CO Grades

The condition (CO) grade is for those who have reached near proficiency of the material but have not yet developed sufficient mastery to pass the course. CO grades are generally used in cases when a student’s achievement in a course is not satisfactory (not sufficient to meet the criteria for passing) yet the student’s performance in the course suggests that he or she should be able to pass a re-examination after a brief independent review of the course material. This grade will normally be reserved for students who are within a point or two of the Pass/Fail cutoff and who only had difficulty with some topic areas within the Block or only failed a single exam.

Remediation of Condition Grades

Condition grades must be made up within three weeks of the end of the course or, at the discretion of the course director, within four weeks after the end of the semester. Faculty are not required to provide a formal review session for students receiving COs. The CO must be cleared by a passing performance on an evaluation instrument either comparable to the original evaluation(s) or limited to the content areas of deficit for that student at the discretion of the Course Director (CD). The CD may select items from previously existing make-up examinations in preparing the exams(s) for clearing the CO grade. Students passing the evaluations will have a grade of CO/P (Pass) and students failing the reevaluation will receive a CO/F (Fail).

The Student Promotions Committee will review the records of students receiving COs.

• Grades of CO Block 1 will be remediated during Fall Break or Winter Break
• Grades of CO in Block 2 will be remediated during Winter Break
• Grades of CO in Block 3 will be remediated during Spring Break or within the first four weeks following the end of the Spring semester
• Grades of CO in Block 4 will be remediated within the first four weeks following the end of the Spring semester

Failing Grades

A failing (F) grade is used when a student’s performance is unsatisfactory, generally accepted to be a grade of less than 70% that is more than two standard deviations below the mean, but may vary depending on the circumstances of the course and the decision of the CD.

Remediation of Failing Grades

The Student Promotions Committee (SPC) will review the student’s record to determine whether the student will remediate a failing grade by retaking the course in Summer Review or in a decelerated curriculum.

• Summer Review is a second formal registration for a given course, for which the student pays tuition and fees, and receives credit as reflected on his/her transcript. It is either a structured or semi-structured guided independent study of the course material. The summer review CD will set dates for formative and final assessments, may assign homework, may hold formal sessions, and will inform students of resources (including faculty) that are available. No more than one Block may be remediated in Summer Review.
• Deceleration is the distribution of the courses of the first two years of the curriculum over a three year period. A decelerated curriculum may be planned for students who have approval to proactively modify the distribution of their preclinical curriculum (voluntary deceleration) or for students who need to remediate unsatisfactory performance in a course or courses. Schedules for deceleration are individualized and will be determined by the Associate Dean for Student Affairs. Decelerated students taking Block 1 or Block 3 will generally attend all scheduled classes during the block and then will review the material with a tutor and take the exams and other assessments during the second half of the semester. Decelerated students taking Block 2 or Block 3 will generally preview the class material with a tutor during the first half of the semester and will attend all scheduled classes and take exams and other assessments during the block. Decelerated students will generally take ICM and Medicine and Society during the first year of deceleration and ICM 1.5 and the Clinical Case Correlations course in the second year of deceleration. In general, Blocks 1 and 4 or Blocks 2 and 3 will be taken during the same year in a decelerated curriculum.

Examples of Decelerated Schedules in the Block Curriculum

Deceleration Plan

Deceleration Plan

Deceleration Plan

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