Early Warnings and Midterm Warning Grades

Early Warnings

During the third week of classes, the Office of Academic Support asks all faculty to identify any student who is already at risk to fail a course. While this might seem early, it is important to identify students having difficulties as early as possible, so that they can be offered support to turn things around. Early warnings may result from poor grades on early assignments, frequent absences, failure to submit work, or other evidence of disengagement from the course. Early warnings are an internal notation only; they do not appear on a student’s APR2 record.

When an early warning has been submitted, the student is contacted (and the student's academic advisor notified) and encouraged to take advantage of academic (and other) support resources and to work with their advisor to formulate a plan to get back on track. Students receiving multiple early warnings will be contacted by a member of the Advising Team for help in addressing whatever is going wrong.

Faculty play a key role by identifying students who are struggling early in the semester, so that there is time to turn things around. Early warnings are not punitive and never appear on a student's record--they are meant to facilitate students getting needed support.

Midterm Warning Grades

During the seventh week of classes, the Registrar's Office asks faculty to submit formal mid-semester grades for those students doing less than satisfactory work, i.e., those earning less than 2.0. These midterm warning grades are available to students and their advisors in APR2 under the "Grades" tab. The midterm warning grade system is voluntary and not all faculty assign midterm warning grades, so students must still be responsible for keeping track of how they are doing in their courses.

While academic advisors are considered the primary resource for students who are struggling, Academic Advising uses both early warnings and midterm warning grades to identify students in academic distress. Once that identification is made, we reach out to the student and academic advisor and to other staff (such as a student’s coach) who have a connection with the struggling student. Our goal is to work with the student to devise a plan to address the problem before it is too late.