By Clyde Noel

Beginning with the fall term of the 2006-2007 academic year, Foothill and De Anza Community colleges will recognize plus and minus symbols in their grades. The board of trustees approved the item by a 4-1 vote with Trustee Andrea Leiderman objecting.

A period of partial implementation will begin with the fall term of the 2004-2005 academic year and continue through the 2005-2006 academic year. During the test period, the grade scale will include the plus and minus symbols, but only the base letter grades will be used to calculate the grade-point averages until the full implementation with the 2006 fall term.

Chancellor Martha Kanter said the period of partial implementation is intended to provide time to educate faculty members and students about plus/minus grading and to study the effects of adoption.

Over a two-hour period, students from both colleges voiced their opposition to the plus/ minus grading system, saying it might lower a student’s overall grade point average and lower the potential of transferring to a four-year institution.

“Nothing has changed since the last time. It’s tragic to magic,” said student Rodolfo Vasquez. “Foothill is a top-tier community college, but if you institute plus/minus grading it won’t be for long.”

Kanter and President of the Academic Senate Dan Mitchell recommended the adoption of the plus/minus grading system. Grade points will be calculated as described in the grade-scale table.

Vasquez said 236 students were surveyed and 47 percent said they would not attend Foothill-De Anza if the plus/minus system were instituted. (Note: 36,260 students attend the two colleges).

Christie Wiere, a former student now attending Stanford University, said the academic senate is railroading this matter and the faculty is being given a red herring. “The faculty is telling us it will be harder to do well but easier to do nothing,” Wiere said.

To address student concerns, Trustee Betsy Bechtel said, “We are restricted on what we can give for grades. This is a trial where we can find out whether it will hurt students.”

Leiderman was in favor of the plus/minus system but did not want to approve the current proposal because there was no provision for an A-plus grade to balance the A-minus. If an A-minus grade carried 3.7 grade points, then an A-plus should be factored as 4.3 points, not 4.0, the same as an A, she explained.

By state law, the instructor of a class may choose any grading symbol within the system selected by the board of trustees and the academic senate.

The current grade scale is as follows: A+ 4.0, A 4.0, A- 3.7, B+ 3.3, B 3.0, B- 2.7, C+ 2.3, C 2.0, D+ 1.3, D 1.0, D- 0.7 and F 0.0. There is no C- grade.