F-PLAN

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

The CRIMSON has recently reported that Professor Robert Cook of Yale University has announced that he will automatically give all of the students in his course a grade of A. From your issue of February 9th, we learn that a proposal that instructors give only A's, or not report grades to the registrar, came before the Columbia faculty which tabled it. As I understand it, given the current international situation, the automatic giving of A's to students, hence-forth called the A-plan, is designed to eliminate various extraneous influences upon the educational process, viz. students unduly concentrating upon getting good grades, and teachers bearing the responsibility of deciding upon grades which may seriously affect a student's future.

I wish to bring to public attention a similar plan which, it seems to me, will better achieve the goals of the A-plan without leading to many of the A-plan's undesirable side effects. Under this new plan, the teacher of a non-required course announces at the beginning of the term that he will fail every student in the course, and, at the end of the term, does. The advantages of the F-plan are obvious. Students will not concentrate excessively upon getting high grades in the course, and the teacher is spared the responsibility of making the decisions which may so seriously affect a student's future. Unlike the A-plan, the F-plan does not distort the educational process by encouraging a student to take a course solely because he will get a good grade. Indeed, under the F-plan, a teacher will be teaching only serious minded students who clearly are interested in taking the course for its own merits.

Under the A-plan, students in the course gain an advantage over students who are not in and perhaps cannot be in the course, and who thus are not automatically assured of an A. It is these latter students who unwillingly bear the undesirable consequences of the A-plan. Under the F-plan, on the other hand, the consequences fall only upon students who voluntarily choose to take the course.

It may be said that though-under the A-plan students may be tempted to take a course solely for the high grade, under the F-plan serious students will be discouraged from taking a course they are seriously interested in. Happily, such students may choose to audit the course rather than take it for a grade. To be sure, if most teachers adopt the F-plan, there will not be many non-F-plan courses with which to fill up a required schedule. But then all students will be in a similar situation, and hence will not be discouraged from taking a course because of the failing grade.

The F-plan will achieve the stated goals of the A-plan, and has additional advantages of its own. In view of this, I have no doubt that it quickly will win the support of current proponents of the A-plan. It is with some interest that I await their rallying to the F-plan banner. Assistant Professor of Philosophy   Robert Nozick