<p>Exeter just announced that beginning next year, first term of prep year will be graded pass-fail.</p>
<p>This is meant to ease the adjustment into the school for new 9th graders. (Current issue of on-line Exonian has the article about this). The student response is mixed. </p>
<p>Having gone through this last year with my D, I say BRAVO. The adjustment for new 9th graders, away from home, in a new environment, with lots of work expected, can be very stressful. </p>
<p>Overall, Exeter's principal Tom Hassan is making many changes to improve quality of student life. Less than a handful of Saturday classes all year are left, time limits on homework have been instituted, later morning start time for classes and 24 hour internet have all been new this year.</p>
<p>At first, I thought this might be a good idea. But in the end, as a matter of principle, I have to agree with some students and teachers who voiced their opinions that new students should be given more support/help during transition rather then lenient grading, and that the new grading system would just postpone inevitable transition.</p>
<p>I love Tom. We talked for over an hour a while back and he really is serious about improving and updating the Exeter climate. MIT is pass/fail its first semester for the same reason - ease the transition.</p>
<p>When most if not all of the incoming class is at the top of their game in their previous year, they can’t all be “top” at boarding school. Pass/fail allows students to focus on coursework and allows them to experiment without the pressure of trying to be perfect. Also eases transition for those parents who think a B+ is equivalent to failing. :)</p>
<p>Tom is the greatest. He has made it his mission to make Exeter less of a Marine Corps boot camp and has been dragging the faculty along. There is a great deal of support for kids but they often need time to discover they need it and that it IS there. While there will be just P/F on the transcripts, the teachers–esp given the Harkness system–know who needs help and can direct those kids towards it-- but can do so before they have a bunch of horrible grades. The social transition living at boarding school is plenty stressful enough prep fall–now they can learn to learn the Exeter way. </p>
<p>Hassan will end up being one of the great Exeter principals. Hooray for Tom!</p>
<p>I can believe that the principal is great, but the decision was not his, but from faculty vote–which was far from being unanimous, not even two thirds, just a mere majority. The opposition appeared to be sizable and passionate. Something like this would have no chance of passing in our Congress;)</p>
<p>Seriously, the faculty didn’t seem to bother asking current students how they had liked/disliked their prep experience, or whether they would favor P/F grading if they had been prep again. When will grown-ups stop pretending to know what kids want and what’s good for them without first listening?</p>
<p>I think one way to help new students in this system would be to let them know what grades they WOULD get, were they to get grades. So their transcript would show “Pass” but they would also get the feedback on the quality of their work, and could get an understanding of the grading standards at Exeter.</p>
<p>Ask preps–not seniors. By the time senior year comes around as the Yale alma mater puts it they will see “though memory’s haze.” Medical internship is incredibly inhumane yet research has demonstrated that senior residents favored no change to the system-- probably for a number of reasons-- we went through it so could you–now, looking back on it, it wasn’t so bad (see: “memory’s haze”)–it is what sets medicine apart from the other professions-- and even: it’s not fair that you(the new interns) have it easy when we had it so much harder… Just change it to Exeter speak and the same arguments would be made by the older students. </p>
<p>The same was the case when Eton abolished flogging and fagging. This is a case, as was the case with those others cited, when those with more laps around the track have a better perspective. </p>
<p>Exeter’s polity requires such changes be approved by the faulty, but there should be no doubt who was the driving force behind this change–as with the limitation on homework, and Saturday classes.</p>
<p>Academic rigor is an important priority at Exeter, and each of these changes is being much debated. In order to remove the Saturday classes, for example, they had to eliminate several long weekends and a week of vacation. So the number of classes has not changed.</p>
<p>Saturdays are now being used to do research by several kids, especially at MIT, which is very easy to get to from Exeter but never before was a practical activity. Saturdays free really opens up time for interests and passions, and overall I think it is strengthening the academic pursuits in a good way, and giving students a chance to grow outside the Exeter bubble.</p>
<p>24 hour internet is certainly a boon to procrastinators. </p>
<p>Homework is still 45 min to an hour a class a night, so with 5 classes it appears that maxes out homework time anyway, and probably just means that one class cannot make unrealistic demands for time as much as it may have in the past.</p>
<p>Plank - It is rather complicated, because they also changed around the whole schedule to a rotating 2 week thing - they have been working on cutting back the Saturdays like this for 2 years. According to the discussion I have seen in the Exonian, the faculty are happy that the number of classes is the same. They did not want to have to change the number of class meetings, their curriculum, or their lesson plans. I honestly don’t know if that translates directly into days, but at least 10 days were trimmed off of vacation and long weekends in order to remove most of the remaining fall term Saturdays.</p>
<p>This takes you to the sign on page. Follow the instructions (find and click to the left of the sign on area), and it is straightforward to log in to read the online issue and search past issues. The article I mentioned was from the February 22nd edition.</p>
<p>A link will not work without going through the sign-on.</p>
<p>Ok Thanks! Very interesting article. It looks like that the students are not happy with the change and many, really many, teachers voted against. 81 x 56</p>
<p>After reading all the articles I am personally disappointed with Exeter, they used to have 30 Saturday classes/year, 2013-2014 it is going to be just eleven!</p>
<p>If you’re suggesting asking the students who ran rampant during an over exuberant round of campus “Assassin” (including breaking into dorms and classrooms) their opinion of how to shape a centuries old institution for the future - I think I’ll pass on that.</p>
<p>The climate was a large topic of discussion this year among alum. I’m neutral on the subject of Saturday classes. I would have l liked to see that maintained. But Exeter’s climate needed a course correction. Not surprised so many teachers voted against some of the policies - I suspect several were people I noted in my comments to the school after observing classes so low energy it would have sucked the oxygen off of a water molecule. </p>
<p>Asking current students how they feel might be valid, but for final decision making, that’s not how any corporation runs. But if the changes aren’t what the kids want - there are thousands ready to take that place.</p>