New Minimum GPA Requirements
for Journalism Majors

From: Carol Winkler, Chair
Department of Communication

Posted: March 2, 2006

Beginning in the Spring semester of 2003, all 3000 and 4000 level journalism courses will require students to have an overall GSU 2.5 grade point average (GPA) prior to enrollment (excluding Jour 3500). The GoSolar registration system will block access of all students that do not meet the minimum GPA requirement, either through normal registration or through overflows requests. Only one course, Journalism 3500 (Public Relations) will be exempt from the requirement, given that it serves multiple department’s programs throughout the university.

The student’s GPA will be the university’s calculation at the moment that the student attempts to register. The system will not round up the student’s GPA (e.g. students with a 2.49 GPA will need to raise their overall average to be eligible for upper level journalism courses).

We appreciate that this change may create hardships for students who have already begun to take their upper level journalism courses. To ease the transition as much as possible, we will implement the policy as follows:

Students with 18 or more semester hours in Journalism at the 3000/4000 level by the beginning of Spring 2003 will have the 2.5 minimum GPA requirement waived. Working with the University prior to Phase I registration, the department will remove all GPA holds for students who have already completed six or seven upper level courses and allow them to complete their remaining courses for the journalism major.

Students with 15 semester hours in Journalism at the 3000/4000 level will have the 2.5 minimum GPA requirement enforced and will be awarded a minor in journalism. Departmental requirements for a minor in journalism require 15 hours of upper level journalism coursework. If students wish to pursue the journalism major, they should take courses outside of journalism until their GPA improves to a 2.5 or higher. At that point, they will again be authorized to take journalism courses.

Students with fewer than 15 semester hours in Journalism at the 3000/4000 level will have the 2.5 minimum GPA requirement enforced and can count their courses for credit as upper level electives. If students wish to pursue the journalism major or minor, they should take courses outside of journalism until their GPA improves to a 2.5 or higher. At that point, they will again be authorized to take journalism courses.

We appreciate your patience as we work to implement the new system. It is our hope that with the new requirement in place, we will be able to more effectively serve the students in our program.