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<p>Does anyone out there think colleges should come up with a better solution than suspending a student, leaving them with no recourse to get themselves back on track. I mean if you are locked out of attending another institution to help raise your "GPA" then how do you redeem yourself? How does sitting out a semester help you? Does the light bulb really come on because you are forced out for a semester? I think colleges should do more to help students... Response anyone?</p>
<p>It’s college. Students are supposed to be helping themselves. There are always plenty of resources for aid - the professors, TA’s, tutors, free help centers (math, etc, especially). What more help do you want? If you are being suspended, you should take that time to get a job and mature and maybe find the motivation you need to buckle down when you get the chance to try again.</p>
<p>You are supposed to be somewhat of an adult by the time you get to college. The rules are the rules. Colleges aren’t in a position to do too much babysitting. They do offer support (in varying levels, depending on the school) but it isn’t high school.</p>
<p>I’m not sure what you mean “locked out of attending another institution” - if you can get admitted and don’t need financial aid, I think you are free to attend?</p>
<p>At the institution where I am employed, students are on probation if they have less than a 2.0 at the end of the first semester. If they raise the cumulative to over a 2.0 they are off probation at the end of the second semester. If they get higher than a 2.0 term GPA but don’t have a cumulative over a 2.0 they can continue on probation. If everything is lower than 2.0 the second term they are suspended. However, federal financial aid has its rules regarding satisfactory academic progress, and those rules are separate.</p>
<p>Some schools also have academic bankruptcy or “fresh start.” You wipe out your academic record (but still on the hook financially) after you sit out for a time.</p>
<p>Often the policies are designed to help you take a break so you don’t get deeper in the hole, both academically and financially.</p>
<p>Agree, Fortunately once a student has failed many colleges call it a suspension and the college leaves the door open for the student to come back. The institutions could just as easily say the student is out with no opportunity to return. And the light bulb may not come on the semester the student is off. Hopefully the light bulb comes on at some point in the student’s life otherwise the student needs to find a different path.</p>
<p>I am assuming the OP is referring to academic suspension, and not suspension for behavior or other reasons?</p>
<p>Academic suspension shouldn’t come as a shock to most students…red flags would have been waving high before the point of academic suspension arrived. In a good number of cases of academic suspension ( not all–sometimes there are other things going on with the student that preclude academic success), the student could have gotten help to get the academics in order or have gotten help in choosing a different major if the student truly could not manage to succeed in the original choice.</p>
<p>Suspension for other reasons? It’s real life, people…and it’s suspension, not expulsion at this point, so there is a path back. It’s a time out…</p>
<p>Suspension gives the student a chance to think things over and figure out how to do things differently the second time around. Time to shore up areas of academic weakness. Time to learn time management and how to prioritize.</p>
<p>In the real world, in the career world, if you don’t measure up, the consequences are a lot more severe than suspension.</p>
<p>At both institutions where I’ve worked, students are given at very least one semester to improve before academic probation becomes an academic suspension. Some students straighten up after one semester outs. Others require a three-year suspension to see the light, and some never do.</p>
<p>^ Agree whole heartedly with RedBetta. There are always indicators first.
Depending on the reason, sitting out a semester allows the student to fix what’s broken or decide to start focusing on school. What more would you have the schools do? As far as I know most schools have help centers available to aid the students in writing/math/other classes, and professors or TAs are available for extra instruction. The student has to make the effort.</p>
<p>I, too, am assuming academic troubles. </p>
<p>Yes, schools hope that one semester off will get the student to figure out whether they are cut out for college at this stage of his or her life. If she wants to return to college, the school expects to see a commitment to putting academic things (not social things) first. </p>
<p>Some schools won’t mind if you take a class at the community college; others don’t want you to take any college classes. </p>
<p>How do you get back in if you can’t take classes to boost your GPA? Schools are looking for evidence of more mature behavior–like holding a job or seriously volunteering or both–and for a realization and verbalization by the student that she screwed up and is ready to make changes.</p>
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Time to think about what is important. They have already tried to help on campus. At the schools all of mine have attended, and 2 of mine have been suspended from, there was at least one semester warning and multiple contacts to encourage attendance at help sessions, time management seminars, and resource centers. They were given specific targets and time lines to bring grades up which actually included the summer sessions so it was more than a semester to recover. They chose to ignore those. The suspension was to reconsider their options. </p>
<p>For mine, one went back, one did not. The one that went back had to write an appeal with what he was going to do differently and attend the time management seminars. Not attending meant he would be expelled. He only lasted a couple of more semesters before he sank again and was expelled. After several years of working, he figured out what was important and what he wanted to do. He started over in a different state, at a CC and then transferred to a university. It worked out in the end. </p>
<p>If they do not return they can start at a CC or go to work and go on from there.</p>
<p>Sitting the semester out definitely helps. It gives you time and perspective to figure out what was wrong and hwo to fix it. If you’re failing, and you’re still at the college, then you’re going to quickly become overwhelmed with the amount of work it takes not just to keep up with the classes, but actually to improve your performance. You can’t diagnose your problem if you’re deluged with the coursework that you’ve shown by your failing grades you can’t handle for one reason or another. You can’t reassess what’s going wrong if your social schedule or the drama of your group of friends, is still swirling around you. Sometimes the best thing to do is to take a break, give yourself time to think things through, maybe get a menial job and remember why you’re going to college (so you can learn something, get a degree, and not have to do menial jobs forever). </p>
<p>It’s pretty much the same thing you’ve gotten since childhood. You act up, you get a timeout so that you can settle down and think about what you’re doing wrong, why you’re there, and how much you don’t want to be there again. Only suspensions are the adult version.</p>
<p>Good advice. College is a priviledge and a very expensive priviledge. If you are struggling to need to stop and take time to figure out why and how to change the situation either through a different personal view or a change of academic setting or a longer break from academia.</p>
<p>I was just reading the OP’s post above again, and noticed 2 things:</p>
<p>It’s the OP"s first post</p>
<p>And, the OP asks if the light will come on for a student forced out for a semester?</p>
<p>I think maybe it will, because obviously what the student was doing previously wasn’t working real well. Isn’t the definition of insanity to keep doing things the same way while expecting a different result?</p>
<p>It really wouldn’t be fair to other students if colleges didn’t draw the line somewhere with those who are having trouble with the work. Of course there should be warnings and resource centers, etc., to go for help. But the next step after college is work-- and no one is going to be offering assistance to a banker or engineer who doesn’t accomplish anything. That person is just out of a job. Community colleges are wonderful places for people to get themselves back together academically, and turn over a new leaf…and when you do it on your own it gives you a kind of strength and confidence that makes the success doubly rewarding.</p>
<p>I wonder if what the OP is suggesting is that it would be better for a suspended student to be able to take some classes at a community college to improve GPA and then return to the college from which he was suspended.</p>
<p>Many (most?) colleges that allow taking classes at CC (usually over the summer) give credit for the classes, but do not count them into GPA. If a student can’t handle the classes at the school s/he is attending, s/he shouldn’t be there.</p>
<p>Thanks to all that replied…I appreciate your feedback. I agree student should be mature and be ready for college, but at 18 it seems like it is a roll of the dice, sometimes on how a child will respond to their new found freedom and the college curriculum.</p>
<p>Hunt, yes, I was thinking something of that nature…to help student get their GPA up.</p>