I’m writing in response to the recent piece about UNCG, alleging that DFW rates were the primary reason for program discontinuations. This conclusion is false and misinformed. As we previously shared, academic performance was only one factor in a holistic review. Low student demand and high relative faculty costs were among the most important drivers of discontinuation. The ratio of declared majors in physics to tenure-stream faculty, for instance, is five to one. This is unsustainable no matter the DFW rates.
Graduate programs in mathematics were discontinued largely because of the way the department is staffed, with essentially the same number of tenured and tenure-track faculty as Biology (1,100+ declared students) and Psychology (1,000+ declared students). Math had 104 declared students in Fall 2023. This imbalance is hard to defend and a reason for action. One very important upshot of addressing it is that we should see better student performance in math classes as our most experienced faculty members shift their attention fully to undergraduate instruction.
However, since DFW rates are the crux of your article, I want to correct the record on why and how we used them. Monitoring DFW rates is a routine best practice. We have published DFW rates for every section of every course since well before I arrived in 2019, and we regularly discuss them. Taken alone, high DFW rates are not an indication of high standards, that a class is hard, or that an instructor is doing a good job. Taken alone, low DFW rates are not an indication of low standards, that a class is easy, or that an instructor is doing a bad job.
High DFW rates are, however, an important sign that students are struggling—that there is a mismatch between the instruction and the learning. They are also a leading indicator of student withdrawals and lack of degree completion. For this reason, most US institutions monitor DFW rates in many or all undergraduate courses, asking academic unit leadership to review the data, diagnose any problems, and intervene where appropriate. Publishing metrics and investigating why students are struggling do not pressure faculty members to award more passing grades. Rather, these practices insist on accountability. When we see that only 40% of the students enrolled in an introductory general education course with no prerequisites are completing it successfully, we must ask why. Rigorous instruction is one possible answer. Poor instruction is another—especially when DFW rates vary widely by instructor in the same course. We owe it to the taxpayers and our students to determine which is which.
There are a lot of reasons for high DFW rates. Many of them are systemic, which is why most campuses see high DFW rates in the same courses. We have worked for years to increase rates of successful course completion without decreasing rigor precisely because UNCG plays such an important role in North Carolina, providing access to excellence in education and career preparation for students from all backgrounds. Any push to lower academic standards would undermine our mission to prepare students for meaningful lives and engaged citizenship. It would also set them up to struggle in their upper-division courses, in graduate or professional school, and in the workplace.
There is a significant body of research literature on improving academic outcomes in lower-division courses, and none of it suggests that making classes easier is the answer. In recent years, we have implemented a mid-term grading policy that allows us to intervene earlier when students are in trouble. At the same time, I led an effort to make our grading more rigorous, changing our long-standing policy of not counting repeated course failures in students’ GPAs. We now count every F. We have also built out our tutoring and mentoring operations, partly by way of a National Science Foundation-funded program that I help lead. In addition to new and expanded academic infrastructure, we have worked with donors to secure scholarships so students with high financial need can better focus on their coursework. As your article mentions, we partnered with the Association of College and University Educators to offer optional training on effective teaching. Effective does not mean easier. It means better.
We have made great strides in recent years to improve academic outcomes by investing in evidence-based solutions and insisting on accountability, not by fudging the numbers. In accepting the false conclusion that because we discussed DFW rates in the context of the academic portfolio review, we meddled in faculty grading, you undercut the wholly appropriate steps we are taking to make sure our students and our taxpayers receive everything we owe them.
I was a first-generation college student and know from personal experience that the way forward at UNCG is not through dumbing down the curriculum or handing out passing grades. The way forward is through the right academic programs, excellent instruction, first-rate learning support outside of class, and accountability for outcomes.
With best wishes,
Andrew Hamilton, Ph.D.
Associate Vice Provost for Academic Affairs
Dean of Undergraduate Studies
UNC Greensboro
