On Oct. 10, Delta approved a revision to the academic renewal policy which allows students more flexibility in cleaning up their academic record to enable easier transfer and graduation, aligning Delta with the more progressive academic renewal policies of other local community colleges.
With the updated policy, students can now apply to have up to 40 units of unsatisfactory grades forgiven as long as they have taken at least six units at Delta and maintain a 2.0 GPA.
The form is available online on the petition page through Delta’s Admissions and Records website.
Previously, students could only apply for academic renewal to wipe 15 units worth of failing grades — “‘D,’ ‘F,’ or ‘FW’ or ‘NC’ or ‘NP’” — and could apply only if they had taken at least 12 units and waited a semester to pass between the failing grade and the application, meaning students were required to wait a year to have substandard grades forgiven.
Given the typical three-unit class, the original policy allowed students to apply for forgiveness for five courses.
“When I went to the Board of Trustees, I brought some students and their stories on how academic renewal will change their life and they’re able to transfer sooner … because of this policy. It was difficult though because a lot of the administrators were against it because they felt like it was gonna make too many students do academic renewal and they would have to process more petitions, and so it was really frustrating,” said Dr. Stacey Bagnasco, a counselor who helped propose the new policy.
Different iterations of the policy had been proposed on multiple occasions, but were blocked.
“We came together and reached a consensus and it did pass … it has been updated and we are here to help support and serve our students with the best way possible,” said Associate Vice President of Student Services James Dalske.
Bagnasco and history professor Dr. Wesley Swanson first proposed a revision to the policy on Feb. 20.
The proposal — which at the time called for a more moderate 10-course cap to the expanded limit on academic renewal — successfully reached the stage of a 30-day public comment period after a vote by the Policies and Procedures Review Committee (PPRC) on March 20 but ultimately failed to pass.
At a May 1 meeting, whose minutes were not publicly available on BoardDocs, recording secretary for the PPRC, Carol Ochoa, confirmed that the motion failed to obtain enough yes votes to move forward.
The proposal was resubmitted again on Aug. 19, but again faced opposition.
“when I brought this to the [PPRC], the administrators and the classified reps voted it down, and they were basically against the faculty, and … the student reps weren’t there … so we didn’t get the numbers. So then this August I got on the agenda for the first [PPRC] meeting and it got voted down again by the administrators, and the classified representatives from their union voted against it,” said Bagnasco.
On Sept. 4, the motion failed with seven votes against and five votes in favor.
“After agreeing that these changes would benefit our students, the consensus among administrators was that the processing of the required petitions would place an unacceptable burden on staff. When asked how much staff time was required or how many related petitions were being anticipated, the administrators did not have an answer or estimate. With all faculty voting in favor, the revision was nevertheless voted down with all administrators voting against,” said counselor Daniel Fernandez during a public comment period at a Sept. 9 board meeting.
At the same meeting, other faculty gave public comments in response to this outcome.
“The no vote disenfranchises students that you’ve heard from last week along with untold others, meaning no graduations, no transfers, and limited financial aid opportunities for them … students’ futures should not be sacrificed over administrative convenience … Instead of supporting our students in support of these goals, we are preventing them from reaching them and taking money out of our own pockets,” said professor and counselor Becky Plaza.
Plaza referred to the California Community College’s Student Success Funding Formula (SCFF) which allocates funding in part based on student success, arguing that giving students better access to academic renewal results in a better transfer and graduation rate, metrics used to determine student success.
At the meeting’s close, Administrative Assistant Susan Rodriguez said “we are not against it … and we are fast-tracking it, Dr. Cordova’s put a meeting together on Thursday … we normally do 30-day but we’re willing to do 15 [-day public comment period] just to get this going just because it’s important.”
Following the expedited public comment period, a special meeting of the President’s Council approved the final revised policy, passing unanimously on Oct. 10.
“It’s really really important that Delta students understand the importance of them being involved in showing up to meetings when they’re able to vote because they can make an impact,” said Bagnasco.
Responses to requests for comment on this story from Vice President of Administrative Services Augustine Chavez and Assistant Superintendent Lonita Cordova were not given at the time of publication.
This story has been updated to include a statement from Associate Vice President of Student Services James Dalske given after the original date of publication.
