Classes are falling out of the sky because of nonattendance
By: Stephen Buechter
Staff Writer
In a fairly new change of policy, students who have been dropped from courses for nonattendance can receive a 100% refund on any of the classes they have been dropped from due to nonattendance.
They also will not receive a W on their transcript.
“[This policy] was implemented for the fall semester of 2016,” said Dr. Michael Cundiff, Director of St. Louis Community College Enrollment Services.
The Vice Chancellor of Finances and Administration, Paul Zinck, stated that this was a change from previous policy.
“If a student had done everything they needed to do to attend a class, paid their bill, whatever, we would refund 80% of the cost,” Zinck said.
Zinck stated that the change took place to decrease potential barriers toward enrollment at St. Louis Community College.
Previously students would owe 20% of the cost for dropped classes as payment before they could attend any other classes, which could add up to a fairly large payment for a student was enrolled in many credit hours and had a lower income.
“This was something that we felt was putting a barrier in front of students that really was not providing that significant of a benefit to the college,” Zinck said.
Cundiff said that as long as the college is clear in explaining class dropping policies and procedures to students and students tell the college if they intend to miss a semester of school, there should be no major drawbacks.
Zinck said that some money would likely be lost due to not collecting the 20% of costs for dropped classes that was previously required, but does not think that the amount of money potentially lost from that is significant enough to make the decision a poor one.
These changes were intended to make paying for and attending college more accessible and less of a hassle.
Part of the intention was also to remove a barrier that stopped some students from attending St. Louis Community College when they would otherwise be able to attend.
