Arizona Bill Would Let College Students Appeal Grades If They Allege Political Bias

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https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2024/03/07/arizona-bill-would-let-college-students-appeal-grades-if-they-perceive-political-bias/?sh=76c9db8110b6

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Quote:Michael T. Nietzel
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I am a former university president who writes about higher education.
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Mar 7, 2024,06:00am EST

Under a bill being considered by Arizona lawmakers, students at public universities could appeal ... [+]

The Arizona State Legislature is considering a bill that would set up an outside process for college students to appeal their grades if they believe they were affected by political bias against them on the part of an instructor.


State Senator Anthony Kern (R-Glendale) has introduced Senate Bill 1477 that would establish a “Grade Challenge Department” within the Arizona Board of Regents, the governance board that oversees the University of Arizona, Arizona State University and Northern Arizona University.

Under the bill, the Grade Challenge Department, which would have a location at each public university and be staffed by “volunteers selected by the Arizona Board of Regents,” would hear challenges by students to course grades they allege were affected by political bias.

If the Grade Challenge Department determines that a student’s grade was affected by political bias, the department could require the faculty member to regrade the students work “consistent with the department’s guidance.”

In addition, if the student disagrees with the Grade Challenge Department’s decision, the student may appeal the decision to the Arizona Board of Regents, and the board would then be able to “order any faculty member of a public university to regrade a student’s assignment or reevaluate a student’s overall class grade consistent with the Board’s guidance.”

Not surprisingly, university leaders and faculty are pushing back against the proposed legislation. As just the latest example of conservative legislators attempting to limit faculty authority, the bill’s problems are numerous and significant.

First, each of the universities already have extensive grade appeals processes in place, as do almost every college and university in the county. Here are those polices for Arizona State University, the University of Arizona and Northern Arizona University. They are meant to afford students an opportunity to show they were graded unfairly or incorrectly, and there is little evidence they have not been adequate for that purpose.

Second, who exactly would the Grade Change Department volunteers be? How would they be selected? What qualifications, if any, would they need to have to judge the presence or influence of political bias, let alone the quality of a student’s work in question? Is it not likely that strongly held viewpoints would motivate political partisans to step forward for such duty? That’s exactly the type of person who should not be weighing the merits of alleged political bias.

Third, it’s not clear who would pay for the new personnel the Board of Regents would need to hire to staff the department. The bill includes no new appropriations for an operating budget. It’s an unfunded mandate.


And finally, imagine the mischief such a bill, were it to become law, could introduce into college courses.

• Would a student in a World History course be entitled to challenge her grade if she claimed her essays were scored more harshly by an instructor who had voiced political differences with her in class?
• Would a student have a case for appeal if he argued that a professor downgraded a Sociology term paper because of a previous in-class political argument between them?
• Could the head of the local College Republicans claim her Social Work grade was lowered by a professor who’s a known champion of liberal causes?
• Could an outspoken communist student argue that a conservative professor unfairly reduced his Economics grade and therefore, the Grade Challenge Department should mandate a regrading?
  

The possible claims are nearly endless, the burden of proof is unclear, and the standards to be applied are unspecified. But one thing is certain – SB 1477 would introduce outside influences into academic evaluations, removing them from the sole purview of faulty and the institutional checks and balances already in place to protect against grading abuses.



Senator Kern, the bill’s sponsor, has been an outspoken critic of public universities in the past. Earlier this legislative session, according to the Arizona Mirror, he said he was “not a university guy” and called the state’s universities “anti-American indoctrination camps” because they offered courses and events designed for students of color and members of the LGBTQ community.


In press accounts, Kern has described his grading bill as “a due process issue,'' claiming that students “do not feel they can debate issues according to their politics or according to what they believe because they're afraid their grades are going to be lowered. This is going to help them.''


Kern, who’s being investigated for serving as one of Arizona’s fake electors in an attempt to undermine the 2020 presidential election, also has introduced Senate Concurrent Resolution 1014, which provides that “the Legislature, and no other official, shall appoint presidential electors.”


In other words, Arizona’s popular vote for president would not select its presidential electors, the state legislature would decide instead — acting sort of like a Grading Challenge Department, but this time for determining elections rather than changing Cs or Ds.

SB 1477 has already passed the Arizona Senate by a vote of 16-12, with two senators not voting. It’s now moved to the Arizona House of Representatives where it passed out of the House Education Committee by a slim 4-3 margin and is waiting for a full House vote.