Nobody Fails VC

20/04/2020

Good Morning and Happy Striking!!
As a reminder, this strike extends to pre-registration for classes! :)
This is a great way for students to participate. You can do it without fear also as students still have the opportunity to sign up for classes later on during the registration phase.

18/04/2020

SUCCESS!

Due to our strikers' tireless advocacy and the efforts of allied professors, more professors have agreed to officially implement a no-fail policy in their classrooms. Last night, the Chair of the Urban Studies Department guaranteed us the department would not fail anyone.

The strike is working and we haven't even started yet. Please continue to ask your professors to implement and advocate for a no-fail policy in their departments and college-wide. Please continue to coordinate your classes and demand no-fail policies from faculty. We can do this!

***Disclaimer: Although the chair guaranteed us this, he reached back out later to clarify that this will stay de facto, rather than program policy, due to the problems posed by URBS being a multidisciplinary program.

link to strike + grading policy feedback form: https://bit.ly/nfvcfeedback
email template to send to professors: https://bit.ly/strikevcprofessor

18/04/2020

𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐏𝐨𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐚 𝐂𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐠𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚 𝐔𝐧𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐚𝐥 𝐏𝐚𝐬𝐬 / 𝐈𝐧𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐲𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐦 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐒𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 '𝟐𝟎! We can do this y'all! We hope Vassar will soon follow suit with a universal no-fail policy of its own.

No letter grades.

17/04/2020

𝘾𝙧𝙞𝙩𝙞𝙘𝙖𝙡 𝙎𝙩𝙧𝙞𝙠𝙚 𝙐𝙥𝙙𝙖𝙩𝙚
We appreciate the support and solidarity many of you have shown over the past few days! Here are updates to the strike and additional resources for striking and supporting the strike for students who cannot take direct action. Additionally, please fill out the 𝗙𝗘𝗘𝗗𝗕𝗔𝗖𝗞 𝗣𝗢𝗟𝗟!

𝗨𝗣𝗗𝗔𝗧𝗘
We’ve altered our strike strategy based on feedback we have received from students, faculty, and community members. As of this morning, we have sent out an email to all Vassar professors informing them of our intent to strike starting Monday. This message asks them to email Nobody Fails VC with the phrase “I commit to a no-fail policy” and tell their students, in writing, that no one will fail. If a professor guarantees in writing that no student will fail, strikers WILL NOT strike their classes. If a professor does not provide this statement, strikers WILL strike their classes.

We are working alongside faculty to advocate for a No Fail policy--one that will serve both students and faculty who are struggling in this time of crisis. Our goal is to ensure a No Fail policy regardless of the CCP’s decision to reopen voting or implement a college wide policy, although that outcome would be ideal and that is the outcome we’re fighting for. We appreciate the work that individual students, faculty, and admin have done thus far to push for this.

Nobody Fails Vassar College has adjusted our demands since they were first released on April 13th. Now, we need your feedback to make sure these demands continue to reflect our needs as Vassar students! We will adapt our demands and strategies based on your responses. Thank you for your time! There....

17/04/2020

ARE YOU IN SUPPORT OF UP / AA BUT CAN'T STRIKE?

Hi students! Many of you have reached out and expressed support for our movement and demands. Many of you need UP/AA and additional financial support from the college at this time. However, many of you have also reported that you cannot or will not participate in the strike because of the inherent risks. We know that for many students, having class structure is necessary for your mental health, and don’t want to take away the one thing keeping you sane. We also know that several of you have unaccommodating professors and worry that your striking will damage your grades or prevent you from graduating. We recommend that everyone who is able and agrees with even one of our demands to strike with us. We are most powerful as a collective, and will affect the most change if we have a critical mass of striking students. Even so, we’ve put together a number of ways that people who cannot strike but still want to help can support the movement.

1. Attend our weekly tea time sit-ins! We had our first sit-in this past Wednesday, and hope that they only improve from here on out. We are in the process of making an anonymous form for students to raise concerns about the current academic and financial climate. Organizers will read these questions. If you’re comfortable asking the questions yourself, we welcome and encourage new voices!

2. Participate in our email-bombs! This is another way for students to show the power of our collective presence despite our lacking physical presence. We will be releasing more information on when and how often these emails will take place once the strike begins. Our plan is to release a time at which all participating students will send an email to an email list of administrators. This email will contain several questions that have been repeatedly posed by organizers and have been ignored by admin. We will likely do these email-bombs 3-4 times a week, and will have regular updates on our page.

3. Have individual conversations with your professors about implementing a Double A policy in their classroom. Let us know if your professors are being particularly unaccommodating. We are trying to gauge faculty opinion and contact resources who have made themselves known through our faculty form, but we can only do this if all faculty respond. With your added input, we can contact faculty and departments who have shown unwillingness to change and have longer 1-on-1 conversations on why we believe UP/AA is necessary.

4. If you have class or a good relationship with a department head, ask them if their department has considered going Double A or No Fail, and if not, why? Several departments have already announced they are not failing anyone this semester, and more are in the process of determining this. The more departments that will not allow a student to fail, the more power we have to towards a no-fail policy.

5. Continue to fill out our feedback form and send us emails if you’d like some clarification.

6. Talk to your friends and classmates, encouraging them to join you in your efforts to support UP or Double A. You can organize together and coordinate as a class how you will discuss grading policy with your professor.

**This post has been edited to remove the suggestion of striking into classes.

16/04/2020

ATTENTION VC:

As of last night, a strike POLL, updated list of demands, and updated strike instructions have been sent to your emails. We ask that everyone fill it out to the best of their ability so that we have an accurate representation of student body needs/demands. This movement is fluid and we will making adjustments to demands and protocols as we receive more information from students, professors, and admin.

If you haven't already, fill out the poll HERE -->

Nobody Fails Vassar College has adjusted our demands since they were first released on April 13th. Now, we need your feedback to make sure these demands continue to reflect our needs as Vassar students! We will adapt our demands and strategies based on your responses. Thank you for your time! There....

15/04/2020

ATTENTION: Virtual sit-in TONIGHT for Universal Pass / AA

When? 9pm-9:30pm EST
Where? PB's Tea: https://vassar.zoom.us/j/92454372149
How?
1. Download icon at bit.ly/strikevcicon (also linked below in this post)
2. Open Zoom through Vassar OneLogin (https://vassar.zoom.us/j/92454372149)
3. Click "Profile" to the left of the page and click "Change" underneath your profile picture
4. Click "Upload," select the icon you downloaded, resize it, and click "Save"
5. You're good to go! When you join Zoom, mute your audio and video

15/04/2020

UPDATE TO STRIKE DETAILS
It has been brought to our attention that our initial strike timeline called for strikers to participate during the 7th and 8th days of Passover. We would like to formally apologize to Vassar’s Jewish community for this oversight. By not properly acknowledging Passover from the start, our original timeline contributed to the erasure of Jewish identity and culture. This was antisemitic and something we cannot condone. To honor the traditions of the many Jewish people we are proud to have in our community, we are pushing back our official timeline so as not to interfere with Passover. We are now asking that all students who intend on striking email their professors sometime during the April 17-19 weekend, no earlier than 3pm EST on Friday, April 17, with the strike formally beginning on Monday, April 20 at 9am EST. We are thankful for this feedback and criticism, and not only invite but encourage further participation as this strike develops.

Additionally, we are now aware that the faculty was not given a second opportunity to vote in favor of UP/AA, only the Committee on Curricular Policies (CCP)-- a group of 9 people-- had the final say in this matter. We were misled by the email sent to students regarding the NRO extension and are currently in the process of updating our documents to reflect what we now know to be the truth. We believe in the preservation of the democratic spirit of voting and do NOT condone the CCP’s decision to not offer the faculty a re-vote after hearing the testimonies many students have been sending via email for the past three weeks. We want to be VERY CLEAR that we are intent on working WITH all faculty to achieve UP or AA, especially those who are on the same page as us and have implemented AA in their classrooms.

A list of FAQs will be published on our social media pages within the next 24-48 hours to provide as much information as possible regarding our demands and relevant updates to those demands. Until then, we want to assure everyone that we are available through DM/email for you to relay questions, comments, and concerns to Nobody Fails VC. We are doing everything we can to make our organizing as transparent as possible and we thank you for your patience.

FB: https://www.facebook.com/nobodyfailsvc/
Insta: nobodyfailsvc
Email: [email protected]

COVID-19 has exacerbated disparities in both the resources and capacity students have to learn. Vassar College students are mobilizing in support of a Universal Pass system for Spring '20 -- no one should fail during a pandemic.

14/04/2020

🗣ATTENTION VC STUDENTS!! 🗣

Our faculty and administration's response to student requests for reconsideration of our grading policies in light of covid-19 has been entirely unacceptable. For the reasons below, and so many more, WE ARE CALLING FOR A SCHOOL-WIDE STRIKE BEGINNING THURSDAY, APRIL 16TH.

Vassar students are self-motivated and committed to our education. We care about our classes, not only for the grades that we receive at the end of each semester but for the gift of knowledge itself and the opportunity to learn. Vassar students are some of the most driven students around, and many of us will go on to do great things with the knowledge that we gain from this institution. However, for many Vassar students, education CANNOT be a priority due to circumstances outside of our control. Your students are currently facing, among many other concerns: homelessness, food insecurity, unemployment, being stranded in foreign countries, abusive homes, anxieties about and realities of death. Over 22,000 lives have been lost in the US alone to coronavirus. Some of these lives belonged to people who are dear to members of the Vassar community.

And now, because of the TWO voting periods held by faculty which maintained the “Universal” NRO, and Vassar’s general inflexibility during this GLOBAL CRISIS, we can add academic pressure and additional financial strain to that long list of concerns. If a student needs to place school work at the bottom of a list of priorities that includes physical, emotional, and mental SAFETY, they should be able to do that without fear of penalization. Receiving a "pass" grade within the Universal NRO system is still penalization. Withdrawing from a class to avoid an “F” is still penalization. Being forced to take incompletes during a pandemic is still penalization.

Vassar’s inflexibility during this crisis has shown students that Vassar is nothing more than a business, and we are not worth the effort. Prove us wrong. Universal Pass/AA, a sustained Emergency fund, financial transparency, protections for Vassar’s most affected employees, and a reversal of the drastic tuition increase are the ONLY ways to truly care for ALL of the Vassar community.

JOIN US in protesting sustained inequity. Demands and protocols listed below.

08/04/2020