That "subtly disguised insane asylum for freaks"—as one student described the redwood-studded University of California at Santa Cruz campus, circa 1970—took one more dose of pedagogical Prozac this spring. On February 23, the school's faculty senate voted 154-77 to make letter grades mandatory for all entering undergraduates beginning in fall 2001. The vote jettisoned the school's "pass/no-record" grading policy, evolved over 35 years, which gave students a "pass" for a course or conveniently expunged it from... More >>>