University of Michigan LSA to Adopt First-Semester Pass/No Credit Grading in Fall 2027
The University of Michigan's College of Literature, Science and the Arts (LSA) will replace letter grades with a pass/no credit system for first-semester students, a shift the university frames as a response to the ongoing mental health crisis among college-aged individuals. The LSA First-Semester Grade Covering Pilot Program, slated to begin in fall 2027, will automatically designate all first-semester grades as either passing or no credit on official transcripts, and these designations will not factor into GPA calculations. The university will retain internal records of first-semester grades for compliance, academic advising, potential academic awards and scholarships, and students' applications for internships, majors outside LSA, and other academic and professional opportunities. Beginning in their second semester, LSA students' grades will be recorded on transcripts and reflected in GPAs for all subsequent semesters they are enrolled at U-M.
LSA Dean Rosario Ceballo said the decision to drop the letter-grade system could address "alarming rates of stress, depression and anxiety among students" and deliver on the college's core promise as a liberal arts and sciences college. Timothy McKay, LSA associate dean for undergraduate education, said the program would provide LSA students with a "smooth on-ramp from high school into a rigorous college education and a chance to build early momentum." The university said in a notice that the pilot aims to help first-year students acclimate to college and foster a culture of connection and collaboration rather than competition. The grade-covering pilot is part of U-M's campus-wide Student Success Initiative, in which helping students establish early momentum is recognized as the most important element. LSA is working collaboratively with faculty and staff across campus to design the program.
The policy change followed a mental health study across 135 US colleges and universities published the previous year showing lower rates of depressive and anxiety symptoms and suicidal ideation. The 2024-2025 Healthy Minds Study reported that symptoms of severe depression among students dropped to 18 percent, down from 23 percent in 2022, and suicidal ideation fell to 11 percent, down from 15 percent over the same period.
The broader context here is a fractured national landscape on grading philosophy and academic preparedness. The University of Michigan's move places it among institutions moving toward structural accommodations for first-year students. According to the Wall Street Journal, several universities including the California Institute of Technology, Swarthmore College, Wellesley College, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are offering similar grade-covering initiatives.
Yet Michigan's approach diverges sharply from concurrent actions at peer institutions. In May, Harvard faculty voted to impose a roughly 20 percent cap on A grades in an effort to curb grade inflation. In June, math and science professors at the University of California called on regents to reinstate college-entrance exams, citing severe preparation deficits among students taking first-semester calculus at UC Berkeley. The University of California San Diego found that the percentage of students needing remedial math before taking precalculus increased to 8.5 percent in 2025 from 0.5 percent in 2020.
Under the College of LSA's existing pass/fail grading policy, a student may elect a course on an optional pass/fail basis, and neither 'Pass' nor 'Fail' grades enter into the GPA. Instructors are not notified of pass/fail elections and report grades as usual (A+ through E). For College of LSA students who have elected pass/fail grading, an unfinished Incomplete will lapse to ILF, which has no impact on GPA. The new pilot program extends a similar grade-covering mechanism to all first-semester students on an automatic basis, though it replaces the 'Fail' notation with 'No Credit' on the transcript. LSA's design process for the pilot remains collaborative and ongoing.
