Pitt math department drops one letter grade rule

Pitt’s Department of Mathematics dropped the one letter grade rule. The one letter grade rule allowed students to only get a grade one letter higher than their final exam letter grade. 

Jonathan Rubin, a math professor and chair of the math department, said the department temporarily removed the rule during the 2020 fall semester to reduce stress during the first fully virtual semester, but they put it back in place the following semester.

“We first dropped the rule during the fall semester of 2020 to help mitigate the stress of coping with the fallout from the COVID pandemic. As this stress is ongoing, our faculty decided that we can again help to take some pressure off of students by dropping the one letter grade rule for another year, at least.”

Rubin said the department decided to remove to mitigate student’s anxiety over a single exam.

“​​We have long recognized that there are arguments for and against the one letter grade rule. One of the arguments against it is that it places such a high importance on a single exam, which can be stressful for students,” Rubin said.