4.5)). Not only does this grading system not favour me, but it has also affected the mental health of EVERY student in this program. Students in the SummerAbroad program from previous years did not have to confront and attempt to overcome stress and anxiety created as a result of an UNFAIR and ABSURD grading regulation. We are not lab rats. This grading system is being applied for the first time in this program. Correct me if I am wrong. But does that not transform us into an experimental cohort? What if this new grading system does not achieve what it is set out to do (render our grades more representative of what we normally achieve at U of T)? What then? We are paying the same money, completing courses of the same difficulty as students in previous years, and yet we are working harder than ever because we have not been guaranteed with our right to achieve our potential. If something is unfair, it is unfair. Claiming that we already signed and agreed to this unfair grading system DOES NOT justify the unfair nature of the system. We are not asking for anything special. Just give us our well-deserved grades and do not rob us of the fruits of our tears, sweat and blood.

I agree with all arguments laid out in this petition.

Reposting this because I strongly feel that the French Department at the University of Toronto did not truly and transparently address our concerns (this list contains just a few of many concerns): Here is the link: http://www.artsci.utoronto.ca/faculty-staff/teacher-info/academic-handbook-for-instructors/sections-9-11#bell A summary of our concerns (as discussed previously) are: 1. Students should be able to reach their full academic potential which should be symbolized by a final grade out of 100 points. For example a student last year receiving a final mark of 17/20 would have received a UofT equivalent of 85% , whereas a student this year receiving the same mark would be receiving a UofT equivalent of 76%. It should be noted that in both scenarios, both students have completed courses of equal difficulty, having completed the same work required for that level, a deduction of 9% is a large difference taking into account the similar circumstances of both students. In this case, these two students would have a Grade Point Average difference of 1.0. The first student would have achieved a 4.0GPA, whereas the second student would have only achieved a 3.0GPA despite receiving the same numerical mark out of 20 from the Institute de Touraine. 2. In the cases of all other U of T courses (including summer courses), there has been no precedence of a similar incident. Therefore, there is no concrete evidence to justify the new 4.5 multiplication scale instead of the previous multiplication scale. The higher average which may have been observed in previous years could have been a simple result of a larger number of beginner students taking beginner level courses (which is not the case for the current year). The new numerical value of 4.5 is unjustified because there is a lack of historical evidence. 3. In addition, the difficulty level of the Summer Abroad program at the Institute is higher because of a limited time span. For students taking any FSL le

I agree with the statement

Please don't put a quota on our mark, it'll be so unfair in all summer abroad courses (only one with 4.5 conversion among all summer abroad courses)

Hopefully department could reconsider the 10% automatical deduction

I never know the grade is *5 last year and I think it is not equity for students of this year.

Broqachel Wu