Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory Grading Scheme (“S/U scheme”) should be optional and not mandatory:  Proposed Amendment to the “COVID-19 UHLC Pass/Fail Petition (“Pass/Fail Petition”) 

Every student’s situation is unique.  As mentioned in the Pass/Fail Petition, the COVID-19 Pandemic (“Pandemic”) will affect students in various ways.  Some students may need to move an immunosuppressed parent from a risky co-living space.  While some students may have real obligations to family, some may not be directly responsible for anything tangible.  Doubtless many students will face challenging feelings, and some may benefit educationally from the decreased distraction accompanied by social distancing.  Enforcing a one-size-fits all approach fails at equity because every student is impacted on a different level - logistically, emotionally, and economically.
 
Enforcing a mandatory S/U scheme punishes the strongest and below-average students.  Some students finished their semester’s reading entirely over winter-break, and some gave up gainful employment to improve their grades.  Enforcing an S/U scheme punishes those who have made major sacrifices up until ~70% of the semester, those who want the choice to actively preserve a strong GPA record, and those who have relied economically on the outcome of their grades.  As has been noted in an ABA journal article, an S/U scheme may hurt “students who have [had] a less-than-stellar first semester, but otherwise would have been able to show an improvement for the second semester.”  This may affect “students who don’t come from a privileged background [and who] may have a slower start at law school, but they figure it out in the second semester.”[1]
 
Enforcing a mandatory S/U scheme eliminates student agency and affects  students' future economic stability.  Students should be able to rely on the promised grading scheme that has been in place for ~70% of the semester.  Students do not come to law school without taking risks.  In choosing to attend UHLC, they incur risk and forgo spending time and resources elsewhere.  For students to be denied the chance to affect their GPA by choice of letter grade at their own risk, reduces the value of their time at UHLC.  In effect, this could change dramatically the trajectories of many students’ professional futures.  A mandatory S/U scheme effectively eliminates a student’s influence on their foreseeable economic and professional future.  This is especially impactful to students looking for jobs in an uncertain Pandemic-compromised economy.
 
Enforcing a mandatory S/U scheme is systematically unfair to students whose first semester grades suffered due to external factors.  Every semester, students experience events that impact them just as deeply as the Pandemic – a parent diagnosed with a life-threatening illness, a family crisis, death of a loved one, a drastic job change, a life-changing marital situation, etc.  Some 1Ls may be adjusting to English as a first language or moved from afar.  Many of these situations which doubtless have grade impacts are not excepted for by the generosity of an S/U scheme.  To mandatorily waive all grades this semester is to rob a student of their ability to make up for semesters like the one previously described.  In effect, it takes the agency and control out of a student’s life, at a time when so much control has been robbed by the Pandemic.
 
This solution serves more students.  Providing the option to elect for a grade would enable Professors to adhere to the original curve and apply the S/U scheme to whomever chooses it.  Much of the Pass/Fail Petition is based on a Cornell Memorandum[2](“Memo”) that gave more weight to students’ anxiety over cheating than the costs of an S/U scheme.  While the Cornell student anxiety over cheating on un-proctored exams is valid, it is outweighed by the anxiety of losing control over one’s economic future during a Pandemic.  Take-home exams are not a novelty at UHLC and if the integrity of our students taking them is questionable now, it should have been before.  Finding the Pass/Fail Petition too drastic and the Memo’s weight given to cheating anxiety outweighed by economic anxiety, an optional S/U scheme would alleviate a broader swath of concerns.  An optional S/U scheme would protect more people than the Pass/Fail Petition: those who are more deeply impacted by the Pandemic, those who are relying economically on their grades, and those who want the choice to preserve their strong GPA record.

[1] https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/several-top-law-schools-adopt-pass-fail-grading-plans-after-going-online
[2] https://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/COVID-19/upload/Spring-2020-Grading-Proposal.pdf