Honor Roll cutoff may increase

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by Hemmy So

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The President's Honor Roll may expand from including the top 30 percent of students to including the top 35 percent, pending student approval. The increase would add approximately 140 students to the honor roll.

Student Association President Maryana Iskander is currently gathering student opinion through the college presidents, who have been addressing the issue at college cabinet meetings.

The issue itself was brought up last August by Accounting Professor Stephen Zeff after a meeting in which Vice President for Student Affairs Zenaido Camacho expressed concerns over students in extracurricular activities.

"We need to find more ways of patting [students] on the back for their academic achievements, so that they might feel more at ease in adding other [extracurricular] activities without jeopardizing their academic performance," Zeff wrote in a letter to Camacho dated Aug. 3, 1995.

Zeff also noted the steady rise in grade point averages over the past 15 years.

His letter cited facts from the registrar showing that the GPA cutoff for the President's Honor Roll was 3.4 in 1981, between 3.55 and 3.6 in the 1993-94 year, 3.620 in the fall of 1994 and 3.647 in the spring of 1995.

A five percent increase for the 1994-95 year would have made the GPA cutoff 3.548 in the fall and 3.571 in the spring, he said later.

The expansion, however, must be approved by President Malcolm Gillis before it goes into effect.

"[The expansion] is not effective until I sign off on it, and I won't sign off on it until we have student opinion," Gillis said.

The issue was opposed at both the Sid Richardson College Council and Lovett College Cabinet meetings. Although both cabinets knew that one reason behind the proposal was to increase student activity, neither knew about the steady increase in GPAs.

"People at [SRC], at least those on council, were resoundingly against the expansion," SRC President Michelle O'Hara said.

"People felt that it was unnecessary and it added to the grade inflation that the administration has been concerned about. Others felt frustrated by the seemingly endless debates about grades, honor roll and graduation honors."

O'Hara also indicated that SRC students were concerned that the proposed expansion might result in an increased difference between the percentage of students qualifying for honor roll and the percentage receiving graduation honors.

She said students were also worried that the situation would again arise where students who had been consistently on the President's Honor Roll would not graduate with honors.

Zeff, however, said that graduation honors and the President's Honor Roll "serve totally different purposes."

"[The President's Honor Roll] is an incentive," Zeff said. "University honors are ... kind of offered as a university record for the cumulative academic record of students."

He also said that making the honor roll can be put on students' resumes while they are still in school, unlike graduation honors.

Students at Lovett had other reasons to oppose the expansion.

"[Lovett students] were concerned about decreasing the prestige [of making the honor roll]" and "some didn't feel like it would make a difference [in increasing student involvement]," said Lovett President Kara Miller.

She said that even the few students who were in favor of the expansion were doubtful that it would increase student involvement on campus.

Wiess College President Dave McCann, however, is in favor of the expansion proposal.

"The first time I heard of it, I was fine with it because I thought it wouldn't affect the prestigiousness of the President's Honor Roll," McCann said.

The issue will be brought up at the Wiess Cabinet meeting on April 10, but McCann has already talked to various Wiess residents about the topic.

"There is no general consensus. It's about an even split," McCann said. He went on to say that "if people knew the facts behind it and the numbers behind it, they'd probably be for it."

The issue has been brought up at the last two SA meetings, and Iskander will compile the colleges' opinions to present them to Gillis on Monday.

"My opinion is that students are going to have the last say in it -- whether we want [the expansion] or not," she said.

Gillis said that he has no problems or strong feelings about the issue, but "if there is a consensus with the faculty, and students want it, then we should have it."

This item appeared in the News section of the April 12, 1996 issue.

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