Oregon State University students may now opt to change the grading scale for even their major classes from a letter scale to S/U, which stands for satisfactory/unsatisfactory, and they also have an extended period to drop classes.

These new policies come during OSU’s sudden switch to remote education to attempt to slow the spread of COVID-19.

In an all-student email sent out Wednesday night, Edward Feser, provost and executive vice president, said OSU has extended the deadline to drop classes for all students to the end of the second week of spring term, replacing the previous deadline, which was at the end of the first week of the term. The updated deadline to drop a course without a W, standing for withdrawal, on students’ transcripts, and receive a full refund is now April 12. Classes can be dropped through the MyOSU website.

Normally, students are generally not allowed to change classes required for their major or minor to S/U grading, but this new policy changes that. The S/U grading system has no effect on students’ GPA. 

Additionally, students may now opt to change a class to the S/U grading option up through week 10 of spring term, whereas previously students were required to file the change-of-grading-scale request by Friday of week 7. 

The new policy for S/U grading does not apply to students in the colleges of pharmacy or veterinary medicine, however, and it comes with additional guidelines for graduate students not in these two colleges. 

Graduate students, besides those in pharmacy or veterinary medicine, are encouraged to opt in to S/U grading only in “exceptional circumstances,” states the email. To request this option, graduate students can talk to their major professor or program director.