By:  Chavez                                                       H.R. No. 501



R E S O L U T I O N
	WHEREAS, In a highly competitive employment market where an 
increasing number of job openings require a bachelor's degree or 
even an advanced degree, a college grade point average (GPA) can 
make a crucial difference when a student is vying for a high-paying 
job or seeking admission to a prestigious graduate school or 
postgraduate program, or simply when attempting to enroll in 
upper-division courses within an already chosen field of study, and 
earnest students who wish to improve or maintain a high GPA may need 
to retake one or more courses in hopes of attaining better grades; 
and
	WHEREAS, There is, however, no uniform statewide policy 
governing how institutions calculate overall GPAs in circumstances 
of course repetition, and some institutions use the higher grade in 
lieu of the lower grade, regardless of which grade the student 
earned first, while others use the later grade to replace the 
earlier grade, even if the later grade is lower than the earlier 
grade; and still other institutions include both grades, thus 
mathematically diluting the effect of any improvement in 
performance and reducing the incentive to work toward better 
scholastic results; and
	WHEREAS, By some of these policies, some institutions 
actually short-change students who wish to improve their academic 
records and, consequently, those students' prospects for later 
success; and
	WHEREAS, The lack of uniformity is particularly worthy of 
concern given the frequency of student transfers between Texas' 
state-funded institutions of post-secondary learning; and
	WHEREAS, With the impact of rulings by federal courts in the 
recent Hopwood case, and the continuing need to recruit and retain 
ethnic minority students in Texas' network of higher education 
campuses so as to more closely reflect the state's diverse 
demographics, any policy which has the direct or indirect effect of 
mathematically diluting a student's true and actual record of 
academic achievement is clearly inappropriate and should be 
revised; and
	WHEREAS, Because Texas residents' college education is 
largely subsidized by the state with some of the lowest tuition 
rates in the nation, it would be fair for the student to bear some of 
the financial costs of repeating a course in the form of a 
reasonable additional fee, but it is most important to create a 
uniform policy for calculating the grade point averages of students 
who repeat courses that is applicable to all students and that does 
not act as a disincentive for enhanced learning; and
	WHEREAS, Students who repeat courses are committed to their 
higher education and their academic achievement, and it is in the 
best interest of this state not to minimize their efforts; now, 
therefore, be it
	RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the 78th Texas 
Legislature hereby direct its Committee on Higher Education to 
conduct a study of the calculation of student grade point averages 
at public colleges and universities and of additional and modest 
fees that may be assessed on students who retake certain classes, as 
well as considering the most equitable manner of determining the 
number of credit hours to be accrued for repeating a particular 
course and whether a superceded grade should be expunged, or be 
retained, on the student's transcript; and, be it further
	RESOLVED, That the committee specifically study the effect on 
a student's GPA of repeating an undergraduate course, the various 
methods for determining which of the multiple grades earned for the 
same course is to be factored in the calculation of such 
averages--provided that the content of the course has not changed 
significantly since it was first undertaken--and the adoption of 
uniform policies applicable to all students at each institution; 
and, be it further
	RESOLVED, That the committee also study the feasibility and 
impact of allowing public colleges and universities to charge 
additional and modest fees for any courses that a student takes more 
than once; and, be it further
	RESOLVED, That the committee submit a full report, including 
findings and recommendations, to the Texas House of Representatives 
of the 79th Texas Legislature when it convenes in January 2005.