Students will receive a 100% tuition refund for any undergraduate course dropped by the last day of class, April 10 with the exception of Faculty of Medicine students and Marine Institue (technical certificate and diploma) students. This includes courses that were paused as well as those that continued. Courses will be considered “dropped without academic prejudice.”

Graduate students are also protected from academic penalties and the School of Graduate Studies will be in contact with graduate students to outline the specific remedies aimed at reducing the impacts of the strike for them.

Students will receive a 100% tuition refund for any undergraduate course dropped by the last day of class, April 10 with the exception of Faculty of Medicine students and Marine Institute (technical certificate and diploma) students. Additional fees, including campus renewal, student services, students’ union, recreation and health insurance (if applicable), will not be refunded.

Students should reach out to individual instructors with concerns on timing of assessments and evaluations. The Academic remedies - Senate approved by Senate strongly encourages instructors to consider the due date and weighting of evaluative pieces (especially those weighted at 20% or more of the final grade) to provide appropriate review and preparation time for students.

Students are always encouraged to raise any concerns or issues with the instructor of the course in question. Students are also encouraged to contact their student union with questions or concerns. They can also contact a unit head, associate dean or dean, as appropriate.

This is permitted if, in the opinion of the course instructor and with the concurrence of the head of the academic unit, any component of a scheduled academic meeting time for a paused course, that was lost as a result of the disruption, is not able to be incorporated in the remaining teaching days and has sound grounds for needing to be rescheduled.

Such rescheduling will take place only after consultation with the students affected. No form of evaluative device should occur or be due during this rescheduled time. Students unable to attend such rescheduled meetings are entitled to reasonable alternative access to materials covered in their absence.

Pass/fail (or PAS/FAL) is a grading system that indicates only whether a student passed or failed a course and does not include a numeric grade. Students choosing this option will receive a “PAS” letter grade (or pass, indicating academic performance has met expectations) or a “FAL” letter grade (or fail, indicating failing performance) on their academic transcript in place of a numeric score or letter grade.

Non-numeric grades are not included in a student’s average or GPA calculation. A “PAS” grade will give students the assigned credit hours for successfully completing the course, while a “FAL” grade will give zero credit hours.

Final evaluations must be submitted to the Registrar with a letter grade or numeric grade as appropriate. An instructor, following discussion with a student or students, may change the method of evaluation to PAS (pass) - indicates performance meets expectations / FAL (fail) - indicates failing performance. This change in evaluation can be made on a per student basis and does not need to be applied to the entire class/section. Such decisions have significant impact on admissions (that use numeric grades), scholarship standing, graduate school admissions etc., and are encouraged to be made through discussion between student(s) and instructor.

If an instructor wishes to switch course grading for all students within their course/section from numeric grades to PAS/FAL, they should discuss this with their academic unit head to maintain consistency between sections of the same course, where possible and appropriate.

It can be to your advantage to choose pass/fail and take a pass or “PAS” if you have a lower passing term grade (e.g. a D grade, or 50-54%). For example, if your term grade is 53% and you choose pass/fail, the “PAS” grade would replace your “53” numerical score and would not be included in the calculation of your average and GPA.

In a typical semester, it could be to your advantage to take a “FAL” grade rather than a low numerical grade (e.g. 30%), which would negatively impact your term and cumulative average. Given the Winter 2023 extended deadline of April 10, 2023 for dropping a course without academic prejudice and with a full tuition refund, students in this situation could consider dropping the course. As outlined in 6.5.7.2. in the Calendar, Dropping Courses Without Academic Prejudice, courses dropped until the end of the second week will be removed from student's record. Courses dropped after week two will appear as a dropped course DR on the student’s record.

Before dropping a course, you are encouraged to seek advice from the Academic Advising Office to consider any potential impacts on student status, academic plans or long-term goals.

A PAS/FAL grade can have a significant impact if you’re competing for or maintaining a scholarship or have plans to apply for admission to graduate, professional or other competitive programs that rely on numeric scores, or if you are required to maintain a particular overall average to graduate in a Major, Minor or Honours program. If you’re in this situation and have a high numerical grade in your course, choosing the PAS/FAL option means your score will be replaced with “PAS” and won’t be included in your average or GPA calculation. For this reason, students with an “A” grade may not want to consider PAS/FAL.

For example, if you need a 60% average on the courses required for your major, taking a “PAS” grade would exclude that course from the calculation of your average and could result in your average not meeting the 60% threshold, despite completing required courses.

You may also want to consider the impact of a “PAS” grade if you are including transfer credits for courses completed at other institutions in your degree. As transfer credits do not have a numerical score and do not count in the calculation of your GPA, taking a “PAS” in a Memorial course would further reduce the number of courses used to calculate your average and GPA.

Students are advised to contact their department or faculty undergraduate advisor or the Academic Advising Office with additional questions about how a PAS/FAL grade may impact their academic plans.

General Academic Regulation (Undergraduate) 6.5.7.2 Dropping Courses Without Academic Prejudice and Graduate Studies General Regulation 4.3.4 Changes in Course Registrations have been amended for all students, and students are permitted to drop courses or to withdraw from the university without academic prejudice up to, and including, the last day of paused lectures in the winter 2023 semester (April 10, 2023) without required signatures and through Memorial Self Service. Students wishing to drop courses should first seek academic guidance.

All students have until Monday, April 10 to drop a course without academic prejudice. Undergraduate students who drop courses by April 10 will be provided a tuition refund for any courses dropped at that time with the exception of Faculty of Medicine students and Marine Institue (technical certificate and diploma) students. This is the result of decisions approved by both Senate and the Board of Regents and will provide flexibility to the end of the semester for students who wish to make changes.

Students wishing to withdraw from the university should first seek appropriate academic advice from within their department, school, faculty or campus.

While it is recognized that providing fulsome feedback to students relating to their academic performance is an important part of the journey to learning and informed decision-making, General Academic Regulation (Undergraduate) 6.7.6 Correction and Return of Student Work has been waived for those courses/sections in which learning was paused. Once instructors have determined appropriate revisions to the methods of evaluation, in consideration of the new condensed teaching timeframe, they should work to provide academic feedback to students as quickly as is appropriate. Courses that were not paused shall remain subject to regulation 6.7.6.

With classes resuming for all paused courses at Memorial University on Feb. 15, a number of measures have been put in place to mitigate the academic and financial impacts of the MUNFA strike.

More information can be found here.

The majority of courses at Memorial are taught by members of the Memorial University of Newfoundland Faculty Association (MUNFA). This union represents full-time faculty, librarians, counselling faculty members and co-operative and field education coordinators. It also includes contract faculty with teaching term or regular term appointments.   

Courses are also taught by members of the Lecturer’s Union of Memorial University of Newfoundland (LUMUN) Per Course Instructors. This union represents individuals who teach no more than two courses per semester. 

Newfoundland and Labrador Association of Public and Private Employees (NAPE) represents instructors, demonstrators, research scientists, and research and technical personnel at Marine Institute. 

Non-bargaining clinical faculty teach in the Faculty of Medicine’s undergraduate medical education and postgraduate medical education courses. 

With classes resuming for all paused courses at Memorial University tomorrow, Wednesday, Feb. 15, a number of measures have been put in place to mitigate the academic and financial impacts of the MUNFA strike.

More information can be found here.

For graduate students, PhD comprehensive exams and oral thesis defences, which normally require the participation of MUNFA members, were paused during job action. Dates will be rescheduled as soon as possible . 

No, students will not be penalized for any work not completed in courses taught by MUNFA members that were paused during the strike.

Students were not expected to continue with course work in paused courses taught by MUNFA members during the period of the strike.